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'Google misled publishers and advertisers for years about the pricing and processes of its ad auctions, creating secret programs that deflated sales for some companies while increasing prices for buyers, according to a lawsuit by state attorneys general.' https://t.co/mZ2obtG9n3
— Jesse Felder (@jessefelder) January 14, 2022
Clear explanation of exactly how Google deceived advertisers and publishers to win ad markets they didn't already control.
— Rand Fishkin (@randfish) January 15, 2022
No amount of private sector action can fix this, only govts can: https://t.co/ptxutPPFHN
It’s so funny how every single high-profile application of the august body of knowledge known as ‘auction theory’ is corruption https://t.co/qWbAtUAp9y
— Marshall Steinbaum ? (@Econ_Marshall) January 15, 2022
At some point billion dollars fines stopped making sense and executives should start facing jail time https://t.co/vL6SSqsbmy
— Alex Barredo ? (@somospostpc) January 14, 2022
Some of the shadiest stuff Google ever pulled, at the expense of journalism and democracy https://t.co/9iPZj8a4x2 pic.twitter.com/3sqsNVvbqQ
— Casey Newton (@CaseyNewton) January 14, 2022
to be clear, bid-rigging like this is a Section 1 Sherman Act violation that carries criminal penalties, including up to 10 years prison.
— Jesse Lehrich (@JesseLehrich) January 14, 2022
cc @TheJusticeDept. https://t.co/u1w1qa9AuK
The digital ad market is murky; Google owns the dominant tools at every link of the chain; rivals complain it tilts the market in its own favor.
— Tripp Mickle (@trippmickle) January 14, 2022
Newly unredacted material in Texas' complaint aims to show how Google does exactly that
w/ @keachhagey https://t.co/Cc4n1khIya
…the inside story of how Google rigged adtech auctions while the adtech industry found itself robbed blind…until the criminal concentration of market power in the dicey dirty world of digital advertising simply became too much to bear… https://t.co/ko03kN86Op
— David Carroll (@profcarroll) January 14, 2022
Tech: Trust us we are good, also we have no comment to anything and you can’t talk to that person you want to
— alex (@alex) January 14, 2022
Also Tech: https://t.co/RmLqu6oUq3
If you want to understand the antitrust case against Google's advertising empire, join me for a dive into the wonkiest—but also juiciest!—details revealed in the newly unredacted complaint: https://t.co/eQ6bAX2DaK
— Gilad Edelman (@GiladEdelman) January 14, 2022
I’ll wait until the mostly unsealed third complaint is public so I can screenshot it but WSJ is out in the meantime. The kicker juxtaposes a Google employee quote next to an anonymous Google spokesperson. ps why does a Google get deception anonymity? 1/2 https://t.co/NfyZ8oFGID
— Jason Kint (@jason_kint) January 14, 2022
facebook gets all the attention but google is gonna go through some stuff with these antitrust lawsuits
— Karl Bode (@KarlBode) January 14, 2022
still amazed the revelations they paid wireless carriers billions not to compete in the app space barely warranted a few headlines https://t.co/Yvg3zoEg6X
I’m continually impressed by the timing of people who sow a bunch of seeds and then call in rich & retire before the chickens come home to roost.
— Dare Obasanjo (@Carnage4Life) January 14, 2022
Tech billionaires like Larry,
Sergey & Chamath are the true black belts of this lifestyle. https://t.co/rk1F7dzAAT
"Meanwhile, Google pocketed the difference between what it told publishers and advertisers that an ad cost and used the pool of money to manipulate future auctions to expand its digital monopoly, the newly unredacted complaint alleges."
— Ben Hunt (@EpsilonTheory) January 14, 2022
Don't Be Evil. LOLhttps://t.co/aJwcbi0OZG
1) Google built an ad empire based on dishonest and corrupt practices;
— Christopher Bedford (@CBedfordDC) January 14, 2022
2) Used it to destroy the in-house advertising of newspapers and other media;
And 3) Turned the spigot off to those sites that ran afoul of its liberalism.
Google is an evil company.https://t.co/FkpDYwlpZZ
?hmmmmmm a secret agreement to divide up the ad tech market between google & facebook? feels remarkably like .. oh what's the phrase... something a cartel would do https://t.co/5frMkPtwes via @politico
— Sacha Haworth (@sachalouise) January 14, 2022
This is a great example of why I tend to steer clients away from Google PPC ads. Aside from frankly being a waste of time for small businesses, if you can't even trust Google's internal algorithm, why bother? https://t.co/IuD4uAvVub
— Michael Carusi (@MichaelCarusi) January 14, 2022
One of the great jokes of the 21st century is that Google started out with "Don't be Evil" as their corporate motto, before removing it once their stock valuation reached a certain threshold. https://t.co/k30hjsRGuy
— Nathan McDermott (@natemcdermott) January 14, 2022
The difference between what Google employees said internally according to unredacted docs, and what spokespeople are now saying, is, how shall we say it...stark. https://t.co/BZRpSMWLm6
— Matt Rosoff (@MattRosoff) January 14, 2022
Like the Facebook Files, but for Google. Now we just need a whistleblower to step forward.https://t.co/K27CRw0gO1
— Mark Hurst (@markhurst) January 14, 2022
BREAK IT UPhttps://t.co/i4KMtSPScc pic.twitter.com/htG49fa23k
— Dan Froomkin/PressWatchers.org (@froomkin) January 14, 2022
WSJ reporting on various Google auction manipulations. I've read this part ten times and don't get it. I *think* what they mean is that the 1st price bid was ignored and instead the 2nd would win but without any reduction. https://t.co/hIRNAbkRsH pic.twitter.com/eXQoOLxFQa
— Ari Paparo Dot Eth (@aripap) January 14, 2022
A newly unredacted complaint alleges that Google pocketed the difference between what it told publishers and advertisers that an ad cost and used the pool of money to manipulate future auctions to expand its digital monopoly https://t.co/xhkv1Pj87u via @WSJ
— Glenn Kessler (@GlennKesslerWP) January 14, 2022
Google would see when it’s own systems had both the first- and second-best bids and then would pay the publisher as if the second bid didn’t exist, but charge the advertiser as if it did. Wow. https://t.co/ZRaEVGJF9K
— Ari Paparo Dot Eth (@aripap) January 14, 2022
If you care about tech platforms and their role in the world and in markets, this story (and the others written about it) are must read. This is criminal behavior, a house of cards. https://t.co/Hr6oP23Dti
— Justin Hendrix (@justinhendrix) January 15, 2022
Can’t be evil > don’t be evil https://t.co/JUL9FnkFPe
— cdixon.eth (@cdixon) January 14, 2022
Leah did a nice thread here explaining one of programs in states’ antitrust v google. It’s always been the most complex of the cases and this helps explain it to a larger audience. Great work, combined with the chart the problem is apparent. Press, please dig in on all of this. https://t.co/GPkgcQ1Dqt
— Jason Kint (@jason_kint) January 15, 2022
WSJ continues to deliver the goods on the state AG lawsuit against Google -- here, with unredacted details that are very revealing. From @trippmickle & @keachhagey https://t.co/zlBVw8cQvg
— Amol Sharma (@asharma) January 14, 2022
According to Texas, Google told everyone that its online ad auctions were second-price auctions. But in reality, it was using third-price auctions and then pocketing the difference.
— Leah AntiTrustButVer1fy Nylen ? (@leah_nylen) January 14, 2022
Oomph.
— Jason Kint (@jason_kint) January 14, 2022
A deal, now a section one allegation which can be filed as criminal, with full knowledge of Facebook's COO (Sheryl Sandberg signed it), Facebook's CEO, Google's SVP and Google's CEO. Sandberg has had quite a week, see last night's thread below. https://t.co/6Vmrws0MVD pic.twitter.com/t5WTKbf1Tu
The extra $9 between the two bids, Google put into a “pool” that it would use to secretly raise the bids by advertisers using its tools to ensure they would always win out over advertisers using non-Google tools. pic.twitter.com/gE5O8Yvvbv
— Leah AntiTrustButVer1fy Nylen ? (@leah_nylen) January 14, 2022
A couple times a month something called the Google News Initiative emails to brag about how they donated like $20 to a fact-checking startup and in the future I will just respond with a link to this story and a ?
— Casey Newton (@CaseyNewton) January 14, 2022
Also good. By the way, interesting to see Scott Spencer’s name in lede. He was also the exec who went out to industry to help them deal with Adblock Plus while at the same time Google Inc was secretly paying AdBlock Plus in order to whitelist billion$ in Google’s own ads. Yup. https://t.co/ZoJUoB03k4
— Jason Kint (@jason_kint) January 15, 2022
Wow. When @akbarpour_ and I wrote about how auctioneers can bend the rules of an auction, this kind of behavior was exactly what we had in mind. ? https://t.co/BGaby7SgHy
— Shengwu Li (@ShengwuLi) January 14, 2022
I don’t like seeing corruption in the world, except when it’s exactly what @ShengwuLi and I predicted some years ago in our Econometrica paper on credible auctions. https://t.co/VtIH3UmttA https://t.co/fCliLMsCAc
— Mohammad Akbarpour (@akbarpour_) January 14, 2022
If true, this is absolutely mind boggling. Can’t end well for Google.
— Yaron Galai (@YaronGalai) January 15, 2022
???????? https://t.co/v56Z6485hy
Google employees fretted that its ad auctions were “untruthful” and based on “insider information,” according to newly unredacted sections of the AGs’ lawsuit. w/ @trippmickle https://t.co/OlMHUGPYFQ via @WSJ
— keachhagey (@keachhagey) January 14, 2022
Just to be clear: this reporting documents a criminal conspiracy between @Facebook and @Google. @TheJusticeDept should file a suit in response.
— American Economic Liberties Project (@econliberties) January 14, 2022
That’s par for the course for @Facebook. We've been documenting their crimes — join us in demanding action.https://t.co/sMcJFtleYJ https://t.co/qud1dx1xjM
J E D I B L U E : The Duopoly is Real
— David Carroll (@profcarroll) January 14, 2022
In a world…where tech executives brazenly flout the law… https://t.co/2VfN820UVC
?? "Mark Zuckerberg & Google chief executive Sundar Pichai personally approved a secret deal that gave the social network a leg up in the search giant’s online advertising auctions...."https://t.co/7EYLH4QT3n
— Jesse Lehrich (@JesseLehrich) January 14, 2022
Anon, this is why they're building @AlkimiExchange.$ADS$DAG $LTX $ADShttps://t.co/8Idy8FulHw
— Ħgtp://sĦockingCrypto333 (@SCrypto333) January 15, 2022
The internet wasn't supposed to be like this. https://t.co/RLYCvftdHB
— DeFi Analyst (@TheDeFiAnalyst) January 15, 2022
Facebook and Google accused of 'secret deal' to carve up ad empire https://t.co/PFWL717aqi pic.twitter.com/GIq2W9OWlW
— New York Post (@nypost) January 14, 2022
Facebook boss Mark Zuckerberg and his counterpart at Google, CEO Sundar Pichai, secretly struck a deal in 2018 to carve up the digital advertising market between the two tech giants, according to top state law-enforcement officials. https://t.co/zxuUTUDFXa
— Jewhadi™ (@JewhadiTM) January 14, 2022
This looks like some serious anti-trust allegations. It's fine for companies to make money but certain arrangements of that are not ethical. Anti-trust laws try to prevent some of those.https://t.co/oZEnlKeDCP
— Fr Matthew P. Schneider LC ? (@FrMatthewLC) January 15, 2022
Facebook and Google accused of ‘secret deal’ to carve up ad empire https://t.co/RU6mdYCENg
— James Hirsen (@thejimjams) January 14, 2022