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According to The Wall Street Journal:
The European Union's antitrust regulator on Tuesday fined Alphabet Inc.'s Google a record €2.42 billion ($2.71 billion) for favoring its own comparison-shopping service in search results and ordered the search giant to apply the same methods to rivals as its own when displaying their services.
[...] If the ruling sets a precedent that holds, these firms might all have to rethink how they make products that—like Google's search engine—have become more than just tools, but dominant gateways to the wider internet.
From The New York Times:
While the fine will garner attention, the focus will most likely shift quickly to the changes that Google will have to make to comply with the antitrust decision, potentially leaving it vulnerable to regular monitoring of its closely guarded search algorithm.
CNBC adds that, based on a filing, Google expects to ultimately pay this fine.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 28 2017, @07:25PM (2 children)
commerce with least restriction (i.e. capitalist)
That's not Capitalism (the opposite of which is Socialism); both of those are methods of PRODUCTION with different ownership models.
What you are attempting to describe are MARKETS and regulation of those markets.
Markets are a part of -any- economic system.
While the inaccurate term "Crony Capitalism" is often used in this context, the (phony) term that is most often used is "The Free Market" (a Libertarian fantasy).
N.B. There is no such thing as a "Free Market"; markets are a construct of government.
Without a mechanism to set rules, enforce contracts, and settle disputes, what you have is The Law of the Jungle (the guy with the largest, most effective aggressor force comes out on top; see a history of Chicago in the 1920s or modern day Somalia).
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by cubancigar11 on Thursday June 29 2017, @03:03AM (1 child)
Thanks. I know that. I didn't mean what you understood. There is also a philosophy part, like a doctrine, that runs through the system. Western capitalist societies have as a rule made it easy to do business. This has got nothing to do with market. They have regulated and deregulated with explicit goal of enabling more transactions and involving more people, with the idea that greater good will follow. Nitty gritty details are different for each country etc., of course. But socialist societies look at greater good at all times without worrying about long term effects or how it will effect market economics. I was talking about that difference. Just as an example, USA bailed out its giant defaulters, while a country like Venezuela will simply nationalize that asset.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 29 2017, @04:44AM
Since you used the plural and indicated large groups of people, go ahead and name 2 such "societies" where ownership of the means of production by The Workers is a thing.
Keep in mind that when -you- "own" something, -you- get to make the decisions about that something.
The closest I can come is Yugoslavia from the 1950s into the 1980s, which had worker-owned workplaces--BUT they had a national dictator who could crush any decision made anywhere in the country.
As such, I reject your terminology.
Western capitalist societies [...] have regulated and deregulated with explicit goal of enabling more transactions and involving more people, with the idea that greater good will follow
...if you go back many many decades, to when that was a bit more true.
...and, oddly enough, those Liberal Democracies are often (incorrectly) called "socialist".
"Involving more people"? Today? In post-Reagan USA? Not so much.
Throw in post-Thatcher UK for good measure.
Economics professor Thomas Piketty in his 696-page analysis of Capitalism concludes that the Capitalist economic system leads to Oligarchy, with the rich buying up the gov't.
The amassing of more wealth than can be spent by the tiny number of individuals holding that wealth serves no logical economic purpose--and that is what Oligarchs do.
If that wealth was instead distributed among The Workers via wages that are proportional with their ever-increasing productivity, that wealth would be spent into the economy, making that stronger.
That's not what's happening and what's happening is the opposite of your claim.
Capitalism is simply another flawed/failed economic system through which we are passing on the way to egalitarian worldwide Socialism.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]