Wait, Google is actually facing consequences. Am I dreaming?
this post was submitted on 02 Jul 2026
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I farted a few minutes ago. Google knows this and was able to monetize the sale of that data. My flatulence paid that fine.
These are not consequences. This is zero-calorie consequences.
Not zero calorie. They made more off your data and that shitty fine was a small cost of doing business.
Fun fact: I haven’t farted in hours. The misdirect both proves my point and devalues their product. Hilarious blip in the data.
Also, excuse to increase Taco Bell intake.
Not really. They’ve made probably a few hundred billion from what they’ve done to be fined $5bil. Just a cost of business expense at this level.
And once again, Apple gets a pass for doing the same thing, only worse.
Apple don’t do anything remotely similar. Apple don’t let other manufacturers use iOS. What are you even talking about?
Right. Google gives away AOSP to any manufacturer. Apple doesn't let ANYONE else use their OS. Yet Google is the one who gets in trouble for being "restrictive".
I'm not upset that Google is getting called it for this, they are not innocent. I just want Apple to be held to the same standard.
AOSP has become unusable over the years because Google bundles more and more core functions with its proprietary Google Play Services.
Source: I've been around long enough to remember independent devs making versions such as Gingerbread or Marshmallow usable.
significant investment to ensure Android remains open.
Unless you want to install apps not from the google app store. Or develop apps not for the google app store. Or use a Captcha without having google services. Or use your bank website without google services. or use the internet without chrome. or... shit, sorry, I don't have time to list all the ways google wants the exact opposite of anything anywhere remaining "open" unless by "open" they mean "open to google's exploitation".
Using the internet without Chrome is basically the only thing you CAN do on Android out of this list.
...for now.
And google definitely doesn't like that. lol
Now lets use part of that money, to fund the development of open alternatives and interoperable protocols / standards. We cannot break a duopoly, if there aren't any alternatives, otherwise it will keep being a duopoly.
i can't stand microshaft, but at least windows phone was competition.
Get on with the times, it's microslop now.
4 billion can go a very long way.
Not in government it doesn’t.
Need another one now for all the removal of side loading, that is another big antitrust issue. Best make the fine actually worth something this time.
The EU can spin that into a serious concern about safety and "won't somebody please think of the children?"
about 0.11% of Google (Alphabet)'s total worth.
Total Worth doesn't matter. What matters is revenue and profit and that is the basis for the fine.
When it comes to something punitive like a fine, fine versus worth is literally the only thing that matters. If the fine isn't big enough, it's more like a fee for doing business. They just added to the bottom line and keep rolling.
I think worth and cash flow are too loosely correlated for that to work how youre intending. I'm all for punitive fines for corporate malfeasance, but if they're based on worth only, a company could easily become insolvent even from fines that aren't intended to be fatal to them.
If it is based off their cash flow instead and potentially distributed over a period of time, it can do multiple good things at once: force the company to literally pay for the harms it caused, damage their operations enough to financially discourage the behavior, and keep corporate behavior in line through examples without frequently disrupting markets by unduly bankrupting companies.
If a company does end up doing something so bad that it is unforgivable and irreparable, and it's deemed worthy of destroying them or punishing those responsible directly, I can see the reasoning for that, too. But, I think it would work best if the punishments are dialed in to have the desired result as often as possible. Allowing the possibility of offenders correcting course seems better for everyone while still allowing any victims to get justice.
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the price of doing business
The question is how much money did they make by using Android to block rivals. If using Android helped them make 1bn extra then this fine costs them 3bn and it doesn't make sense from them to keep doing it. If they made 100bn than obviously they will continue.
I mean, with it they've managed to build a walled garden that includes the majority of every phone in the world.
We can probably assume trillions.
It's all hypothetical. You can't know if any of the rivals had any chance at gaining significant share of the market. I was using Blackberry when it was still perfectly fine OS, supported by all the important apps (but before everything was an app) and I didn't know anyone else using it. I think that yes, the deals they made stopped most of the phone manufactures from offering alternative OSes like Geko OS or Lineage OS (before it was called like that) but we can only guess if any of them had any chance of becoming anything else than niche curiosity like Graphene OS today. So you can only really compare this fine with what they are doing now to block Graphene or AOSP. I don't know if this fine is big enough but I doubt they made trillions thanks to those practices.
pretty much. these fines are just cost of doing business. I'm sure they made MUCH more than the fine by doing what they did.
I was going to say "Finally, a fine with some substance!" but you took the wind out of my sails...
The fine is not the largest ever imposed on Google, however.
In October 2024 a charge was brought against the firm by a Russian court for restricting Russian state media channels on YouTube.
The fine was for two undecillion roubles - more than the world's total GDP.
Google's behavior in this debacle has been utterly shameful. They got caught with their dick in the pie and have spent 8 fucking years arguing that it was for the good of society.
While continuing to thrust harder.
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