“Search Neutrality” is silly…
In the ongoing war between ISPs and the big network content providers over net neutrality, a new weapon has been unveiled. Apparently, the ISPs (who don’t want net neutrality) have accused Google (their primary adversary in the war) of the same things they are guilty of, and that Google must accept “search neutrality” as a consequence.
This is stupid. Here’s why:
- Market Regulation by the government should only occur when there is a definite market failure.
- ISP services, like many other utilities (power, water, gas) is a perfect example of a natural monopoly. It is generally inefficient to run multiple networks when a single one is all that will be utilized.
- A natural monopoly is a type of monopoly, which is a type of market failure.
- Ergo - regulation is a viable option to correct the market failure. Q.E.D.
The same is not true in the case of search engines. There is absolutely nothing preventing me from utilizing any of the many search engines available on the web - Google, Bing, Yahoo, Dogpile, Altavista, etc. There is nothing preventing a new player from entering the market and upsetting the status quo - a feat Google itself accomplished not so long ago. Compare that to the de facto monopolies and duopolies throughout the country in the ISP market.
Admittedly, Google may one day step over the anti-trust line by bundling its various services too tightly (ala Microsoft and Windows + Internet Explorer) but that’s a totally different ball of wax.