Marketplace Tech Bytes: Week in Review — Google antitrust verdict, Trump's crypto stake, and AI angst
7 snips
Sep 5, 2025 Natasha Mascarenhas, a reporter at The Information, joins to discuss the latest in tech. She unpacks the Trump family's new digital token, a controversial move that fuses politics with crypto. The conversation shifts to the impact of artificial intelligence, revealing the anxiety it generates in Silicon Valley and the challenges CEOs face. Also highlighted is Google's recent antitrust ruling, which surprisingly lets them off the hook with just a data-sharing requirement, raising questions about competition in the AI-driven future.
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AI Shifted The Antitrust Outcome
- The judge reduced remedies because rapid AI advances create new competition for Google search.
- AI startups like ChatGPT and Perplexity changed the legal calculus by posing a credible threat to Google's dominance.
Startups Changed The Legal View
- Startups' AI gains forced regulators to rethink structural breakups for incumbents.
- The law now treats AI challengers as meaningful market threats to entrenched firms.
Perplexity's Chrome Play
- Perplexity briefly tried to buy Chrome as a strategic play against Google.
- That unusual move showed how aggressively AI startups considered shortcuts into search dominance.
