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What's Wrong With The Latest FairSearch Complaint to the EU Commision About Google? A Lot ~pj Updated 5Xs

By Pamela Jones et al.

I've been thinking a lot about the latest complaint to the EU Commission by those persistent anti-Google complainers, FairSearch. Believe it or not, part of the complaint is that it's anticompetitive to distribute Android for free when proprietary companies have costs for development:

When its comes to the charges related to "predatory distribution of Android at below cost" Blaber is less understanding of FairSearch's stance. "That is a very difficult argument to make in a mobile industry where open source is quickly becoming the norm. ... Really it's only Microsoft that still has a model based on license fees," he said.

Aha! Microsoft. So, it's about *Microsoft's* business model, not any other FairSearch member? Well, maybe Microsoft's little partner, Nokia, but that is the same thing, having trouble competing against Android, and complaining to regulators that it's not fair to distribute Android for free when others have proprietary products that they claim they have to charge for to recoup their investment. That makes this complaint yet another anti-Linux, anti-Open Source, anti-GPL attack from Microsoft, which has a long history of such behavior. It's an attack against the Open Source development model itself. Free distribution is the norm for Open Source. It's also, I believe, part of a coordinated smear campaign against Google. And while FairSearch claims it's not dominated by Microsoft, this complaint demonstrates otherwise.

I suggest writing to the EU Commission, to make sure they understand what is at issue. Here's the page that lists who to write to:

comp-greffe-antitrust at ec.europa.eu

I know I don't need to remind you that politeness counts. Also, do read all the instructions on that linked page. For example, they don't accept any emails larger than 8 MB. I could do it in a tweet, I suspect:

FairSearch attacks Open Source/GPL. #NotFair.

I doubt the EU Commission realizes this is what is at stake, if it took me this long to figure it out, and I'm always trying to be on the alert. If the EU Commission gets this wrong, the result would be that it would discourage use of Open Source code, out of fear of being accused, if successful, of anticompetitive behavior for offering free code.

Incidentally, South Korea just acquitted Google of any antitrust behavior regarding search, after looking into it for two years, saying there are plenty of alternative search engines (here are 11 of them), and the EU Commission should not accept this new attack against Google as valid either. So far, it's just a complaint, and the Commission looks into any complaint filed, but it's not yet an official investigation, and it should never become one. I'll show you why I say that.

Full post as published by Groklaw on July 18, 2013 (boomark / email).