The antitrust claim by Dreamstime accusing Google of stifling Dreamstime’s images in search results and “favoring contractual partners (Shutterstock and Getty Images) with opportunities not available to other smaller stock photography suppliers” has been dismissed by a federal judge in California.
You can read more on Dreamstime’s claims against Google in the original blog post here.
The judge however has yet to dismiss Dreamstime’s Breach of Contract claim, where Dreamstime alleges Google breached two contracts: (1) the AdWords Agreement and (2) the Google Play Agreement. Dreamstime claims that they paid Google $50 million for AdWords and DisplayAds services, which didn’t meet their expectations and that Google “overcharged and overdelivered” beyond Dreamstime’s daily spending caps.
Judge Dismisses Google’s 1st Amendment Defense in Dreamstime’s Contract Breach Case
Sources:
Order Granting In Part And Denying In Part Motion To Dismiss
On one hand, Dreamstime did engage in trying to skew search results by paying $50 million to Google (which I find shocking), but on the other hand, Google is very very scary. They’re like a James Bond villain. They try to influence elections and they control the information we get and the way we get it. They really need to be reined in. I just don’t know how. Some day they’ll probably have the Bomb haha