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The EU told them they can not by default prefer their own maps product when linking from their search product, they have to allow the user to choose. They coul

The EU told them they can not by default prefer their own maps product when linking from their search product, they have to allow the user to choose. They could have simply added a selector when a user first clicks on the maps preview in the search result, and then remembered it on device or across that user's account. But of course, then the user could choose a competitor's product and Google would have to honor it. That would be horrible, so instead they just made the user experience worse for everyone and elegantly made people blame the EU.

nolok 2mo ago
It's malicious compliance with the intent of having the users misunderstand what's happening (that you don't have to do that but do it on purpose, and instead blame the law protecting them). And eh, it works for the cookie banner so why change the strategy ? The comment you're answering to prove it still works. As long as people can't be bothered to think and inform themselves for a second about it, they won't stop. Same with the purposefully annoying and unclear and user hostile 'gdpr popup' about third party consent. I'm not saying I agree with it. I'm saying from Google POV that's the correct move given their intent, the issue then become people like parent.
- darkwater 2mo ago
  Yes, but by the time you are sued and fined into compliance again, you already made a ton of money to pay 10x the next fine.
  - nolok 2mo ago
    Yes and no, it's true now but the EU fines are not just "you did that" but "you did that we're going to assume you're going to be better and if you do again next time it will really hurt". Which I think is a fair point of view. You might still answer too little to late, but given that we're at the starting point to a massive sovereignty push here thanks to the current US admin being proved as a possibility rather than a novelty, I think this matters a lot.
- maccard 2mo ago
  Well no, the cookie banner is a well intentioned but flawed and poorly designed law. Any law that is that technically specific but relies on people without an understanding of how it works is doomed to repeat the same fate. The eu should have seen prop 65 and not sleepwalked back into it.
  - tchalla 2mo ago
    There a reason why we have courts. Laws aren’t algorithms despite what the tech world wet dream might want them to be.
  - nolok 2mo ago
    1. The EU works on intent of the law rather than specific wording and precedence. 2. The law is a very simple "if you want to do it, you have to make sure they know", intended to force information without creating excessive administrative / legal / tech burden, please inform me about what other way you would present it that would reach the goal without being subject to malicious compliance ?
    - maccard 2mo ago
      I understand. I'm generally a proponent of the spirit of the law rather than the wording of the law, and I've argued that is how the EU works here in the past. I think GDPR is a much, much better attempt at solving the problem, and has made meaningful change in tech industries. The ePrivacy directive just added pseudo-mandatory popups to every company without a technical lawyer.
      - spwa4 2mo ago
        Why? The whole point of the GPDR was to prevent medical information being used for insurance and all sorts of purposes. Then come the lists of what exceptions are approved. Your medical info is used for divorces (anything involving court cases, anything involving criminal law), the police has access to it, your mayor has access to it, tax departments have access to it (think you can not pay tax and pay for your kid's cancer treatment instead? In Europe, think again). Insurance (if you get treatment for getting hurt in traffic your car insurance goes up). Unemployment (if you get treated for anything drug-related ...). Hospitals and doctors can use your medical information without your permission (for billing, for other treatments, for deciding if you should be interned, ...). And so on and so forth. Oh and there are even silent exceptions. You see, YOU can't sue anyone under the GPDR. You can only ask a specific "supervisory authority" (you can't even choose which one) They are under control of the executive, and so it is in most cases the currently elected party that decides if your GPDR complaint does anything, NOT the courts. Not the police. Not the public prosecutor. None of that. And it's even closed on the back end: you don't agree with these "supervisory authority"'s actions? Doesn't matter if you're complainant or defendant. You can't sue them either. You can't get a judge on your case, only appointed politicians. There are even organizations that the GPDR supposedly applies to that have their own supervisory authority. Interpol violated your rights? No worries, file your complaint here in this building. You know, the building with "Interpol" on it in big letters. So really, we do not even know the full list of exceptions. More generally, the GPDR was supposed to prevent further encroachment of all sorts of organizations on privacy, with a big focus on medical data. It has achieved the opposite of that. FOR NOW (and not in every country) the only way to get a private medical file is to only use private medical care. For now that is still possible. It's like the DMA (Digital Markets Act). Prevents organizations from using control of the OS to implement policy. There's a few exceptions though. Google gets an exception. Apple gets an exception. Through specific deals made with these organizations and the EU commissioner of Nobody seems to have thought to scream into the commissions face: "THEN WHAT'S THE POINT?". Well, who made those deals? Thierry Breton. He currently serves as a remunerated member of Bank of America’s Global Advisory Council (who have huge investments in Alphabet and Apple). Yeah, I get why you want to focus on the intent only and not on what practically happened. Theory and practice are very, very different and the EU is incredibly pro-business and uses their power to literally grant billionaires exceptions to laws. That's how Goldman Sachs got it's first communist president (Barosso, who saved Goldman Sachs as president of the EU commission). That's reality, but of course the intent is thoroughly disguised, and you don't want to talk about the difference.
esterna 2mo ago
I wonder if the EU will someday figure out a patch for this "Deteriorate everyone's user experience in a way that is technically compliant and blame the EU" behavioural exploit...
- brador 2mo ago
  The corrective force should be market competition, but Google is a monopoly not a monopoly with so many moats it might as well be a monopoly. They also buy up the competition before it gets a chance as is the way now.
  - esterna 2mo ago
    Why should be? I think it is abundantly clear by now that market competition alone will not fix this. Though that does not stop people from claiming "Yes that failed and people suffered/died, but that was not real capitalism! If only we had a real free market, it would have been better!"
- nolok 2mo ago
  It's fine + obligation to fix, and daily fine until fixed, and higher fine if you do it again. I know that sounds like it comes from "it will never work", but that's how active directory, office file format, etc ... got opened, and in a case more similar to here that's how windows n and decoupling of media and internet component from windows internals happened. The issue is, yes, it takes time. Another issue, purely PR, is that yes the EU gets attacked repeatedly by people trying to match "respect the law of the market or leave" with "the EU tax US companies because they can't compete".
  - BrenBarn 2mo ago
    > It's fine + obligation to fix, and daily fine until fixed, and higher fine if you do it again. The important proviso is that the penalties need to (on some non-geological timescale) get high enough that the offender is no longer capable of operating. That could mean the fines reach $500 billion, or it could mean the company is barred from operating in the EU, or it could mean people get arrested and assets are seized. But unless the penalties become crippling, it won't matter. It needs to reach a point where the downsides of noncompliance are actually greater than the benefits.
Hamuko 2mo ago
Google really sucks at giving users a choice. The Gmail app on iOS has a browser selector dialog, which asks if you want to open a link in an email in Chrome or Safari. Despite the fact that you can change your default browser in iOS settings if you really want to use Chrome. And even if you choose Safari and don’t ask it to remind you every time, it will still prompt you again later if you’d like to switch to Chrome this time. Couldn’t I just pick Safari and you respect that choice until I say otherwise? I do wonder if people using Chrome on iOS face the same issue, or if Google respects your browser of choice a bit more if it’s their browser.
patrickmcnamara 2mo ago
They could also just have their maps and others show in the results as normal.
- brainwad 2mo ago
  That would suck, though? Showing places on a map makes so much more sense than burying them in a list of webpages.
brainwad 2mo ago
The specific problem with Maps is that Google _can't_ deep link to other providers except by lat-lng or address, both of which throw away the actual context of the PoI in the common case of searching for PoIs. Well, it could perhaps deep-link to OSM-based maps, since their map data is open... but Google, as a proprietary map maker, probably treats OSM data as radioactive.
- bmordue 2mo ago
  They could make available a URI using the geo: scheme, but the hacky ways of including a POI as part of a geo: URI (ie using a query string) feel generally unsatisfactory.
bko 2mo ago
Google measures latency at microseconds.100 ms ≈ 0.2% fewer searches. Google tracks this very closely and invests a lot as that's the operational life blood of the company. You can make more money by simply making search easier. To save "it's easy" and Google chooses to nuke their own products for... I don't know what, stick it the European regulators, strikes me as incorrect. It's because it's incredibly hard to navigate this arbitrary punative regulatory framework. No one would use the other maps because other maps are worse. As much as euro regulators hem and haw about lack of competition, it's precisely these types of dictats that make Europe not have any viable competitors in tech.
- piyuv 2mo ago
  Google also makes money by making search worse. https://www.wheresyoured.at/the-men-who-killed-google/ https://www.wheresyoured.at/the-men-who-killed-google/
  - bko 2mo ago
    [flagged]
    - KronisLV 2mo ago
      I often hate how loaded/incendiary Ed Zitron's tone is and don't like some of his takes, but I wouldn't call it "some random blog". I run a random blog, that guy's closer to being a proper journalist: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ed_Zitron https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ed_Zitron
      - bko 2mo ago
        Referencing a blog is fine. But when you're on a forum discussing ideas just forwarding a blog link is bad taste. Summarize the key arguments. Do some work. It's like if someone is arguing free markets and I just provide a link to a WSJ editorial. It's rude, requires no work on the sender and imposes work on the receiver to read and synthesize and respond to the argument. I see this occasionally where someone will just have an LLM generate a response (which it will happily do for any topic taking any position) and just passing it off.
HeavyStorm 2mo ago
~don't~ be evil
chrisjj 2mo ago
Probably every Google team has an enshittification expert.

nolok 2mo ago

It's malicious compliance with the intent of having the users misunderstand what's happening (that you don't have to do that but do it on purpose, and instead blame the law protecting them). And eh, it works for the cookie banner so why change the strategy ? The comment you're answering to prove it still works. As long as people can't be bothered to think and inform themselves for a second about it, they won't stop. Same with the purposefully annoying and unclear and user hostile 'gdpr popup' about third party consent. I'm not saying I agree with it. I'm saying from Google POV that's the correct move given their intent, the issue then become people like parent.

darkwater 2mo ago
Yes, but by the time you are sued and fined into compliance again, you already made a ton of money to pay 10x the next fine.
- nolok 2mo ago
  Yes and no, it's true now but the EU fines are not just "you did that" but "you did that we're going to assume you're going to be better and if you do again next time it will really hurt". Which I think is a fair point of view. You might still answer too little to late, but given that we're at the starting point to a massive sovereignty push here thanks to the current US admin being proved as a possibility rather than a novelty, I think this matters a lot.
maccard 2mo ago
Well no, the cookie banner is a well intentioned but flawed and poorly designed law. Any law that is that technically specific but relies on people without an understanding of how it works is doomed to repeat the same fate. The eu should have seen prop 65 and not sleepwalked back into it.
- tchalla 2mo ago
  There a reason why we have courts. Laws aren’t algorithms despite what the tech world wet dream might want them to be.
- nolok 2mo ago
  1. The EU works on intent of the law rather than specific wording and precedence. 2. The law is a very simple "if you want to do it, you have to make sure they know", intended to force information without creating excessive administrative / legal / tech burden, please inform me about what other way you would present it that would reach the goal without being subject to malicious compliance ?
  - maccard 2mo ago
    I understand. I'm generally a proponent of the spirit of the law rather than the wording of the law, and I've argued that is how the EU works here in the past. I think GDPR is a much, much better attempt at solving the problem, and has made meaningful change in tech industries. The ePrivacy directive just added pseudo-mandatory popups to every company without a technical lawyer.
    - spwa4 2mo ago
      Why? The whole point of the GPDR was to prevent medical information being used for insurance and all sorts of purposes. Then come the lists of what exceptions are approved. Your medical info is used for divorces (anything involving court cases, anything involving criminal law), the police has access to it, your mayor has access to it, tax departments have access to it (think you can not pay tax and pay for your kid's cancer treatment instead? In Europe, think again). Insurance (if you get treatment for getting hurt in traffic your car insurance goes up). Unemployment (if you get treated for anything drug-related ...). Hospitals and doctors can use your medical information without your permission (for billing, for other treatments, for deciding if you should be interned, ...). And so on and so forth. Oh and there are even silent exceptions. You see, YOU can't sue anyone under the GPDR. You can only ask a specific "supervisory authority" (you can't even choose which one) They are under control of the executive, and so it is in most cases the currently elected party that decides if your GPDR complaint does anything, NOT the courts. Not the police. Not the public prosecutor. None of that. And it's even closed on the back end: you don't agree with these "supervisory authority"'s actions? Doesn't matter if you're complainant or defendant. You can't sue them either. You can't get a judge on your case, only appointed politicians. There are even organizations that the GPDR supposedly applies to that have their own supervisory authority. Interpol violated your rights? No worries, file your complaint here in this building. You know, the building with "Interpol" on it in big letters. So really, we do not even know the full list of exceptions. More generally, the GPDR was supposed to prevent further encroachment of all sorts of organizations on privacy, with a big focus on medical data. It has achieved the opposite of that. FOR NOW (and not in every country) the only way to get a private medical file is to only use private medical care. For now that is still possible. It's like the DMA (Digital Markets Act). Prevents organizations from using control of the OS to implement policy. There's a few exceptions though. Google gets an exception. Apple gets an exception. Through specific deals made with these organizations and the EU commissioner of Nobody seems to have thought to scream into the commissions face: "THEN WHAT'S THE POINT?". Well, who made those deals? Thierry Breton. He currently serves as a remunerated member of Bank of America’s Global Advisory Council (who have huge investments in Alphabet and Apple). Yeah, I get why you want to focus on the intent only and not on what practically happened. Theory and practice are very, very different and the EU is incredibly pro-business and uses their power to literally grant billionaires exceptions to laws. That's how Goldman Sachs got it's first communist president (Barosso, who saved Goldman Sachs as president of the EU commission). That's reality, but of course the intent is thoroughly disguised, and you don't want to talk about the difference.

esterna 2mo ago

I wonder if the EU will someday figure out a patch for this "Deteriorate everyone's user experience in a way that is technically compliant and blame the EU" behavioural exploit...

brador 2mo ago
The corrective force should be market competition, but Google is a monopoly not a monopoly with so many moats it might as well be a monopoly. They also buy up the competition before it gets a chance as is the way now.
- esterna 2mo ago
  Why should be? I think it is abundantly clear by now that market competition alone will not fix this. Though that does not stop people from claiming "Yes that failed and people suffered/died, but that was not real capitalism! If only we had a real free market, it would have been better!"
nolok 2mo ago
It's fine + obligation to fix, and daily fine until fixed, and higher fine if you do it again. I know that sounds like it comes from "it will never work", but that's how active directory, office file format, etc ... got opened, and in a case more similar to here that's how windows n and decoupling of media and internet component from windows internals happened. The issue is, yes, it takes time. Another issue, purely PR, is that yes the EU gets attacked repeatedly by people trying to match "respect the law of the market or leave" with "the EU tax US companies because they can't compete".
- BrenBarn 2mo ago
  > It's fine + obligation to fix, and daily fine until fixed, and higher fine if you do it again. The important proviso is that the penalties need to (on some non-geological timescale) get high enough that the offender is no longer capable of operating. That could mean the fines reach $500 billion, or it could mean the company is barred from operating in the EU, or it could mean people get arrested and assets are seized. But unless the penalties become crippling, it won't matter. It needs to reach a point where the downsides of noncompliance are actually greater than the benefits.

Hamuko 2mo ago

Google really sucks at giving users a choice. The Gmail app on iOS has a browser selector dialog, which asks if you want to open a link in an email in Chrome or Safari. Despite the fact that you can change your default browser in iOS settings if you really want to use Chrome. And even if you choose Safari and don’t ask it to remind you every time, it will still prompt you again later if you’d like to switch to Chrome this time. Couldn’t I just pick Safari and you respect that choice until I say otherwise? I do wonder if people using Chrome on iOS face the same issue, or if Google respects your browser of choice a bit more if it’s their browser.

patrickmcnamara 2mo ago

They could also just have their maps and others show in the results as normal.

brainwad 2mo ago
That would suck, though? Showing places on a map makes so much more sense than burying them in a list of webpages.

brainwad 2mo ago

The specific problem with Maps is that Google _can't_ deep link to other providers except by lat-lng or address, both of which throw away the actual context of the PoI in the common case of searching for PoIs. Well, it could perhaps deep-link to OSM-based maps, since their map data is open... but Google, as a proprietary map maker, probably treats OSM data as radioactive.

bmordue 2mo ago
They could make available a URI using the geo: scheme, but the hacky ways of including a POI as part of a geo: URI (ie using a query string) feel generally unsatisfactory.

bko 2mo ago

Google measures latency at microseconds.100 ms ≈ 0.2% fewer searches. Google tracks this very closely and invests a lot as that's the operational life blood of the company. You can make more money by simply making search easier. To save "it's easy" and Google chooses to nuke their own products for... I don't know what, stick it the European regulators, strikes me as incorrect. It's because it's incredibly hard to navigate this arbitrary punative regulatory framework. No one would use the other maps because other maps are worse. As much as euro regulators hem and haw about lack of competition, it's precisely these types of dictats that make Europe not have any viable competitors in tech.

piyuv 2mo ago
Google also makes money by making search worse. https://www.wheresyoured.at/the-men-who-killed-google/ https://www.wheresyoured.at/the-men-who-killed-google/
- bko 2mo ago
  [flagged]
  - KronisLV 2mo ago
    I often hate how loaded/incendiary Ed Zitron's tone is and don't like some of his takes, but I wouldn't call it "some random blog". I run a random blog, that guy's closer to being a proper journalist: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ed_Zitron https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ed_Zitron
    - bko 2mo ago
      Referencing a blog is fine. But when you're on a forum discussing ideas just forwarding a blog link is bad taste. Summarize the key arguments. Do some work. It's like if someone is arguing free markets and I just provide a link to a WSJ editorial. It's rude, requires no work on the sender and imposes work on the receiver to read and synthesize and respond to the argument. I see this occasionally where someone will just have an LLM generate a response (which it will happily do for any topic taking any position) and just passing it off.

HeavyStorm 2mo ago

~don't~ be evil

chrisjj 2mo ago

Probably every Google team has an enshittification expert.