FairSearch.org, the coalition fighting the Google-ITA Software deal, sees a parallel in Google’s attempts to make inroads into the book market and the alleged possibility that it would withhold airfare content if the acquisition is approved.
A federal judge this week overturned a 2008 settlement between Google and book publishers and authors. Google had scanned millions of books and planned to make snippets of them available online.
In blocking the settlement — and the parties likely will get back to the bargaining table — Judge Denny Chin wrote that the agreement “would arguably give Google control over the [book] search market.”
FairSearch had the following to say about the book decision.
The “rejection of the Google Books settlement by Federal appeals court Judge Denny Chin confirms that allowing Google to acquire exclusive access to content and withhold it from other search engines – as Google threatens to do with ITA Software in online flight search – raises serious antitrust concerns.
“Judge Chin recognized that the proposal he rejected ‘would further entrench Google’s market power in the online search market.’ … [The] ruling reaffirms the Justice Department was right to take on Google on this issue and that enforcing antitrust laws is essential to ensuring that Google not be allowed to harm consumers or competition by illegally extending its dominance in online search.”
On the withholding content issue, FairSearch.org members have argued that Google could bar ITA Software customers from gaining access to the latest technology updates or would refuse to renew software licenses.
And, there also is a fear that customers — or former customers, that is — would lose access to real-time feeds of airline fare and availability data.
Google is on record as saying that it would honor ITA Software’s existing contracts and that Google would not negotiate renewals in public.
Google couldn’t immediately be reached for comment on FairSearch’s statement about the books decision.
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Books are content – ITA software is technology. It has been pointed out many times that ITA’s QPX – while leading – is not the only game in town. I fail to see the parallel.
Fiona: I agree with you on the content versus technology argument. But, for U.S. airfare data, ITA is basically the only game in town — other for companies like Travelocity and Expedia.com which have home-grown solutions.
As Kayak said in its recent S-1/A: “In addition, we believe that alternative faring engine solutions currently do not provide the level of comprehensiveness and accuracy that ITA’s software provides.”
I’m sure Kayak and others would transition to another product if they thought it was feasible.
The fact that Expedia is by a wide margin the most popular OTA seems to indicate that competitive fare search tools can be developed – or that QPX level technology is not necessary to run the most successful US OTA – no?
Doesn’t Kayak power http://www.amadeus.net/ ? Surely the results served up there don’t come via ITA’s QPX … (and work just fine for US domestic flights).
“I’m sure Kayak and others would transition to another product if they thought it was feasible.”
Not openly, and not as long as the Google/ITA decision can be delayed.
Once again, it’s interesting to look beyond the FairSearch spin and see what the apples vs. oranges might be. The issue of abusing power in the search market is real, but there are some key differences here.
Google began scanning the books a while back and attempted to find any authors of “orphan” books – going back decades and decades – who could not or did not step forward to claim the copyrights. Bringing that content to consumers is actually a great idea, and the settlement was set up to compensate the owners of the content should they ever come forward. The “opt-out” nature of the deal is definitely a sticky point, however.
A key, though, is that Google could hold, not own though, the content it went to all the trouble to acquire and make available, and potentially limit its availability to others.
The apples vs. oranges is that Google-ITA would never “own” airline content. Airlines can choose whomever they want to access it, and as pointed out, there already are other options and there could definitely be new players, so for FairSearch to claim that Google could threaten to withhold access to exclusive content in the same way as the book issue is well off-base. And consumers, of course, are not dumb.
I’m not arguing right or wrong, just that the FairSearch spin needs a closer look by anyone listening to the lobbying.
And let’s not forget that Microsoft automatically objects to anything Google does (and vice-versa) travel-related or not, so if you look outside the travel-sphere, its involvement in FairSearch is pretty much everyday business rather than a severe statement in the travel space.
And don’t the other members of FairSearch put quite a bit of effort into getting exclusive content other cannot access, such as last-room rights, etc? Normal course of business…
again, no right or wrong, just some thoughts…please argue…