Google can keep its Chrome browser but will be barred from exclusive contracts

This is an astonishing victory for Google, they must be very happy about it.

They get basically everything they want (keeping it all in the tent), plus a negotiating position on search deals where they can refuse something because they can't do it now.

Quite why the judge is so concerned about the rise of AI factoring in here is beyond me. It's fundamentally an anticompetitive decision.

Feels like judge was looking for any excuse not to apply harsh penalty and since Google brought up AI as competitor, the judge accepted it as acceptable excuse for very minor penalty.

AI is a competitor. You know how StackOverflow is dead because AI provided an alternative? That's happening in search too.

You might think "but ChatGPT isn't a search engine", and that's true. It can't handle all queries you might use a search engine for, e.g. if you want to find a particular website. But there are many many queries that it can handle. Here's just a few from my recent history:

* How do I load a shared library and call a function from it with VCS? [Kind of surprising it got the answer to this given how locked down the documentation is.]

* In a PAM config what do they keywords auth, account, password, session, and also required/sufficient mean?

* What do you call the thing that car roof bars attach to? The thing that goes front to back?

* How do I right-pad a string with spaces using printf?

These are all things I would have gone to Google for before, but ChatGPT gives a better overall experience now.

Yes, overall, because while it bullshits sometimes, it also cuts to the chase a lot more. And no ads for now! (Btw, someone gave me the hint to set its personality mode to "Robot", and that really helps make it less annoying!)

quit that narrative! stack overflow is dead because it's garbage! try to visit it without being logged in, the entire screen is covered by four halfscreen popups! then search is useless and require to be logged. when you finally give in, the answer is deleted by overzealous power tripping users.

it's a miracle it survived that long. and i think it saving grace was that nobody wanted to browse reddit at work, nothing else.

so tired of AI apologists exploiting this isolated case as if it is some proof AI is magic and a solution to anything. it's all so inane and expose how that side is grasping for straw.