Yahoo Wants To Buy Chrome (theverge.com)
- Reference: 0177137667
- News link: https://tech.slashdot.org/story/25/04/25/1354237/yahoo-wants-to-buy-chrome
- Source link: https://www.theverge.com/policy/655975/yahoo-search-web-browser-prototype-google-trial-antitrust-chrome
> The information came out during the fourth day of the Justice Department's remedies trial to rectify Google's search monopoly. The DOJ has -- among other proposals -- requested Judge Amit Mehta break up Google by requiring it sell its Chrome browser, which the agency says is a key distribution channel for its popular search engine that's amassed too much power for anyone else to compete. Yahoo isn't the only company interested in buying Chrome. While DuckDuckGo's CEO said they wouldn't be able to afford it, witnesses from Perplexity and OpenAI both expressed interest in the popular browser on the stand this week.
Yahoo obviously isn't worth Chrome's estimated price tag of tens of billions of dollars. So the company is saying that its owner, the hedge fund giant Apollo, will help bankroll the purchase should the opportunity present itself.
[1] https://www.theverge.com/policy/655975/yahoo-search-web-browser-prototype-google-trial-antitrust-chrome
Yahoo are still around? (Score:3)
I thought they'd vanished with AOL, Geocities, MySpace etc a decade or more ago.
Re: (Score:2)
Verizon bought AOL and Yahoo, which only made things worse.
Chrome will become as great as Altavista ! (Score:3)
Yahoo also bought Altavista.
You haven't heard of Altavista ?
Exactly.
Re: (Score:2)
Um... what if I have heard of Altavista (and actually used it)... I guess that makes me too old to deal with this modern (enshitified) world. Of course, Altavista was a pioneer in enshitification so it might be appropriate if its current owner purchases Chrome and does the same.
Re: (Score:2)
Webcrawler was big back in those early days too.
Re: (Score:1)
Verizon are thieves, when Verizon bought Tracfone they stole over 100 dollars in cellular data from me,
Dont sell Chrome (Score:2)
The court should make google donate chrome to the Linux Foundation or the Open Source Initiative, [eg] an a not for profit corporation that advocates FOSS and human rights & equality, then the spyware & telemetry code can be removed and hopefully a better & more secure browser will be developed out of it
Re: Dont sell Chrome (Score:2)
You mean like brave?
Re: (Score:2)
No! Not like Brave [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brave_(web_browser)#Controversies
Re: (Score:2)
Why? What is the public interest of doing this? And by public interest, I do not mean your personal interest.
And what reason would we have to believe that an organization of your choice would remove code you don't like or that they would be capable of making a "better and more secure browser"? Your post is pure dogma.
Re: (Score:2)
Chrome going from one for-profit advertising company to another for-profit advertising company is not doing the âoepublic interestâ any good either
Re: (Score:2)
> Chrome going from one for-profit advertising company to another for-profit advertising company is not doing the âoepublic interestâ any good either
"Public interest" has become a codeword in the modern age. It now means, "most profitable outcome." FOSS would not immediately lead to profits for someone, so is no longer in the public interest.
Public Interest (Score:2)
I can see a strong case being made for there to be a public reference browser. That doesn't mean Chrome should be it, but I can see the case.
Having a well-maintained reference implementation that doesn't favor particular owners or markets doesn't do all the work, but it is a big part of the strategy of a lot of long-lived, well-behaved internet protocols.
Even more advertising (Score:2)
Google is already twisting the thumb screws and trying to salami-tactic more and more advertising and less ad-blocking into Chrome, but under yahoo this would definitely be a whole new dimension of hurt.
apple needs to be forced to sell safari or allow a (Score:2)
apple needs to be forced to sell safari or allow any web browser (full) on ios.
Re: (Score:2)
Other browsers ought to be allowed on the platform, but I really think it would be a bad idea to force them to sell. The ONLY way to make money off an independent browser will be via advertising. Apple doesn't need that revenue stream (their way to make money is to at least pretend to be better than the others at privacy - making money indirectly by giving people a reason to stick with their hardware). It's nice that at least one browser has a non-advertising reason to be funded.
Re: (Score:2)
No thanks. I'm happy with Safari and I don't want to be forced to use other crap on my Macs and iPhones. I value my privacy, battery life and cross-device integration. Opening up Apple systems like this isn't in the interests of me as a user but rather in the interests of those who want my data and to monetise it, which is precisely what I'm trying to escape from with Apple.
Re: (Score:2)
Nobody is forcing you to. But you should have the choice of using Firefox if you want to (and Mozilla wants to release Firefox for iOS of course). And I am not talking about a Safari skin labeled as Firefox, but a real browser not using the Safari engine at all.
If Safari is so good anyways, Apple shouldn't have to fear competition, isn't it?
What? (Score:2)
Yahoo exists?
Re: (Score:2)
I knew it exists and from what I heard is yahoo is very popular in Japan. My question is "Yahoo has the funds to buy chrome ?".
I would think the price for chrome would be far more than what yahoo could afford.
APRIL FOOLS!!! (Score:1)
> Yahoo wants to buy Chrome...
Yeah and I want to buy a $250,000 motorhome like Clarence Thomas was bought for.
I also want a $100,000/head dinner where people who want my favor pay to by my $EHUD cryptocurrency.
I also want peace in the world.
I want children to respect their elders.
I want elders to listen to what the children want.
I want red lights to change to green quickly.
I also want Ayrton and Michael to rejoin us and race against each other. Alain can commentate but Jolyon should provide the color!!
B
Too much focus on the browser (Score:2)
What really needs to be divested is the Android OS and its associated apps, web store, etc.
I have a better idea (Score:3)
Why doesn't Perplexity buy Chrome? See the previous article.
Re:I have a better idea (Score:4, Insightful)
If Chrome goes up for sale, there'll be a bidding process. Whoever gets it will pay most, and they who pay most will want to get their money back and more.
So it will be a privacy, standards and all other kinds of rape, which we haven't seen even in the worst days of the Internet explorer. It will die, but it will be an epic tale of evil and enshittification.
Re: I have a better idea (Score:4, Insightful)
It will be the end of chrome as a product. Granted, smart people moved off that shit years ago.
Chromium (Score:2)
Not sure I care much about Chrome, but what happens to the open-source upstream browser, Chromium? Will the buyer continue to maintain and release it?
I guess there's always Firefox/derivatives.
Re: (Score:2)
But what will happen then? Firefox has been dying for years and I can't see Mozilla turning it around, or anyone else adopting it. Safari is crap and nobody wants to tie themselves to Apple's mast. Everything else is based on Chrome.
Browsers require a lot of investment to develop, which is one of the reasons that Mozilla is failing with Firefox. There are not many other companies that can throw enough resources at it. Even Microsoft gave up and just adopted Chrome.
Re: (Score:2)
Disagree that Safari is shit. I've been using it exclusively on laptop and mobile for more than a decade, after deciding I couldn't take any more of Chrome's shitness. That was even before I decided I didn't like Google's privacy stance.
There are more reasons that Mozilla is failing with Firefox. The wrong people running the show and developing it are probably bigger factors. I stopped using it when they couldn't get their shit together about a process per tab, even when every other major browser was al
Re: (Score:2)
Safari is shit because of vendor lock-in. When there are multiple alternatives that works on all platforms (such as Chrome, Firefox, most browsers), it is foolish to chose the only one which works only on products made by a single vendor.
You should be avoiding Apple products to begin with, but if you aren't, at least you should be using as little Apple software/services as possible (not use Apple mail, iCloud, etc.). Safari is likely one of the easiest Apple software to avoid.
Re: (Score:2)
I use Firefox and the sad thing is that it's actually a pretty good browser on desktop.
The two big issues at the moment are that quite a few sites break with it because they were only tested with Chrome and derivatives, and that the Android version is still quite weak. Now to be fair the Android version does finally seem to be getting to a decent state. Some stuff is still painful like tab management, but for the most part it's usable, compatibility issues aside.