> Google said Amazon doesn’t have a special deal. The company and Amazon declined to offer specifics.
> Google and Amazon say the payment options aren’t new. Google said Amazon was among a few companies that had been able to offer non-Google payment options for their existing customers, under a test program.
"It's not a special deal. It's just that only a few companies can benefit from it."
I thank the US for voluntarily deciding to run the experiment on what decades of voluntary non enforcement of competition laws will do to companies. I suggest we have the results now and it could safely be stopped.
> Google said Amazon was among a few companies that had been able to offer non-Google payment options for their existing customers, under a test program.
"Test program", what a bunch of corporate shitspeak.
The time comes when we need to define what "special" means. To me, if "only a few" companies can do this, among possibly millions of companies that put their apps on the store, it seems very special.
I suspect it's something along the lines of "it's not special, you just need to be making enough money that we can justify giving you a rep specifically to manage and execute this deal".
They baldfaced lie to the public because there are exactly zero consequences for doing so. One of the dilemmas of modern existence, IMO, is this general comfort with lying as if it were no big deal.
If Amazon were happy selling books for zero or less than zero profit, as they'd have to be if this idea that they're somehow still paying Google requires, then they would have also been doing it on iOS too, wouldn't they? That's "all" Apple has been demanding this whole time.
It's not a special deal. Google would love to have a deal with Amazon.
It's simply that Amazon is one of the few companies that can get away with not paying Google anything. Amazon is the big dog in this context.
If Google were to cut off Amazon from search results, people would just do all their shopping (and searches) directly on Amazon and cut Google out of the process entirely, and Google would lose hundreds of millions in ad revenue for the ads it show sin Amazon-related google searches. Amazon could even promote competitors to Google on their website just for the hell of it (or more likely in exchange for $$$ or stock), and Google would start seeing material drops in usage (material meaning large enough for investors to care about).
I don't think you guys understand what a "special deal" is. A deal is an agreement between two parties.
Amazon and Google don't have a deal. Amazon is just doing whatever the fuck it wants and Google is going along, because Google already lost this battle in court. Notably, Amazon didn't start offering the option to buy books in the Android apps until after Google lost the court case.
Amazon is very likely to do this with its Apple apps later this year as well, now that Apple has also lost this battle and may be facing civil and criminal sanctions for its continued attempts to prevent companies from doing what Amazon did on Android.
> Google and Amazon say the payment options aren’t new. Google said Amazon was among a few companies that had been able to offer non-Google payment options for their existing customers, under a test program.
"It's not a special deal. It's just that only a few companies can benefit from it."
Who are they kidding, seriously?