Speaker 1: Al Zone Media.
Speaker 2: Hello and welcome to Better Offline. I am, as usual
Speaker 2: your host ed Zichrono. Today I'm joined again for the
Speaker 2: last episode of our DOJV Google Ads series Ariel Garcia
Speaker 2: of Check My Ads and of course Jason Kent of DCN.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much for coming. What's happened in this
Speaker 2: week's This Saga?
Speaker 1: So this week we had the opportunity to listen to
Speaker 1: Google's defense. They I haven't done the tally yet, I
Speaker 1: intend to, but the vast majority of witnesses they called
Speaker 1: were people that either have been paid or still are
Speaker 1: paid by Google.
Speaker 3: So that includes people like.
Speaker 1: Current employees, small businesses that get big grants from Google,
Speaker 1: and their expert witnesses. The most notable one is doctor
Speaker 1: Mark Israel, who is at a consultancy called Compass Lexicon.
Speaker 3: He's there, he was their lead economists.
Speaker 1: So, if you remember, we've talked about how Google is
Speaker 1: trying to argue that ad tech is just one big,
Speaker 1: two sided market that connects advertisers and impressions.
Speaker 3: Not even publishers.
Speaker 1: Publicers don't exist, Okay, So that two sided market argument
Speaker 1: comes from Mark Israel's work, or it was his expert
Speaker 1: report that really defined that argument and.
Speaker 2: For the listener's sake, what is this man? Like? What
Speaker 2: does he do for a living?
Speaker 3: Yeah, so that's what the DOJ wanted to know. So apparently.
Speaker 1: He makes eighty percent of his money and spends a
Speaker 1: five percent of his time being an expert witness, so
Speaker 1: literally getting cool paid to say what people want him
Speaker 1: to say cool.
Speaker 2: So is that like a job that anyone could do?
Speaker 2: Just wondering, but in all serious this looking up this
Speaker 2: wonderful man's He has a PhD in economics from Stanford,
Speaker 2: MSc in economics from the University of Wisconsin Madison, so
Speaker 2: big ten BOYBA in economics from Illinois Wesleyan University. This
Speaker 2: man's job is just having a job. It's just like
Speaker 2: existing and saying stuff that people asking, like, come on, man,
Speaker 2: you can't do this, Well, I mean you can, and
Speaker 2: he does.
Speaker 1: He.
Speaker 4: I think it's worth noting he was the expert witness
Speaker 4: for Google at the search trial too that they just lost,
Speaker 4: and and he's done like fifty or so different cases.
Speaker 4: He's also Albertson's and Kroger, which is playing out in
Speaker 4: the grocery store space. So yeah, this is his full
Speaker 4: time job.
Speaker 2: Wait, so he's in the Albatsons and Kroger case as well. Yeah, Jesus,
Speaker 2: so this man's this man's job is just like kind
Speaker 2: of being a sock puppet, but like a really well
Speaker 2: paid one.
Speaker 4: Your words. But as somebody sitting there listening to him testify,
Speaker 4: I guess I would say, and this happens a lot
Speaker 4: of time, I think with economists not to be critical
Speaker 4: of the whole field. But it wasn't connected to the
Speaker 4: real world at all, And so it was like, you know,
Speaker 4: an argument that nobody that understands the actual advertising business
Speaker 4: would agree with, like, yeah, it's one big, two sided
Speaker 4: market that also competes with Reddit and Facebook and all
Speaker 4: these other you know, large platforms, as if they're just
Speaker 4: directly similar and comparable.
Speaker 2: So, and how did his augument do with the judge?
Speaker 4: I didn't think it did well at all. I mean,
Speaker 4: as he was spinning the yarn in the beginning it
Speaker 4: I could see where somebody could be convinced that they
Speaker 4: didn't really understand the business. But then once the just
Speaker 4: Department did their cross, it really fell apart in my mind.
Speaker 4: I don't know if if you have a different point
Speaker 4: of view.
Speaker 3: Yeah, no, I agree with that.
Speaker 1: And you could tell because at one point, when he
Speaker 1: was talking about one of the alleged reasonable substitutes that
Speaker 1: publishers have, he was basically saying that a publisher that
Speaker 1: has a website and sells ads on their website can
Speaker 1: just move those ads to their app, right, And so
Speaker 1: the judge asks like, well, what if the publisher doesn't
Speaker 1: have an app, and he's like, well, then there would
Speaker 1: be they would need to build one. She's like, well
Speaker 1: that would cost money, no, And he's like, well, yeah,
Speaker 1: in that instance, they would need to pay money to
Speaker 1: build an app. That was the only and that, like,
Speaker 1: that was the simplest pushback point. We're not addressing the
Speaker 1: fact that, like the amount of people that end up
Speaker 1: on your website versus the amount of readers that will
Speaker 1: download an app are not the same. We got to
Speaker 1: that today when the DJ called their rebuttal witness. But yeah,
Speaker 1: that's the type of flavor that we that we got.
Speaker 1: And if the judge was not already skeptical from the direct,
Speaker 1: definitely the DOJ absolutely, I literally might. My immediate commentary
Speaker 1: was that the DJ mopped the floor with him so so.
Speaker 2: And just to be clear, his argument was, if you
Speaker 2: don't like Google's heavy monopoly. You could build your own app.
Speaker 1: That's got yes and that, and it gets more wild,
Speaker 1: Like at one point he was saying that if if
Speaker 1: a publisher's ad server is is bad, then advertisers might
Speaker 1: move money to Facebook. Like these two things have nothing
Speaker 1: to do so if the tool a publisher uses to
Speaker 1: manage their campaigns as bad, an advertiser might move money
Speaker 1: to social media.
Speaker 3: These It was just completely unhinged.
Speaker 2: This man is meant to be smart. That feels like
Speaker 2: a dumb guy augment that that doesn't even make technically.
Speaker 2: Is this just Google's attempt to just kind of obfiscate
Speaker 2: things and try and muddy the waters.
Speaker 1: So I think I think I'm speculating, but I think
Speaker 1: what he was trying to drive at is that on
Speaker 1: some level, a good product on one side has implications
Speaker 1: for the other side. It's part of this bigger argument
Speaker 1: that they're trying to make for why Google being on
Speaker 1: both sides of the market of their alleged you know,
Speaker 1: two sided market is good that when they do something
Speaker 1: good for advertisers, the knock on effects are good for
Speaker 1: publishers and vice versa. What the DOJ points out is
Speaker 1: like okay, but that means ostensibly it can't always just
Speaker 1: be about the advertisers, right, And we didn't really have
Speaker 1: a good answer for that.
Speaker 2: So we're at the end of this trial, though there
Speaker 2: are closing arguments in NOVEMBI mentioned before the call. How
Speaker 2: did the rest of the last week or so go?
Speaker 2: Was it mostly just Google attempting to muddy more like
Speaker 2: they come up with new arguments of any kind.
Speaker 4: There's nothing. I didn't hear anything really new, and I
Speaker 4: think really the fireworks were mostly today as the just
Speaker 4: department brought in one of the publisher witnesses for a rebuttal,
Speaker 4: was the only rebuttal witness, and there was a lot
Speaker 4: of back and forth about whether or not he was
Speaker 4: gonna be able to testify again, but he basically, you
Speaker 4: know those arguments that Mark Israel Matthew Wheatland from the
Speaker 4: Daily Mail senior executive Daily Mail, and so each of
Speaker 4: those arguments that Israel had made, they kind of cleaned
Speaker 4: that up, I think the apartment and made it clear
Speaker 4: that that wasn't wasn't in the real world, that wasn't
Speaker 4: an issue. And but it got to the point then
Speaker 4: during when the when Google was doing it's cross where
Speaker 4: it got. Really, it's kind of absurd if you were
Speaker 4: in the room. I feel like the judge even knew
Speaker 4: it was absurd where they were, you know, if he
Speaker 4: was cleaning up that that it wasn't a real world
Speaker 4: situation that you could just, you know, shut down your
Speaker 4: website if things weren't working well with the Google monopoly
Speaker 4: and launch an app. And then Google's attorney started to
Speaker 4: compare the number of clicks it takes to type in
Speaker 4: a website, like literally down to the https colon slash
Speaker 4: slash versus downloading an app, and was actually comparing how
Speaker 4: much time it takes to do the two different things.
Speaker 4: And it was just I could understand how we were
Speaker 4: gaining that literal on the last day in the last witness.
Speaker 2: So was the argument the apps are easier to launch
Speaker 2: them websites.
Speaker 4: It felt like they were going back to Google's classic
Speaker 4: argument of you know, of efficiency and you know, competitions
Speaker 4: a click away, and you know, and all these arguments
Speaker 4: about how quickly you can do different things. So it
Speaker 4: was not working in my opinion.
Speaker 1: So, I mean in Google's world where they can just
Speaker 1: kind of like coerce their users and customers to do
Speaker 1: whatever they want them to. Maybe that that, maybe that works,
Speaker 1: but it doesn't really matter. How If it's the same
Speaker 1: amount of clicks for a consumer, for a user to
Speaker 1: download an app as it is to go to a website,
Speaker 1: no one can force them to download the app, right.
Speaker 3: But yes, I completely agree. It was just ridiculous.
Speaker 1: It also was like, because she decided to go there,
Speaker 1: it kept every time Wheatland went to talk, she had
Speaker 1: to cut him off because he was trying.
Speaker 2: To You could tell me she being the judge here.
Speaker 3: No, no, no.
Speaker 1: Every time Wheatland went to talk beyond a yes or no,
Speaker 1: Google's council needed to cut him off because she probably
Speaker 1: realized that he was going to say, well no, Like
Speaker 1: he kept saying, that's one way to get to a website,
Speaker 1: and obviously, you know, search results would be another one,
Speaker 1: you know.
Speaker 3: So it was just a very odd.
Speaker 2: It really does feel and I said this last episode,
Speaker 2: it doesn't feel like Google came in with an argument.
Speaker 2: I'm astonished because these are meant to For years, we've
Speaker 2: seen these companies as these kind of mammoth organizations that
Speaker 2: can do what they want. But in front of a judge,
Speaker 2: they just seemed kind of pathetic.
Speaker 1: I think that the facts were just so not on
Speaker 1: their side that they really struggled. There was not one
Speaker 1: witness that they called where on cross examination, DJ didn't
Speaker 1: manage to surface something that set Google back a little
Speaker 1: bit or introduced something new that was bad, you know
Speaker 1: what I mean.
Speaker 3: They just they didn't have very much.
Speaker 1: And so that's why their experts, and specifically Mark Israel,
Speaker 1: because the other experts that Google called their analysis relied
Speaker 1: heavily on Israel's report, right, so it was really hinging
Speaker 1: on Israel. I expected that there would be something at least.
Speaker 3: Somewhat compelling there, and when I.
Speaker 1: Saw that there was just absolutely nothing there, I mean,
Speaker 1: to me, that was the nail on the coffin for
Speaker 1: their case.
Speaker 2: It's remarkable. It also kind of suggests that these other
Speaker 2: antitrust cases might be similarly chaotic, because you would think that,
Speaker 2: I think what is really stunning me, other than the
Speaker 2: fact that just kind of incompetent is you'd think they'd
Speaker 2: have planned for this, Like Jason, you've been getting you
Speaker 2: covered the search trial. Did they have a better argument there?
Speaker 4: They did, and you know, I think their argument there
Speaker 4: was you know that they still had kind of a
Speaker 4: giant elf in the room that they were spending you know,
Speaker 4: upwards of twenty twenty five billion dollars a year for
Speaker 4: the search slot. And you know, if they were the
Speaker 4: best product out there and consumers, why it naturally then
Speaker 4: why they have to pay all that money? That was
Speaker 4: the big help in the room. But they at least
Speaker 4: could make arguments about exclusionary conduct and a few other
Speaker 4: things that they'll try to make in their appeal. I
Speaker 4: don't think they're going to win because the appeal goes
Speaker 4: to the same as in the same circuit as USB Microsoft,
Speaker 4: which it relied on. So but they, you know, it
Speaker 4: was more down to illegal arguments and they didn't have
Speaker 4: the same issues with deletion of emails and all that
Speaker 4: stuff in the same way that came out in this case.
Speaker 4: So yeah, I you know, one thing and I can
Speaker 4: thinking a lot about is. I mean, as much as
Speaker 4: you know they've got, it feels like, you know, almost
Speaker 4: every major law firm at their fingertips when they need them,
Speaker 4: and experts and paid experts, et cetera. It's a really
Speaker 4: complicated chess game when you've got remedies going on in
Speaker 4: California from your app store loss, and you've got the
Speaker 4: Search case remedies going on in DC and all these
Speaker 4: things are you know, dividing executive time within the company,
Speaker 4: and you also are trying to manage, you know, your
Speaker 4: business at the same time you've got Sundar Forsha going
Speaker 4: on TV a couple of nights ago, you know, to
Speaker 4: say that you know, everything's all good, right, It's it's
Speaker 4: a very complicated chess game no matter who you are.
Speaker 2: And do you think, what do you think these cases
Speaker 2: are kind of splitting their attention?
Speaker 4: That would be my I mean, it has to be
Speaker 4: at some point, and you you kind of see that
Speaker 4: play out in the real world, you know, when you've
Speaker 4: got you know, I saw in the Search case. I
Speaker 4: think it was like one of the last days where
Speaker 4: you had Kent Walker, the chief legal officer at Google,
Speaker 4: you know, in the front row and then like literally
Speaker 4: move up to the lawyer's table, you know, which was
Speaker 4: kind of unusual to try to whisper to some of
Speaker 4: the lawyers in real time. So like he's gained involved
Speaker 4: right in the actual arguments at the trial as Search
Speaker 4: cases weighing down, And I sensed that a little bit today,
Speaker 4: Ari L I don't know if you sens this, you
Speaker 4: were in the courtroom, but like there was shuffling around
Speaker 4: by various Google and and their law firms.
Speaker 2: Folks. You know when you say shuffling around, is he
Speaker 2: just handing papers to the Yeah?
Speaker 4: I mean there was like almost many huddles happening, you know,
Speaker 4: you know, a borderline close to disturbing the judge. But
Speaker 4: you had, you know, three or four people leaning back
Speaker 4: and forth talking to each other, and then people running
Speaker 4: out of the room and stuff. It was it was
Speaker 4: like they were, you know, dealing, They were trying to
Speaker 4: escalate and deal with things in real time because things
Speaker 4: weren't going.
Speaker 2: Well, I'm losing this trial.
Speaker 1: Like their whole team was there today like that. Everyone
Speaker 1: knew that today was going to be the last day.
Speaker 1: So Google's entire team was there. And I'll also say
Speaker 1: we knew it was a big team between like their
Speaker 1: associates and their comms people and stuff, but I didn't
Speaker 1: know quite how big it was. They they filled like
Speaker 1: the entire middle section of the courtroom, which is the
Speaker 1: largest section I'd say they have. They had three times
Speaker 1: the amount of people there that dooj did. And because
Speaker 1: everyone was there, you could see the full extent of
Speaker 1: the shuffling. So even someone next to me, all the
Speaker 1: way in the back of the room was having you know,
Speaker 1: notes scribbled and people were running back and forth to
Speaker 1: them handing them notes.
Speaker 3: So it was like it was very obvious that there was.
Speaker 1: An all hands on deck scramble when the when DJ
Speaker 1: called their rebuttal witness and the judge decided to allow
Speaker 1: it to proceed.
Speaker 2: And what was so scary about this witness? What was
Speaker 2: it that that like chilled.
Speaker 1: Them that he had the real world experience to knock
Speaker 1: down every single one of Mark Israel's wild recommendation.
Speaker 2: And this was the fellow from the Daily Mail, which just.
Speaker 3: Correct correct, right.
Speaker 1: So it's like they were just going to go one
Speaker 1: by one and be like, you know, if if an
Speaker 1: advertiser moves spending to social does that impact your negotiations
Speaker 1: with Google?
Speaker 3: No, you know, like they just kind of went one
Speaker 3: by one.
Speaker 1: And because the questions, the hypotheticals are so outlandish, Google
Speaker 1: knew that he was going to seem confused by the
Speaker 1: very question, like like the premise is so backwards that
Speaker 1: it would that his sincere confusion would come across, you know.
Speaker 2: So that there is one person I want to bring
Speaker 2: up so big on tech, Tom Blakeley over there. He
Speaker 2: brought up on Tuesday that there was testimony from a
Speaker 2: guy called doctor Paul Milgram, Yes, from Stamford. Now Blakely
Speaker 2: seems to think that this was a good a good
Speaker 2: day for Google.
Speaker 4: Well, yeah, thing, I wasn't there that day. I was
Speaker 4: actually up, which is a whole nother, a whole nother story.
Speaker 1: I was up.
Speaker 4: I ram up in New York real quickly for a conference.
Speaker 2: But I think R A. L.
Speaker 4: You were there. I know who he is though, and
Speaker 4: I actually think he probably could have been their best witness,
Speaker 4: expert witness. He's like an auction guru. But but Eril,
Speaker 4: you'd have to say how you thought it went my
Speaker 4: reado that wasn't yet.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I agree with that.
Speaker 1: I think by far he was their best witness, and
Speaker 1: and he uh, it was very clear that the judge
Speaker 1: found him credible.
Speaker 3: I would say he's.
Speaker 1: The witness that the judge engaged directly with the most
Speaker 1: on on both sides.
Speaker 2: What was his How did they use him?
Speaker 1: Uh to explain the like the auction dynamics, like try
Speaker 1: they were trying to use him to explain why last
Speaker 1: look wasn't always beneficial to Google.
Speaker 2: Why Why that's where you can see the bits of
Speaker 2: competing advertisers and beat them by a dollar.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, So they went through each of those kind
Speaker 1: of like auction dynamic questions. But I still think that
Speaker 1: the DOJ did well on cross at highlighting things that
Speaker 1: he didn't bring up. I don't want to like get
Speaker 1: too far into the weeds on it, but but.
Speaker 3: Yeah, they but the DOJ did a good job at.
Speaker 1: Illuminating the things that he just didn't emphasize. Right, They
Speaker 1: played some games with a timeline of changes they made
Speaker 1: to their product. And it's not that his testimony necessarily
Speaker 1: was false, but it was a little bit misleading the
Speaker 1: way it presented things. If if you consider the timelines
Speaker 1: of the changes that Google implemented, and I think the
Speaker 1: DJ did a good job of clearing that up.
Speaker 3: But I do think that this was Google's strongest witness.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's it seems like though having one strong witness
Speaker 2: is not going to win them this case. If I'm honest,
Speaker 2: it doesn't sound like it went well. And I mean,
Speaker 2: maybe this is the right time to lost both of you.
Speaker 2: What do you think happens?
Speaker 4: I mean in terms of the actual opinion. Yeah, it
Speaker 4: didn't you've heard from me. It didn't go it didn't go.
Speaker 4: Well there, yeah, they one expert witness actually gained into
Speaker 4: the granular detail of auctions and that you know, that
Speaker 4: element probably isn't need necessary anyway, because the monopoly power
Speaker 4: is clear, and the conflict of me is clear, and
Speaker 4: the tying is clear. So you know, depending on on
Speaker 4: the actual analysis of a paid witness by Google, is
Speaker 4: really a hail mary at that point, it's very I
Speaker 4: think it's very rare that expert witness like that can
Speaker 4: can swing the case. So I think if, if very much,
Speaker 4: the DOJ's case to lose at this point, I mean,
Speaker 4: they've they're going to update their findings of fact and
Speaker 4: and you know, they still have the advantage of the
Speaker 4: judge questioning the credibility of all the Google witnesses from
Speaker 4: the deletion of the chats, et cetera. So so then
Speaker 4: we just get to remedies. And we've you know, since
Speaker 4: we last talked, we've got the schedule for remedies in
Speaker 4: search too, so those are going to be happy, you know,
Speaker 4: probably shortly after the ad tech remedies.
Speaker 2: So here we go when would those be?
Speaker 4: That hearing is going to be in April, and Judge
Speaker 4: Meta said he wants to have his opinion out by
Speaker 4: the summertime. So and so in the asset case, the
Speaker 4: attach case closing arguments are November, and I would think
Speaker 4: that means her opinion probably will be out January. I
Speaker 4: would doubt it before the holidays.
Speaker 2: How are you feeling about a real so what do
Speaker 2: you think might happen?
Speaker 1: I mean, I agree, I like especially when I think
Speaker 1: about like the ad server monopolization claim, the tying claim,
Speaker 1: I don't really see a realm in reality that where
Speaker 1: the DOJ's claims there don't succeed.
Speaker 3: There's just like, there's so.
Speaker 1: Much evidence to prove it, and there's so little evidence
Speaker 1: that Google put forward to even try to refute it.
Speaker 1: They put all of their eggs in that market definition basket.
Speaker 1: And from that perspective, I think, you know, I was
Speaker 1: debating in my mind earlier and actually with Tom Blakely
Speaker 1: if they should have called the rebuttal witness. But I
Speaker 1: do see the value in what they did because they
Speaker 1: literally close their rebuttal by saying, okay, what like, what
Speaker 1: is the tool that ultimately decides what AD is served,
Speaker 1: and he says the AD server, Okay, who's your AD server?
Speaker 3: Google?
Speaker 1: Right?
Speaker 3: So I just I think they ended it perfectly.
Speaker 1: I don't think that there's a way that the AD
Speaker 1: server or the tying claims fail. I'm interested to see
Speaker 1: what happens with the AD network side of things, because
Speaker 1: I think that the DOJ spent the least amount of
Speaker 1: time on that.
Speaker 3: But I also don't think it really changes the remedy
Speaker 3: very much.
Speaker 2: Well, do you think the remedies might be though? Do
Speaker 2: you think that they bring like is it even like
Speaker 2: are we going to just see the entire thing shattered?
Speaker 2: I realized we're all guessing he by the way the
Speaker 2: entire Google thing chattered, I mean, I mean that's where
Speaker 2: the AD side of Google.
Speaker 4: The adside of Google. I mean, I don't think there's
Speaker 4: any way that if Google loses, I don't see there's
Speaker 4: any way that's not the remedy, because that's what the
Speaker 4: JUST Department said was the appropriate relief and all the
Speaker 4: evidence points. Do you know, unless you believe it's a
Speaker 4: two sided market that is just more efficient that way,
Speaker 4: then there's no other real defense that doesn't you know,
Speaker 4: you can't go anywhere else except for break the ad
Speaker 4: tech business apart.
Speaker 2: So, and to take a step back, when you say
Speaker 2: it's a two sided market, is that what are they
Speaker 2: actually arguing that? Like, what is Google's argument in that way?
Speaker 2: Is it?
Speaker 1: That?
Speaker 2: Is it just the publishers don't exist.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's a little bit of a messnomer to explain it. Yeah,
Speaker 4: it's a because I know there is the argument that
Speaker 4: there's publishers and advertisers are on both sides. And that's
Speaker 4: actually the DJ's case. This is a legal term for
Speaker 4: a two sided market. That and it relates to the
Speaker 4: America Express Ohio case and and so yes, yeah, so
Speaker 4: you know it actually you know, it stems from the
Speaker 4: notion of when you run a I think technically a
Speaker 4: debit card through like are you, as the merchant if
Speaker 4: I if I get this right, like as a merchant,
Speaker 4: if somebody is about to use an American Express card
Speaker 4: that costs them more money, is the merchant allowed to say, hey,
Speaker 4: if you use your Visa card or whatever other card,
Speaker 4: then you won't have to pay me, as you know
Speaker 4: you I want to pay as much and can you steer?
Speaker 4: And so there's some some legal following out from there
Speaker 4: that that leads to an offense.
Speaker 2: So and that argument isn't gonna work for Google though, because.
Speaker 4: That in Google's world, it's a single Yeah, it's one
Speaker 4: big thing, like one big contraption, right, that just handles
Speaker 4: more efficiently the entire ad marketplace.
Speaker 2: So yeah, as opposed to what it is, which it
Speaker 2: sounds like you're paying Google to advertise with Google and
Speaker 2: then Google messing with the old shapes that Google exactly
Speaker 2: effectively led it. Yeah, exactly what a bizarre I mean,
Speaker 2: you two have been there. This feels like a very
Speaker 2: bizarre trial, just a peculiar one to have watched because
Speaker 2: all these other tech trials, having obviously not been in
Speaker 2: court with myself, haven't read a good amount of transcripts
Speaker 2: listening listen to various depositions and stuff, even going back
Speaker 2: to like the Bill Gates deposition one where he was
Speaker 2: asking for like the very minute definitions. They always seem
Speaker 2: very cocky. They always seem like they add a bit
Speaker 2: pisson vinegar to them. This one they just seem to
Speaker 2: be kind of milling about.
Speaker 3: Oh no, they were, they're they're. The arrogance is definitely there.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, oh yeah, Like if you talk to anyone
Speaker 1: that goes to their secret briefings, they're like, they're so
Speaker 1: they appear so confident in their case that they actually
Speaker 1: start to confuse the people that have been there watching
Speaker 1: the trial about whether they are seeing what they think
Speaker 1: they're seeing. But that Google's entire strategy, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean? So confidence no matter what they they put
Speaker 1: out there.
Speaker 2: Yeah, cool, So what do.
Speaker 4: You think about if I can ask Gurriel question? There
Speaker 4: was a moment this morning where when Matthew Wheland from
Speaker 4: Daily Mail was testifying and they were trying, they were
Speaker 4: they were objecting to back and forth to something just
Speaker 4: department was asking. But ultimately the judge made a comment
Speaker 4: about there's clearly a lot of competition in that market,
Speaker 4: and I think she was my read I was she
Speaker 4: was talking generally about something and they were all talking
Speaker 4: over each other. But like that was the one line
Speaker 4: where I was like the judge, it didn't make any
Speaker 4: sense in the context of DFP, which is really what
Speaker 4: mattered there, and DFP has ninety one percent of the market,
Speaker 4: so like it didn't fit. But so I found it
Speaker 4: quite like.
Speaker 2: You break that down a little bit, what do you
Speaker 2: mean by DFP and what'd.
Speaker 4: You mean publisher at So the publisher ad server, which
Speaker 4: Google has.
Speaker 2: The place where it publishes sell their ads.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and Google has ninety one percent of the marketplace
Speaker 4: for that software. So that's the that's one of the
Speaker 4: three monopolies alleged, is the publisher ad server marketplace. And
Speaker 4: and Google has ninety one percent of the market, which
Speaker 4: most average person street and definitely any lawyer would say
Speaker 4: is monopoly power at ninety one percent.
Speaker 1: And so yeah, there's no way, there's no way that
Speaker 1: that judge that the judge was talking about the ad
Speaker 1: server market. My read is so it was a chaotic
Speaker 1: flurry of objections, right, And if we remember how the
Speaker 1: objection started, it was the DOJ wanted to call Wheatland.
Speaker 1: Karen Dunn was upset because why is a fact witness
Speaker 1: being called to rebut an expert, And they argued about it,
Speaker 1: and then finally he's allowed to go on, and then
Speaker 1: they asked him the first question, and there's a flurry
Speaker 1: of objections again, and then they asked the question about
Speaker 1: whether Google whether the ad server market is competitive, and
Speaker 1: that's where this objection fest happened.
Speaker 3: And so my understanding is.
Speaker 1: The judge knew that the everything at issue here was
Speaker 1: they wanted to use him to rebut Mark Israel Mar
Speaker 1: Israel thinks it's all one two sided market. And I
Speaker 1: believe that the judge was thought that the question was
Speaker 1: about that big market when she said that it was,
Speaker 1: it's clear that it's competitive, because remember just it was
Speaker 1: like five minutes ago that the judge was saying that
Speaker 1: market definition is a core issue in this case, and
Speaker 1: it's one that the court is going to need to resolve.
Speaker 4: You know, got it, got it makes sense? Makes sense.
Speaker 2: What a bizarre year year this has been for tech
Speaker 2: in general. I mean, as we wrap up this wonderful
Speaker 2: series and thank you both for doing this, it does
Speaker 2: feel like something has changed with how definitely like society,
Speaker 2: but almost all of these judges are looking at the
Speaker 2: tech industry. They're not friends anymore. There's no it doesn't
Speaker 2: feel like the government is on tech's side anymore.
Speaker 4: Well, I think that my rate is that, you know,
Speaker 4: the courts are very much just calling balls and strikes,
Speaker 4: and I I would applaud this judge. I mean, incredible
Speaker 4: that she got through everything in three weeks instead of six.
Speaker 4: She clearly was tracking and followed what happened with Judge
Speaker 4: Meta's case in DC. She actually referenced today something from
Speaker 4: the California case where Google had argued the very opposite
Speaker 4: defense as what they were arguing in court today, and
Speaker 4: she said that that was very problematic for Google, and
Speaker 4: so they'd address it during the final closing argument. So,
Speaker 4: you know, they're all paying attention to each other, and
Speaker 4: they're calling balls and strikes. And then yes, the PRUS,
Speaker 4: you know, the AGS and the Just Department are doing
Speaker 4: a masterful job of understanding the you know, the sophistication
Speaker 4: of these companies.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's it's a fun time to be alive and
Speaker 2: reporting on this and you two have done just incredible work.
Speaker 2: And I want to thank you on behalf of listeners
Speaker 2: as well. You've both been kicking off and checked my ads,
Speaker 2: in particular with usv Google Ads, which will be linked
Speaker 2: at the end of this episode. You've done just a
Speaker 2: phenomenal job here and I I don't know if this
Speaker 2: would have been as well covered without you both, actually,
Speaker 2: so thank you.
Speaker 4: Thank you, thank you for having us.
Speaker 2: So I'm going to call it there, Ariel work and
Speaker 2: people find you.
Speaker 3: You can find me a check my adds dot org.
Speaker 3: You can find me at Ariel s Garcia on.
Speaker 4: Twitter, Jason Underscore kent ordigitalcontentnext dot org sometimes called DCN.
Speaker 2: That works for thanks, and you can find me by
Speaker 2: googling who ruined Google search. That will bring you to
Speaker 2: an article that I wrote thanks to an AI overview,
Speaker 2: you've been listening to Better Offline. That's the end of
Speaker 2: our coverage for now, but I'll be bringing back both
Speaker 2: Ariel and Jason for the closing arguments sometime in November.
Speaker 2: Thank you for listening. Thank you for listening to Better Offline.
Speaker 2: The editor and composer of the Better Offline theme song
Speaker 2: is Matosowski. You can check out more of his music
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