Google Writes In Court Document That Search Quality Continues To Enhance

Google has posted its post-trial debrief document for the DOJ trial that talks about many different things, including stating that its search quality continues to improve. We covered its statement that Microsoft Bing Search had search quality issues earlier.

Greg Sterling posted about this on X, writing, “Google boldly claims in its “default search” antitrust post-trial brief that search quality has improved, not degraded.”

It is written throughout the document, but here are some clauses:

The undisputed evidence contradicts any assertion that Google has wielded monopoly power by degrading search quality or search ads quality below competitive levels. As Plaintiffs acknowledge, Google is the highest quality general search engine in the U.S. and has been since before Plaintiffs claim it began violating Section 2. FOF ¶ 1081. Google’s search quality has continuously improved over its twenty-five years as a search engine as Google has continuously innovated. FOF ¶¶ 79-106, 112-241, 695-760. And Google unceasingly strives to better its search quality, annually setting goals to improve its search quality as measured by IS score.

In the introduction paragraphs, Google wrote:

These innovations have greatly improved search quality and powered extraordinary increases in search output—all at no cost to consumers.

The evidence conclusively established that Google is the highest quality, most popular search engine in the United States, with the highest general search engine advertising monetization.

Google added:

Google’s decision to preserve features that have a positive impact on search quality while offering customizable settings to suit users’ privacy preferences is a reasoned business judgment consistent with a competitive marketplace, not a degradation of product quality that evidences monopoly power.

Google also wrote in this document that the “Barriers to Entry Are Not Significant and Are Falling Rapidly.”

This is worth a read if you have time over the weekend, you can download it over here.

People are asking me what this “IS score” is, well, Danny Goodwin mentioned it over here and it refers to Google’s own internal “information satisfaction” score.

Forum discussion at X.