By Cory Doctorow (GPG 0xBF3D9110957E5F4C) @doctorow.pluralistic.net · 12/06/2026Google wasn't always this way. The "don't be evil" company owes its very existence to the open web ecosystem. 16/ 1190
By Cory Doctorow (GPG 0xBF3D9110957E5F4C) @doctorow.pluralistic.net · 12/06/2026When the company started to index the web in 1998, it was playing on an open field, where any web server could talk to any "user agent," even one whose user was a startup like Google, that was making a copy of every page on the server. 17/ 2131
By Cory Doctorow (GPG 0xBF3D9110957E5F4C) @doctorow.pluralistic.net · 12/06/2026For years, Google thrived on the open web, and built open technologies. Android - the mobile operating system that Google bought in 2005 - was presented as an "open" alternative to existing mobile offerings. 18/ 191
Douglas Long @minimillian.bsky.social · 13/06/2026Except at that time it felt like the web was increasingly not open. Microsoft was giving away a non-standards compliant browser with every copy of their then overwhelmingly dominant OS, and more and more websites became only viewable in IE.investopedia.comMicrosoft Antitrust Case: Understanding the 1998 Charges and ImpactLearn about Microsoft's 1998 antitrust charges, alleged monopoly tactics, and the case's outcome. Discover how these events shaped tech industry regulations. 000
