Kick Google all you like, Mozilla tells US government, so long we keep getting our Google-bucks
- Reference: 1603267334
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2020/10/21/mozilla_position_on_us_vs_google/
- Source link:
Mozilla has weighed in on two fronts, firstly as an organisation that likes an open web.
“Like millions of everyday internet users, we share concerns about how Big Tech’s growing power can deter innovation and reduce consumer choice,” [2]wrote chief legal officer Amy Keating, before getting to the hear of the matter: Mozilla has a deal to funnel search traffic to Google and the resulting royalties represent over 90 percent of the Mozilla revenue.
Mozilla's second position is as an organisation that has a [3]recently renewed deal to send search traffic to Google that is thought to see around $400m a year flow from the ad giant to the browser contender. That's around 90 percent of Mozilla's income.
Which is where things get complex, because as Keating noted: “In this new lawsuit, the DOJ referenced Google’s search agreement with Mozilla as one example of Google’s monopolization of the search engine market in the United States.”
So what’s a not-for-profit to do when it worries about Big Tech, but is also utterly dependent on it for revenue?
Keating has recommended the USA kick Google as hard as it wants, so long as Mozilla still gets paid by ... someone.
“Small and independent companies such as Mozilla thrive by innovating, disrupting and providing users with industry leading features and services in areas like search,” she wrote. “The ultimate outcomes of an antitrust lawsuit should not cause collateral damage to the very organizations – like Mozilla – best positioned to drive competition and protect the interests of consumers on the web.”
“Unintended harm to smaller innovators from enforcement actions will be detrimental to the system as a whole, without any meaningful benefit to consumers — and is not how anyone will fix Big Tech," she added, before concluding: “remedies must look at the ecosystem in its entirety, and allow the flourishing of competition and choice to benefit consumers.”
But the US action is against Google the ad giant, not Google the browser-maker. It is unclear exactly how Mozilla – which funnels plenty of ad-carrying search traffic to Google – represents a bulwark against Google's dominance. Indeed, Mozilla only survives by helping to sustain Google.
Advising lawmakers to beware the law of unintended consequences, and to preserve both public and private interests, is nothing out of the ordinary. Doing so while advocating a position that would preserve revenue is quite the contortion, and not a pretty one. ®
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[1] https://www.theregister.com/2020/10/20/us_google_antitrust/
[2] https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2020/10/20/mozilla-reaction-to-u-s-v-google/
[3] https://www.theregister.com/2020/08/14/mozilla_google_search/
[4] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
I was wondering how this would affect Mozilla and what their position would be. We now have the answer.
Note that Mozilla switched the default to Yahoo in 2014. Then they switched back to Google in 2017, amid lawsuits between Mozilla and Yahoo [1]reported on this excellent website . One particular detail is interesting:
Also of interest is a section explaining that when Mozilla went to market for a search partner in 2014, it considered Yahoo! a very risky proposition and sought special protections in its contract.
This seems to imply that Mozilla does not only use Google because it's paying well, but also because they consider it more reliable.
[1] https://www.theregister.com/2017/12/06/mozilla_yahoo_search_dispute/
I know modern web browsers are very complex beasts, but does it really cost $400m a year to employ the necessary staff to develop Firefox?
Well, they've got to pay someone to remove all those features.
It does if your overheads include enough lawyers to require the post of Chief Legal Officer.
Reality
I guess that means really that Mozilla is 'owned' by Google. It could certainly be construed that way from a financial point of view.
"I guess that means really that Mozilla is 'owned' by Google"
Almost everything on and related to the web is effectively owned by Google, Amazon or Facebook now. They're the gateways, brokers and service providers to almost all content, so nobody can argue with them. This is the monopoly of monopolies and it's unlikely there's any way back.
Money doesn't shout - it screams.
Strangely when my PC updated Firefox to 82.0 this week it changed my default search engine to become Yahoo, not Google. And I had to change it back to Startpage. That could just a Linux Mint issue though I haven't booted into my Windows 10 partition to see what happens there.