[Imnimo]

If some some search engineer at Google has decided to move Rumble down in the search rankings, then sue away. But what if it's just that Google's algorithm, designed by someone who's never even heard of Rumble, just doesn't like the Rumble site as much as other sites? If that by itself constitutes a violation, it seems impossible to make a non-violating search engine. Like how could you possibly ensure that for every possible search, the "correct" results appear first?

Google does its fair share of shitty things with search and ads, but I'm kind of skeptical that this is one of them.

[Cthulhu_]

> But what if it's just that Google's algorithm, designed by someone who's never even heard of Rumble, just doesn't like the Rumble site as much as other sites?

See, that's been Google's defense in most of these cases; they (claim to) defer EVERYTHING to "the algorithm", a magic, top secret, unknowable and ineffable deity that calls the shots, so that Google themselves can deny culpability when it comes to anti-trust cases like this. They insist HARD on minimizing human intervention in search results and rankings, because if they allow it, they become more liable.

[simonh]

And.... so what? Yes that is the case. Is it a problem, and if so why?

The manual indexes were explicitly editorialised and pushed their own services, and that was ok. Google is just an index service, if you don't like it's results go elsewhere.

[dimitrios1]

If your algorithm is designed perfectly, without the need for human intervention, and it proceeds to do shitty things, you are still responsible for said shitty things.

[kevincox]

Imagine that search results were picked by humans, and the particular human that answered these queries had no idea that Google owned YouTube and just thought that YouTube was a better result. It isn't necessarily the best result and Google is responsible for it, but it doesn't strike me as anti-competitive or any sort of legal issue.

If Google tweaks the algorithm (or tells their human rankers) to prefer Google properties then it is an abuse of power and something that I think is morally wrong.

[cromka]

if (result.origin == (select origin from origins having max(count) and type == result.type)) priority+=10; else priority-=10;

Not manual, so OK. Right?

[simonh]

What’s wrong with manual? Also if I set up a service like that, what would be illegal about it? Nobody would use it, but that’s fine too.

[mdoms]

> Like how could you possibly ensure that for every possible search, the "correct" results appear first?

You align the incentives by breaking up Google. They have no business promoting their other revenue streams in their own search results.

[colejohnson66]

So a company isn’t allowed to advertise its other products?

[torben-friis]

More like, a company that is in the business of offering you information should not alter that information based on personal interest.

You wouldn't expect a map created by a company to hide streets where rival businesses are located for example, or your doctor to avoid disclosing a potential treatment because it's done by a rival health provider.

Funnily enough, I remember this being one of the differentiating factors that made people love google when they were starting to become popular - "our ads are unintrusive and clearly separated from actual content".

[pornel]

At tech giant's scale, I'd say yes. YouTube gets the level of promotion and integration with Google services that money can't buy.

Google and Microsoft use their successful products to promote and keep competition out for other products.

Microsoft got slapped for Internet Explorer, but somehow Google gets away with shoving Chrome and the Android certification program which is basically "you either bundle all our other products, or we'll make you incompatible with Play Services".

[mdoms]

On the same platform where they sell ads to competing products? No.