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Others insisted that the technological shift to the Internet and the move away from the personal computer meant that Microsoft lost the watchdog power it once had. Technology, not antitrust, opened the door to competition, they said.
The Justice Department, in its lawsuit and in a briefing with journalists, was vague about what remedies the government would propose if it won the case. But at this stage, Google is so dominant in searches that giving consumers the option to select another search engine may not make much of a difference.
Google is considered not only as a search service that provides relevant results, but also as a verb, what people consider to be Internet search. Given the option, they might as well choose Google, and the company would argue that it was because it was a superior product that people preferred.
“It’s hard to argue that this case, whatever the outcome, will really change the competitive landscape in search,” said A. Douglas Melamed, a former senior official in the Department of Justice’s antitrust division who is a professor in the College of Justice. Stanford Law.
The standard criticism of antitrust law, with its lengthy court battles, is that it is late and slow, inadequate to address anti-competitive concerns in rapidly evolving high-tech markets. That’s a genuine concern, legal experts said.
Still, filing the lawsuit this week could make a difference, they agreed.
“A suit like this sends signals to the market and to the company itself about what kind of competitive behavior is acceptable,” said Scott Hemphill, a professor at New York University School of Law.
Daisuke Wakabayashi contributed reporting.