Accused of pushing a fee-based product aside with its free media player, Microsoft has had to settle antitrust complaints from Real for $761 million dollars.
Google makes some very good technology. Its search engine has become part of modern day language, and the company’s Gmail, with ever-increasing storage space, has found many fans among email users. Especially since Gmail is free for users, requiring only a registration.
The search engine company has products in a lot of other areas, and some of those free offerings do compete with for-pay rivals. Nobody has complained yet, or whispered a phrase most tech observers only associate with Microsoft: anticompetitive practice.
Is it too much of a stretch to think a company that provides an email client for sale might decide that free Gmail accounts pose a threat? Sure, there’s plenty of free and open source email clients available. But there are plenty of lawyers too, and in America litigation happens with astonishing frequency.
Google is a publicly traded company that just added billions to its cash pile. Money like that attracts attention, and not all of it will be good. Look at Microsoft, which became so renowned for its hoard of cash that investors complained until the company decided to start paying some of it back via dividends. And now has to give some of that cash to Real.
Microsoft nearly got broken up as a company when it knocked the for-pay Netscape browser off of corporate desktops with its free Internet Explorer. Google probably doesn’t face that kind of an issue today. And maybe not tomorrow.
But what if all those GoogleNet rumors come true, and the Wi-Fi proposal for San Francisco leads to the unveiling of a massive Google-controlled network, pushing free Wi-Fi access throughout the country?
A competitor like SBC would be certain to complain. Google could be in Microsoft’s shoes, arguing in front of a judge that it isn’t a barrier to competition. And maybe that judge wouldn’t be inclined to make comments outside of the courtroom that end up damaging the case against the tech firm in question.
Let’s hope Google doesn’t have to experience this.
David Utter is a staff writer for Murdok covering technology and business. Email him here.
