Pass the Buck or £3 or maybe £5
Below is an except from an interview with Google’s chief economist talking about potential anti competitive actions within the online advertising industry.
Mr. Varian, Google’s chief economist, acknowledges that the company has been criticized for its lack of transparency. But he says that the Google approach is a byproduct of its virtue as a fast-moving learning machine. “The system is constantly evolving to optimize efficiency, improve ad quality and make the pricing smarter, so you don’t want set rules that say we do X and we don’t do Y,” Mr. Varian explained.
-NY Times: Google, Zen Master of the Market
Seems like his argument assumes the system is always evolving in a way that maximizes utility for both ad buyers and sellers, of course the system and its underlying algorithms are controlled by people who have a fiduciary responsibility to their shareholders to maximize return on capital…is there a conflict of interest…maybe/maybe not?
Though it seems quite naive for Google to once again proffer the “trust us” argument.
Comparing the system to some incomprehensible “fast-moving learning machine” black-box seems like a convenient and overly simplistic argument which flies in the face of Google’s “open platform” policy it demanded from the FCC in the lead-up to the 700 MHz spectrum auctions.
