[whimsicalism]

Google creates and implements its own privacy solution in its browser. Once released, other advertisers are behind and no longer have access to their tracking -> Google dominates the market because it delivers better ROI for advertisers because it knows how to track on Chrome because it built the privacy solution.

[fumar]

> while giving its own ad teams inside details & time to adapt to the new paradigm

I've worked in ad tech my entire career and many years competing against Google ad solutions. To my knowledge, Google strictly separates Chrome privacy efforts from Google Ads, and these work streams are part of the Consumer Markets Authority oversight. https://www.gov.uk/cma-cases/investigation-into-googles-priv...

I highlight these nuances for readers who are not closely tracking ads and privacy efforts. It is easy to make claims like "giving its own ads teams inside details" without proof, but in ad tech we know Chrome is working with multiple testing companies. Some of us happen to work in ads, but we also believe in greater consumer privacy and are eager for an improved ads paradigm.

[whimsicalism]

i think it's worth noting that the 'CMA oversight' is the result of an investigation being initiated against Google for these exact anti-competitive practices and that Google has been forced to change their process by the CMA as a result of that investigation.

I don't think you work for Google or are a sock, but it is clear from your comment history that you are extremely supportive of Google and a considerable proportion of your comments on HN writ large are just defending Google across multiple different threads/issues.

[fumar]

My comment history probably makes it clear where I work (maybe years back) and it is not Google. I see my recent comments are reactively supporting specific Google products. I don’t have a strong stance for them at entity level and if anything I ding them for killing some of my favorite web tools. I earnestly believe that ad tech is fighting to maintain user level tracking with limited transparency, look at the efforts by LiveRamp and The Trade Desk. Those are overt efforts to use emails as currency where consumers would have limited control for relevant ads. I am surprised Google truly would eliminate 3p cookies in chrome and mobile IDs on android when both platforms benefited in ads revenue post Apple ATT and ITP. I support the privacy sandbox principles as an ad tech person and a regular consumer. I caveat that if new information comes to light regarding their intentions then I would change my mind.

I was fairly pro Apple until they half attempted to provide ads solutions in the wake of App tracking transparency and I realized their gain was on App Store ads revenue. Amazon wishes they had a browser but their stores and hardware provide sufficient ads signals. Meta has plenty of ads scandals over the years. It’s a messy landscape but only a few organizations are developing ad tech and consumer privacy solutions in the open.

[itopaloglu83]

Although I understand the sentiment of the Google’s ability to create better ad products in this area, I’m very consumer focused on the topic of privacy, and I want further restrictions and even incredible fines on ad companies that are focused on eliminating personal privacy rights.

That being said, I personally think that the Chrome team might be choosing solutions that better suits other Google products instead of ease of implementation and security/privacy in mind.

[ehhthing]

The Topics API doesn't seem to have any abuse opportunity since it's entirely enforced by the browser itself. There's nothing the JavaScript API can do that could give Google an advantage here given as far as I know there's only a single function that can be called in the first place.

I think more research would need to be conducted to see whether this change is actually anti-competitive or not.