Google head disputes that company thwarts rivals

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   Stacie Lposted 12 years ago

   WASHINGTON (AP)  Google Inc. Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt told a Senate panel Wednesday that the company faces tough competition and isn't using its dominance in Internet search to stifle competitors.
   Schmidt is testifying at a hearing examining whether Google is abusing its power to thwart competition by placing links to its own content and services at the top of search results to the disadvantage of its rivals' links.
   Schmidt told lawmakers that the Internet search giant won't make the same mistakes as Microsoft Corp., which was curbed by the government several years ago when it was deemed to be exercising monopoly power.
   read the whole article here
   http://news.yahoo.com/google-head-dispu … 54335.html
   looks like many others are thinking that same thing...

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      Stacie Lposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      I guess people are hesitant to anger the Gods...
      The senate is taking this seriously enough ...they are looking into antitrust issues..

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   jcmayer777posted 12 years ago

   IMO, we all need to hope Google beats this.  Skewing results to show their ads and working to give advertisers what is by far the most productive and well-known means to advertise online is what makes us our money.
   
   People get pi$$ed about the big G and their control over the internet, but without them, we'll all make A LOT less.  Guaranteed.

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      Randy Godwinposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      So, as along as they make US money whatever THEY do is okay?   
      
      
      
      Grew Scoogle!  I hope they are investigated much further! 

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   wampyriiposted 12 years ago

   "Do no evil". Google hasn't followed that mantra since they got shareholders.
   
   The most telling thing for me was when Schmidt was asked whether their algorithm was unbiased and he said something along the lines of "I believe so"... The lack of a definite answer here from the chairman means either he doesn't know (which is scary) or he's leaving himself some deniability over some of the less savory stuff incorporated into Panda.
   
   Google claims to care about providing information and being the best search engine yet the next time you do a search on Google, just take a look at some of the results they pop up. I'm not talking about relevancy, just the CONTENT of the results page itself.
   
   For example, I searched earlier for something and my 'above the fold' results were:
   
   -- 8 adwords ads - 3 at the top, 5 on the right, some with images which really stand out on a plain search page which has to attract lots of paid clicks.
   
   -- 10 "related searches" links to 'brands' and 'stores' search results which are all top brand companies of their choosing like Walmart, Sears - fair to the rest of us? These are honestly useless and basically look like just another chance to shove adwords ads in your face in a new set of search results if you missed them the first time.
   
   -- an amazon result (as usual) at the top of the REAL search results, followed by...
   
   -- 3 google shopping results - which link through to yet another google property!
   
   ...and the rest was below the fold, or out of the prime real estate area.
   
   Its amazing anything gets clicked in the 'organic' results at all!
   
   If my own website was that stuffed with ads above the fold the search quality team would have marked it to be dinged as a piece of spammy garbage.
   
   Google has become an advertising network which just happens to provide a search engine. Sad but true and the only real alternative is Bing which I guess has been losing billions for Microsoft every quarter.
   
   Sad.

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      Randy Godwinposted 12 years agoin reply to this

      This! 

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   NerdyWerdsposted 12 years ago

   I personally am a huge Google fan boy, but as of late I've kind of been a bit annoyed with them. Like Wampryii said, they are stuffing their search results with ads and plugs for their own products. When I had an Adsense account, I noticed the majority of my ads were for their own Adwords trials, for which I apparently did not get paid on clicks. I love Google, but I hope they get back to overall relevance in their search, and not just plugging anything Google.

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