Comment by pjc50
6 days ago
The problem is this:
- the browser is undeniably critical as everyone's window through which they view the online world;
- the user gains a huge amount of value by a browser being integrated into the OS, webviews in other applications, etc
- browsers aren't really a self funding product
- having a single for-profit US advertising company control everyone's view of the online world, however slightly (e.g. by obstructing adblockers), is Not Good
Splitting it off solves the latter problem but immediately raises the question of how to pay for it. A very artificial arrangement where Google pay "arms length browserco" to maintain Chrome?
You raise some very important points.
Specifically, this one:
I feel the same. I also feel the same about a modern C library and C compiler (and C++, if you like). They are essential to build any modern system and applications. Yet, those are also (mostly) no longer self-funding products.
What do you think will happen if Google is forced to divest Chrome?
Netscape used to cost the equivalent of $100 inflation-adjusted dollars and was only forced to go free to compete with Internet Explorer. Now the genie can't be put back in the bottle, and anyone trying to sell you a browser would become irrelevant the same way Delphi's paid compiler lost out to free C compilers.
Maybe you could carve out a niche that's willing to pay, the same way C# did before dotnet core. But for a mass product the best-case scenario would be something similar to today's Opera.
However what it would do is open up the market to competition. Right now Google is spending a lot on Chrome development and Chrome advertisement. Opera and Edge both have given up on their own engines because they couldn't keep pace with Chrome development, and Firefox kept its engine but can't compete with Chrome's ad spend. If Chrome had to compete on a more even playing field there would be more room for diversity and competition. That could be a net positive, even if it makes Chrome worse.
Windows is a paid-for product; either enterprise licenses or via the manufacturer. Yet few people (mainly those who build PCs themselves) realise this.
What if the browser had a similar model? The manufacturer pays a certain 'browser development fee' into escrow, then on first boot, the copmuter shows a browser ballot, which gets set as the default, and the fee goes to the chosen browser developer? There's probably a bunch of problems with this approach, and, at least initially, wouldn't break the monoculture, but it might be a good starting point for how to fund browser development.
There was never a time that you as individual couldn’t use an ftp client back in the day and download a free version of Netscape.
So who would buy “Chrome” when they can get Chromium for free and fork it?
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> What do you think will happen if Google is forced to divest Chrome?
The new Chrome company will struggle for a year or two then Apple will try to buy it but lose out after Oracle submits a higher bid.
Oracle Chrome would remain free at first, but one year down the road all new versions would become free for home use but $50 per seat yearly for commercial use, with a clause that allows Oracle to enter your offices to audit your compliance at any time
If the choice is no internet, forever, or giving Oracle money, I'm gonna live in 1990 from here on out.
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>The new Chrome company will struggle for a year or two then Apple will try to buy it but lose out after Oracle submits a higher bid.
We're in the worst timeline, so I could see that happening.
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Oracle Chrome, Ha! I wouldn't even be surprised if that's exactly how it plays out.
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Did you know that Oracle used to have its own web browser PowerBrowser? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oracle_PowerBrowser
This sounds surprisingly likely.
Firefox has made Mozilla billions over its lifetime by selling the default search engine rights to Yahoo and Google. Chrome, having a much greater user base, would demand a correspondingly higher fee (probably around $10b a year). Now, the other problem is there is no other search engine to compete with Google at that level, but that might change with independence of Chrome.
Google's payment to be the default search engine was ruled anti-competitive though.
https://fortune.com/2024/08/05/mozilla-firefox-biggest-poten...
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Browsers can be profitable, see Opera: https://investor.opera.com/news-releases/news-release-detail...
But not everything must be for-profit. Free/Libre/Open Source Software is a prime example. Projects like GNU, Linux, GNOME, KDE, WebKitGTK, LibreOffice are sustainable for a long time.
I guess its easy to be a profitable company when you're getting into predatory payday loans! https://www.cnet.com/tech/mobile/opera-defends-its-android-a...
Every browser also gets a significant amount of money from Google. Mozilla is profitable too. But when Google is forced to stop paying browsers to use their search, it'll put Apple and Microsoft at an even wider advantage since they're the ones that can afford to push their own browsers at a loss...
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Opera is not a browser at this point but a chrome skin. Yes, there is some engineering still going on, but they don't run as much engineering as would be needed to build world-class browser software.
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> They are essential to build any modern system and applications. Yet, those are also (mostly) no longer self-funding products.
so, an utility.
create a (partially?) state-owned steward with a legislated mandate to develop the browser, self-funded via extra tax on digital goods and services.
Currently, talented engineers flock to google to contribute their skills to making the best web browser. My concern for a publicly owned utility is that the top talent won't want to work there.
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The way governments fuck up basically anything (with very few exceptions) IT related I would say no. Personal example: my name is Marcello and I had troubles applying for a permit online because names can't contain musical instruments (Cello in this case).
Create a consortium or interested private entities but let's not give such an important piece of technology to governments where meritocracy is non-existent (also based on personal experiences).
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You really trust the government to fund a browser without content interference?
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Any potential buyer will have to be looking to use Chrome to accomplish the same kinds of synergies that Google is using it for, to get ahead in some adjacent market. Depending on the buyer that could be good for competition, at least in the short term, but it's not clear that it will be better for us as users.
Hypothetically, why would some buyer using Chrome's monopoly to establish a market advantage in an adjacent domain be different than Google using Chrome's monopoly to establish a market advantage in an adjacent domain?
Because the relationship between Google and Chrome goes both ways. Chrome helps Google keep their monopoly on search and ads, and Google helps Chrome keep its monopoly via Android and its other products.
After the separation, Google won’t have an incentive to promote Chrome - so it’ll lose market share eventually, and Chrome won’t have an incentive to require things like Google accounts or use Google search by default - opening space for other companies to compete.
How does splitting off Chrome as a separate company solve anything? They would still rely on Google for funding (like Mozilla) and being close friends they would do whatever Alphabet tells them to do.
A better solution is to implement a bill like DMA in the EU to enforce competition among web browser vendors and fight monopolies.
> A better solution is to implement a bill
Not that I disagree with the overall point, but this is something the DOJ does not do. They would just look at the current laws and decide who to prosecute based on their interpretation of events.
Unless you own a Chromebook, if you have Chrome on your computer, you made a choice to download it. How would a browser choice screen help?
It's less about PC and more about Android, where Chrome is preinstalled.
Probably it would forbid "Download Chrome" on Google and "Download Edge" on Bing.
But now Bing would have a chance of becoming the default search engine of the most used browser in the world.
That's the difference.
Bing is already the default search engine on the default browser of the most used OS in the world.
If they're not competing well, then that's entirely their fault. Microsoft is not at any kind of disadvantage here.
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Look at the effects of breaking up the bells into smaller companies....
Which of the bells provided a valuable free product that could only be funded via other product revenue streams?
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Frankly, who cares. The important part is that google doesn't own a browser.
Is the justice department then going to stop Google from using the open source Chromium project to create a new browser?
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Yes, in the sense that me putting a gun to your head and ordering you to stay still isn't the same as me handcuffing you, because you can still physically move.
> A very artificial arrangement where Google pay "arms length browserco" to maintain [a browser]?
Sounds almost like Firefox.
Google to Mozilla: "I'm gonna pay you 400M a year for antitrust to fuck off"
Seems like it didn't work though.
Firefox lost too much market share. And while some of that is due to bad leadership at Mozilla, Chrome running big advertising campaigns and Google advertising Chrome on their own properties (hints to download Chrome on Google Search, Drive, etc. when you visit with other browsers) were also a big driver. Google flew too close to the sun.
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Maybe it needed to be a cool billion.
It worked until they decided to unfairly compete with Firefox and get all the market share.
The issue is who controls Chromium. I would create a non profit and staff it with a handful of maintainers. Their primary job would be to ensure safety and squash exploits. Their other job is to curate and approve pull requests from volunteers for enhancements. They should make it open source with the caveat if it is used for commercial purposes, there will be a licensing fee to pay for security enhancements, bug bounties, and the like.
Whoever contributes to it controls Chromium.
If 90% of the contributors were non-Google, then it would effectively be controlled by non-Google, because they could fork it and their fork would still get 90% of development.
See Terraform for a live example.
The only reason Google "controls" Chromium is because Google funds almost, but not quite, 100% of its development.
On a similar note, there's nothing stopping Microsoft from investing equal or greater amounts and forking Chromium (well, arguably they might already have with Edge). Except that they're benefiting from all of Google's investment, for free. Why turn down a massive developer investment from your competitor with no strings attached?
Because all the “owners” who approve commits are all Googlers?
So more or less what Mozilla was supposed to be all along?
Yes.
Do you think Google will continue to invest money and resources into the development of Chromium if they were forced to sell Chrome? I don't. The first thing I would do is close source the Chromium project and work on a new closed source browser to compete with Chrome. I also don't see Chrome surviving when all of the Google/Chromium developers have left.
I beg to differ. Google will go where the users are; their ad business depends on it.
They could sell a lot of the data that Google now gets for free and uses for its ranking algorithms, like Clickstream sells data to SEO tools like AHrefs and SemRush.
Google doesn't use Chrome data for Ads or Search. They're not allowed to based on the TOS, and also they have government regulators watching carefully to make sure they don't make a mistake like that.
A data leak from earlier this year suggested that they do, although there is no definitive proof.
https://www.theverge.com/2024/5/31/24167119/google-search-al...
The regulators in question are pushing for divestiture of Chrome because they don’t believe that the current structure prevents using Chrome data, so it seems that Google did “make a mistake like that”.
And what legal enforcement of the TOS is there? None. And what are the consequences of Google ignoring their own TOS? None.
We have actual Google documentation leaked that proves you wrong and that they absolutely do use Chrome data for ads. Catch up please.
Sort of sounds like you are one step short of suggesting a browser is critical infrastructure.
I’m consistently fascinated to look at Chrome/Google and think of all the things we lost when we broke IE/Microsoft.
To what extent and I holding a stupid belief, and why? I think I might like to be talked out of this, if reasonable. Want to try?
> browsers aren't really a self funding product
They are, see how both Safari and Firefox, the 2nd and 3rd most popular browsers, have brought in tens of billions of revenue per year. Safari is immensely profitable, Firefox too would be if Mozilla wouldn't be run in an absurdly poor manner.
> the user gains a huge amount of value by a browser being integrated into the OS, webviews in other applications, etc
What is the huge value gain that e.g. Safari being integrated into MacOS is bringing me? Why couldn't webviews be backed by a browser of my choice?
Mozilla literally gets paid by Google, and not sure how you can quantify Safari as being profitable on its own when it's the default for all Apple products and realistically, the only browser on iOS.
Apple also literally gets paid by Google for the same thing, but a lot more money.
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> Safari is immensely profitable
The exact way Safari itself is immensely profitable is under scruity in this exact DOJ case!
This DOJ case isn't looking to ban payments for default search engines in browsers. It is very unlikely that this entire practice will be outlawed/stopped as a result of this DOJ case.
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In what way is Safari profitable? How is that even measured? Has any consumer in the last 10 years ever specifically paid for safari? Or do you mean the payments by google to be the default search engine?
If Safari didn't exist, Google wouldn't be paying Apple ~$20-Billion a year to default Safari's search to Google
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Please provide proof that Firefox has "brought in tens of billions of revenue per year".
I meant the combination of both, it was indeed unclear.
hundreds of millions per year, perhaps approaching ten billion lifetime, is more accurate
> browsers aren't really a self funding product
Yeah... Because massive companies use them anti-competitively as a moat against other companies, and as a loss leader to enable massive data collection and vendor lock in.
"browsers aren't really a self funding product" is a symptom of dysfunction, not the inevitable conclusion of a fair market.
I'm not sure that software entirely obeys normal market theory. So much of it is zero-cost free.
The synergistic effects are so strong that most users would prefer there to be The System, in which everything works together and there's no risk of incompatible choices. They don't necessarily care which system.
The market in things like, say, file explorers is tiny. There's a few shell replacements (free), Midnight Commander and clones, and maybe over in the corner someone making a few thousand dollars a year from an Explorer replacement.
Well, things with open source alternatives tend to fare badly when sold.
Like Jira vs Mantis?
There are probably plenty of such examples.
Firefox has made a mountain of money off of their tiny market share. Chrome as a company would instantly rake in billions.
From making Google the default search engine…
And probably even more if they made Google the only option, assuming it was otherwise perfect for most users.
Browsers should be developed by an intercountry nonprofit. Funded by all the countries' governments.
You might have missed recent news about Linux maintainers being kicked off for reasons having nothing to do with Linux. This will not work across "political borders" because psychologically we're all still cavemen in need of a tribe to stick to, and a group of "them" to hate on.
> psychologically we're all still cavemen in need of a tribe to stick to, and a group of "them" to hate on.
I'm not sure this is fundamentally true, but regardless of whether it is or not, our political systems have followed an historical path of development such that it behooves political leaders to think like this, and encourage their followers to.
That is your assumption.
We can't even get the world's governments to agree on what basic human rights are.
It works out so well for the UN!
You can have country-specific nonprofits that cooperate; you can have consumer-rights nonprofits or free-speech nonprofits cooperating...
The best thing about open source is that cooperating on it is very easy.
That is your assumption.
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Profit is, by definition, inefficiency.
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Why is efficiency the guiding metric of our decision making?
In what way? Google seems like the perfect example of profit obscuring inefficiency.
Only in a highly competitive environment.
But the browser market is not currently highly competitive.
>browsers aren't really a self funding product
You can use Firefox 3, programs don't rot.
Not really true...
In this specific case I'd be willing to bet that Firefox 3 probably doesn't handle current HTTPS/TLS standards and might not be able to browser the modern Internet at all (let alone display modern webpages, HTML5 video players, single-page web apps, WebRTC live calls, etc.)
Firefox 3.5 was actually the first browser to support HTML5 video and audio. In general for old browsers TLS is the main issue. Most websites that don't rely on JavaScript or newer CSS still render well enough or "fail gracefully" but are still readable.
>HTTPS/TLS
Put it behind privoxy. All those SPA blogs exist solely due to google. No google - no SPA.
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