Do you online shop from Google? Or Amazon?

[John Doe]

I just caught part of a Senate hearing about concerns that Google
is misusing monopoly power.

One stated contention in the hearing is that most users shop by
entering "washing machine" into the Google search engine instead
of going to Amazon. I go to Amazon much more often than using
Google Web search when online shopping. How about you? That's
generally speaking, of course it might depend on the specific
product you are looking for. I'm talking about when you are
shopping for something that you know is available to the general
public, like a washing machine.

Maybe that has something to do with whether a user is proficient
in his (or her) online activity? But making an Internet bookmark
to Amazon should be easy enough for most users these days.

Nexttag is one of the complainers about Google in that hearing. I
think their rep said something like "we are one of the most used
companies that nobody knows anything about". But I have never
found their links interesting, and their links have been excluded
from my Google search criteria for months. I exclude Amazon
because I go there anyway and I don't need to see their Google
results.

http://www.google.com/advanced_search?q=-wiki+-alibaba+-nextag+-amazon+-ebay&hl=en&num=100

 

[Flasherly]

Maybe that has something to do with whether a user is proficient in his (or her) online activity?

Annoying is their latest browser interaction which defaults for 10
search results unless, through no help really through Google in making
this simple, on first goes to www.google.com/default. What Google's
doing without redirecting oneself is intervening through a cookie in
blocking out "advanced search" options for anything more than 10
results.

In reports earlier this year concerning publicly traded stocks, Google
as much as admitted responsibility by setting aside earnings from its
shareholders, a fifth of profits, half a billion or so, due to Justice
Dept. investigations on behalf of the FDA and American drug usage.
Google claims it's been duped by rogue advertising interests within
the brisk market of burgeoning, national drug affairs, Google hitherto
conducted, apart from industrial FDA interests, in unwittingly having
collaborated with unnamed defendants stipulated for being in direct
violation of Google's policies concerning drug sales.

Precisely. In answer to your question, yes, then, I have bought, to
the best of my recollection, and will continue to buy in bulk within a
substantial interest of such regard for sales matters if not directly
intended for drug usage, then closest to a well-being of products and
opinions, endorsed by said provisions as expressly classifiable under
a merchandise Amazon purveys within its Heath Dept., irregardless
whether that objective, a priori, is in form first articulated by
Google.

 

[Davej]

I just caught part of a Senate hearing about concerns that Google
is misusing monopoly power.

One stated contention in the hearing is that most users shop by
entering "washing machine" into the Google search engine instead
of going to Amazon.

Depends on what I am shopping for. For a general item I might go to
Google and search for "best price" or something like that to find the
shopping engines such as PriceGrabber. I guess Google now has a
"shopping mode" but I don't use it. Amazon is pretty good for a lot of
stuff but if I try to sort the results by price I seem to get
unreliable results.

 

[Gorman]

I just caught part of a Senate hearing about concerns that Google
is misusing monopoly power.

I don't think this idea really applies to an entity that is
essentially just an aggregator. Amazon and other results show up too;
in general even if someone searches for an item on Google, after the
first click they will continue to search in that website (which is
most commonly Amazon or ebay or some other well known website).
Needless to say, if I am looking for something I will check Amazon,
ebay and Google. A large portion of users probably do the same,
comparing prices rather than taking the first one.

Although, perhaps I am misunderstanding this Google shops feature,
since we don't have it in Australia so all I know is that it is just
another aggregation feature.

 

[John Doe]

I don't think this idea really applies to an entity that is
essentially just an aggregator. Amazon and other results show up
too;

Apparently it matters under our law here in the United States. If
everybody uses Google to the point that no other search engine can
gain a foothold, then how Google displays results is very
important. Showing Amazon and others is important, but the details
matter too. Obtaining monopoly power is perfectly legal, but then
they have to exercise that power within limits.