Cutting Google accounts out of your life, however, is an entirely different undertaking that would take much longer and have a big impact on how you use the web.
I dont understand. I can browse the internet using a non-Google computer, use a non-Google browser, go to a non-Google website, use a non-Google programming language etc etc.
Nobody, including Google, is stopping you from doing that.
Note, this is different from actual monopoly of railways (I have to use Central Pacific Railroad) or ISP (My city only has Comcast) or electricity (If I want electricity, I have to use PG&E).
The barometer is whether there's meaningful alternative. Can I do X without the $company in question = not a monopoly.
No, they're saying their is an alternative, but it comes at a huge disadvantage. Perhaps not for individual users, as a DDG and Firefox user I'm quite content, but it's definitely an overwhelming disparity for website admins. Even if that admin is not literally in Google Analytics to view their site data (and they probably are), they're still looking at an overwhelming majority of organic traffic coming from Google Search using Google Chrome. And for site publishers and advertisers, Google AdSense or Google Ad[Word]s are enormous.
In 1870, if you wanted to get from Chicago to San Francisco, it would be facetious to claim that Union Pacific did not have a monopoly on that route. No, Union Pacific wasn't forcing you to board their train. Just like you can Ctrl+T over to duckduckgo.com/ or bing.com/ or kagi.com/ in seconds, and never go back to Google. You could avoid the railroad monopoly by 'just' riding a horse, or walking, or taking a boat down the Mississippi and launching a sailing expedition around Cape Horn. That's still a monopoly.
That’s a horrible argument. The difference between riding a horse and riding a train is multiple orders of magnitude. The difference between using an alternate search engine is minimum and the experience is often
better than Google.
And if your entire business strategy is to have a website and depend on Google search results to drive traffic, you are doing it wrong as many news organizations like Buzzfeed found out.
I do occasional self promotion and “thought leadership” bullshit to put my name out there. I go to where the eyeballs are - LinkedIn. It’s far more likely that the people I want to reach are on LinkedIn than my blog that I don’t have a link to anywhere. I just use it as a publicly accessible place to workshop my writing and thoughts before I post them to LinkedIn.
And I will play the world’s smallest fiddle for advertisers even then, if you have a product to sale to consumers, you are probably better off using Amazon or a Meta app to advertised. It’s better targeting and ads are less likely to be blocked.
Is coca cola then a monopoly on soft drinks? I would say obviously yes.
This is the situation the current internet and applications are in. They only service users who utilize Google in some type of way, for the majority of apps.
Its deceptive to say "well it's just that one bank". No, that one bank is an example. That's not the breadth of it, and we both know that.
If I understand correctly, manifest v3 is like what Safari implemented a decade ago and it’s perfectly possible to block Google analytics with Safari content blockers.
How is your argument that you can’t avoid Google supported by the argument that with manifest v3 you can’t block Google analytics even though you can?
In the US, iOS has 60% market share and installing an ad blocker is a matter of going to the App Store and installing it and then enabling in settings. They all walk you through the process. It’s the same on the Mac with the Mac App Store.
And you can change your search engine. If you have evidence that someone Google has quantum computers that allows it decrypt encrypted traffic, I’m sure people would like to know.
But no one has been proposing that Google not be allowed to have underseas cables
You don’t think that’s going deep down the rabbit hole to show that Google is a monopoly to say that it owns a few of the under seas pipes? How much of an American’s traffic do you think goes over Google’s pipelines?
And the other half all put a giant pop-up asking me to sign into Google. I've not yet figured out how to block it, if anyone knows I would love to hear it.
Whether a company has a business relationship with a company you dont like, doesnt make the same argument you're making.
It is like saying, I dont like Coca Cola but when I go to McDonald's to eat food, they only serve Coca Cola. Hence, Coca Cola is.. bad? McDonald's is free to chose any business partner they like, and you insisting that McDonald's shouldnt use Coca Cola sounds silly.
I did this and it's been great. Still use Google search because it's by far the best but I was using DDG for a while. It's not that difficult to de-Google.
I could completely cut Google out of my personal life with no ill effect. I can either use Apple’s iWork or Microsoft’s Office 365, I use ChatGPT as my default search engine now because Google has gotten so bad. I don’t use YouTube regularly except once a year to watch AWS Reinvent videos.
I use Safari on my Mac because Chrome is worse on battery life and doesn’t integrate as well with the rest of my digital life. I use Gmail. But at the end of the day, it’s just another one of my emails.
