For years shareholders have paid little heed to the thunderbolts hurled at America's west-coast technology giants by the trustbusting deities of Washington, DC. No longer. Despite expectations of solidly rising profits, the share price of Alphabet, Google's parent company, is wobbling.多年来，股东们对华盛顿特区反垄断监管机构针对西海岸科技巨头发起的猛烈拌击几乎置若罔闻。然而，时过境迁，如今情形已大不相同。尽管预计利润将持续稳健增长，谷歌母公司字母表（ Alphabet)的股价却出现了波动。The reasons seem paradoxical. On the one hand, an American judge ruled in August that Google's search business, source of about 90% of its operating income, was an illegal monopoly. On the other, investors fear that it could suffer unprecedented competition because of generative artificial intelligence (AI). On October 8th the Department of Justice (DoJ) is expected to file proposedremedies that aim to redress the sins of the past and prevent future abuse in generative AI.股价波动的原因似乎自相矛盾。一方面，美国的一名法官在8月裁定，谷歌的检索业务构成了非法垄断，而该业务约占其运营收入的90%。另一方面，投资者又担忧，随着生成式人工智能的崛起，谷歌可能会遭遇前所未有的竞争压力。10月8日，美国司法部（DoJ）预计将提出一系列反垄断补救措施建议，既为了修正过去的违规行为，也为防止未来谷歌在生成式AI领域再次发生滥用行为。
The DoJ appears eager to make an example of Google. Jonathan Kanter, the agency's trustbuster-in-chief, has said the verdict belongs on the “Mount Rushmore” of antitrust cases. Leaks to the media have suggested he could go as far as asking the court to break up Google by separating its search engine from its Chrome browser and Android operating system. That would be America's biggest anti-monopolistic act since an unsuccessful attempt to carve up Microsoft almost 25 years ago.司法部似乎有意将谷歌作为典型案例来处理。该机构的首席反垄断负责人乔纳森·坎特（Jonathan Kanter）指出，这一裁决堪比“反垄断案件的总统山”。据媒体透露的消息，他甚至可能请求法院通过将谷歌的搜索引擎与其谷歌浏览器及安卓操作系统拆分开来，对谷歌进行解体。此举将成为美国自近25年前试图解体微软（Microsoft）未果以来，规模最大的一次反垄断行动。Amit Mehta, the judge handling the case, is likely to have other considerations. A breakup may be too draconian for him. The nub of his ruling was that Google benefited from a monopoly on search and text-based advertisements that it furthered through “exclusionary” distribution deals with companies like Apple; Google's size alone was not the issue. Moreover, his verdict against Google was based largely around precedents set in the Microsoft trial. The fact that the decision to break up Microsoft was quashed on appeal has been a deterrent to far-reaching “structural” remedies ever since.负责审理此案的法官阿米特·梅塔（Amit Mehta）可能有其他考量。对他来说，解体谷歌可能显得过于严苛。他裁决的要点在于，谷歌通过与苹果等公司达成的“排他性”分销协议，在搜索和文本广告领域获得了垄断利益。而问题的关键并不在于谷歌的规模本身。此外，他对谷歌的判决主要是依据微软案中确立的先例。自那以后，由于微软被解体的决定在上诉中被撤销，这一事件便一直成为阻碍政府采取反垄断深远“结构性”补救措施的绊脚石。Like Mr Kanter, Mr Mehta appears keen to address not just Google's market distortions of the past but also to consider how they will play out in the generative-AI era. For that, targetedremedies may be more likely. An obvious one would be to ban the payments that Google makes for its place as a default search engine on many devices and carriers, which in 2021 came to $26bn. But that would penalise the recipients of Google's cash more than Google, even though they were not in the dock.与坎特相仿，梅塔似乎也迫切希望不仅解决谷歌以往造成的市场扭曲问题，还关注这些问题在生成式人工智能时代将如何发展演变。为此，采取更具针对性的补救措施或许更为合适。一个明确的方案是禁止谷歌支付巨额费用来换取在众多设备及运营商中占据默认搜索引擎的位置，在2021年谷歌的此项花销高达260亿美元。然而，这样的措施可能更不利于收取谷歌费用的合作方，而非谷歌本身，即使这些公司并未卷入本案。
More likely, Google may be required to continue the payments but without the exclusions. This, says Mark Shmulik of Bernstein, a broker, could help spur competition, especially when it comes to generative AI. It would, for instance, give Apple latitude to direct more searches through OpenAI's ChatGPT, with which it is shortly due to start an AI partnership called Apple Intelligence. further helping rivals, Google could be forced to share some data it relies on to make its search business so powerful, including its huge volume of search queries. Google considers such data troves its secret sauce; it will argue that making them publicly available raises privacy and security concerns. But such obligations could be a fillip for firms trying to launch generative-AI capabilities to compete with Google, such as Perplexity.更有可能的情况是，谷歌或许仍需继续支付相关费用，但将被禁止执行排他性协议。经纪公司伯恩斯坦（Bernstein）的马克·施穆利克（Mark Shmulik）指出，此举将有助于激发市场竞争，尤其是在生成式人工智能领域。举例来说，这将为苹果公司提供更大的灵活性，使其能更多地通过OpenAI的ChatGPT进行搜索操作，而苹果与OpenAI即将启动一项名为“Apple Intelligence”的人工智能合作伙伴关系。为了进一步增强竞争对手的实力，谷歌可能会被迫分享其搜索业务所依赖的关键数据资源。这些数据中包含了其庞大的搜索查询量，正是使其搜索业务如此强大的原因。谷歌视这些数据为其核心机密并会辩称，公开这些数据会引发隐私和安全问题。然而，对于那些试图推出生成式人工智能功能以与谷歌竞争的企业（Perplexity）而言，这种对谷歌的强制政策或许正是一剂强心针。Alphabet has vowed to appeal the verdict and the process may drag on for years. In the meantime, the going will be tough. In addition to illegal use of the default payments, the judge found Google guilty of using its monopoly power to push up the price of text advertisements, which could spur a wave of potentially costly lawsuits from advertisers and rivals.字母表公司已明确表示将对裁决提起上诉，而这一过程恐将持续多年。在此期间，谷歌将面临严峻挑战。除被指控非法使用默认支付外，法官还裁定谷歌利用其市场垄断地位抬高文本广告价格，此举可能会促使广告商和谷歌的竞争对手提起一系列成本高昂的诉讼。All this is occurring while the business model of search is changing profoundly. Generative AI is eroding the power of selling ads based on clicking links. So far, Google's ad business has withstood the hit. But this is a bad time to be distracted by lengthy legal wrangling. Perhaps better to try to settle fast and move on.这一切变化正值搜索引擎行业的商业模式经历深刻转型之时。生成式人工智能正在逐渐降低点击链接广告的销售效力。到目前为止，谷歌的广告业务尚未感受到明显的冲击。此时，谷歌不宜被持续的法律纠纷所牵绊。或许，更明智的选择是尽快寻求和解，以便继续前行。
