EVIDENCE: CORROBORATION OF EXPERTS "If you don’t call this a MONOPOLY, let me know the definition of monopoly…," says Ahmet Kirtok on Small Business Arena regarding Google-only AdWords policy. (on Monopoly/Anti-trust) "Investors are skeptical of betting on mostly unprofitable upstarts in a highly fragmented market, where Google has the power to control pricing and crush competitors," says Michael Binger, a portfolio manager at Gradient Investments LLC and Google shareholder. —FAIR SEARCH Michael Binger serves as senior portfolio manager for Gradient Investments, LLC, and has over 24 years of institutional equity investment experience. (on Monopoly/Anti-trust) "I do believe that Google's practices are worthy of discussion with competition authority, and we have certainly discussed them with competition authorities," said Ballmer of Microsoft. "I don't think their practices are getting less meritorious of discussion." —Steve Ballmer on The Verge (on Monopoly/Anti-trust) "The restrictions are such that online writers who need to earn a living must stick to stories about fluff and celebrities and anything that can have a happy face plastered over it," says writer Rupert Taylor on site.io. (on AdSense) "Google founders Brin and Page (1998, 18), who initially opposed the idea of paid advertisement on search engines, noted that it would seem reasonable to expect that advertising funded search engines will be inherently biased towards the advertisers and away from the needs of consumers… Since it is very difficult even for experts to evaluate search engines, search engine bias is particularly insidious…[and] less blatant bias are likely to be tolerated by the market." The study goes on to state: "Search engines have often been described as the 'gatekeepers of cyberspace,' and some critics note that this has significant implications for democracy. For example, Diaz (2008, 11) points out that if we believe in the principles of deliberative democracy—and especially if we believe that the Web is an open 'democratic' medium—then we should expect our search engines to disseminate a broad spectrum of information on any given topic. "Hinman (2005, 25) makes a similar point, when he notes that 'the flourishing of deliberative democracy is dependent on the free and undistorted access to information.' And because search engines are 'increasingly the principal gatekeepers of knowledge,' Hinman argues that 'we find ourselves moving in a philosophically dangerous position.'" —from Search Engines and Ethics from the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (on Philosophy/Ethics) "Officials from Orange and Santa Clara counties—both hit hard by overdose deaths, emergency room visits and escalating medical costs associated with prescription narcotics —contend the drug makers violated California laws against false advertising, unfair business practices and creating a public nuisance." —from LA Times, 22 May 2014 (on AdWords) "O'Connor founded FindTheBest in 2009 after selling his ad network, DoubleClick, to Google for $3.1 billion two years earlier. He was frustrated by the lack of easily available quality information when he searched Google for phrases like 'what's the best ski resort?' He wanted to build a site that would let people enter such queries and receive a trove of useful information that would help them make an informed decision about, say, where to spend that ski holiday. (O'Connor was disappointed when a search steered him to Deer Valley, Utah.)" ... "'The pattern we are seeing is that people find search systems that let them focus on their main interests or within specific online communities,' said Ray Larson, a professor at UC Berkeley's School of Information. 'I suspect that part of the reason that these niche search systems are springing up is that nobody can afford to compete with Google head-to-head, but for specialized markets they can get some traction.'" ... —The Chronicle with Bloomberg/SF Gate, 13 May 2014 (on Monopoly/Antitrust) "The would-be AdSense customer who filed suit against Google for fraud and misrepresentation says the search company also entered her Gmail account and removed all communications regarding the dispute, Google Watch has learned." —eWEEK, 2006-09-05 (on AdSense) Evidence: Additional Corroboration Links —compiled by Dr. S Louis Martin |
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