The Federal Trade Commission’s running an anti-trust suit against Google on the principle that its practices are anti-competitive. Okay, that’s all well and good, except Google only has 66% of the market and there’s nothing forcing anybody to use Google. Every browser – including Google Chrome – has built-in access to competing search engines. My own browser, Firefox, has Google, Yahoo and Bing as part of the standard toolbar.

But that’s not where I’m concerned. The issue to me is the language:

For example, if Google were to program its system so that a consumer’s search for “washing machines” is more likely to produce as its top result a link to Google-related shopping sites, that could be interpreted as putting its competitors at a disadvantage.

The rest of the article throws out platitudes how “technology is transforming our society” but that’s really the heart of what the feds care about. That bothers me. It bothers me because there’s a fundamental disconnect between how they see the internet and how lowly peons like me see the internet.

To me, the internet is a font of information. To them, the internet is a playground of consumerism. They don’t care about the fact that Google’s been collecting data on users such that the Chinese government had to call shenanigans. They don’t care that Google has more access to personal information than a federal agent with a court order, with no effective oversight. They care that Google might favor this consumer product over that consumer product.

To that I ask, who the fuck cares? There are more important things to bust Google on. Like how it’s almost impossible for the feds to bust Google’s data aggregation issues because most federal agencies use Google Apps. Our priorities are ridiculously skewed. But then, I suspect they’re not gigging Google on this because they want to do the same thing.

What Fourth Amendment?

Why still have hockey?

I was watching this game in a bottle bar on the West side yesterday. To call it “hockey” would be generous. What it was would be better defined as “ice boxing.”

Now, in a sense, both basketball and football can be considered bloodsports – in that there’s a lot of contact play and tempers flaring – but they’re also largely self-policing. You tend not to chop a player’s ankles because they’ll do the same to yours. You tend not to bean batters in baseball because they’ll knock out the first of yours who steps to the plate.

But hockey? Pah! It’s been allowed so long it’s part of the game! It’s funny counting the scars on the commentators, all of whom former players. Nobody was especially surprised about this particular game – apparently, Philly’s called the “Broad Street Bullies” and Pitts’ captain is known as “crybaby Crosby,” but, watching it, I was rather concerned that they wouldn’t have players left by the third period.