Prop for Wednesday, May 20

IPO: MAGOOGLE

"Will either the US or the EU pursue antitrust charges against Google?"

It's getting tougher and tougher to be a billionaire plutocrat these days. Shortly after the European Union (EU) fined Intel $1.45 billion for antitrust violations, the Obama administration announced that it would tighten American antitrust laws, bringing them more in line with their European counterparts. And with Microsoft and Intel already counted as heads on the wall, it looks like Google might be the antitrust big game in both in the EU and the US. In the last two months, the Justice Department and the Federal Trade Commission both opened inquiries into Google, and the launch of Google's social networking software, Google Profiles, widens the possibility of legal action even more. However, there is one big difference between the companies that have already run afoul of regulators, Microsoft and Intel, for example, and Google. Google, and all of its apps, are free.
That raises the interesting question of how can you have a monopoly if you're not actually selling anything?

This prop will pay out POP$100 if the US Government or the EU bring an antitrust suit against Google by May 29th, 2009. This can be checked at http://www.techcrunch.com.

Related Links:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/18/technology/companies/18antitrust.html?hpw

http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/05/11/watch-out-google-obamas-antitrust-chief-is-looking-to-make-a-big-case/

http://searchengineland.com/google-and-other-tech-firms-brace-for-more-anti-trust-scrutiny-19436