Perplexity takes a shine to Chrome, offers Google $34.5 billion

AI search biz Perplexity has offered to pay about twice as much as it is worth to acquire Chrome from Google. A company spokesperson confirmed that the nearly three-year-old startup, with an estimated value of $18 billion, has proposed paying $34.5 billion to take Chrome and the associated Chromium open-source project off …

[DS999]

I saw an article earlier today

Saying that the sale would be a bad thing, asking "how could Perplexity ever recoup $35 billion to buy a free browser" and answering that it would have to be monetized via using your data to train their AI. I guess the author didn't think to ask himself the opposite question "if Google refuses, how could they ever believe a free browser is worth more than $35 billion?"

Anyway I doubt it would so much be using our data to train their AI, rather than making the search traffic go to Perplexity's AI which will somehow monetize it with advertising like Google has been doing with Chrome for years.

[elsergiovolador]

Re: I saw an article earlier today

making the search traffic go to

and that should be illegal. Google has ill incentive - as a de facto monopolist - to manipulate results, or to put it bluntly, make them shittier - so that people spend more time finding information and are more likely to click on an Ad.

[stiine]

Re: I saw an article earlier today

Yes, so which one is the lesser of two evils? Answers in the comments, please.

[VicMortimer]

Re: I saw an article earlier today

Whichever one is more likely to destroy Chrome.

Honestly, I'd prefer the vulture capital scam company buy it. It should significantly reduce public trust in Chrome, which will be MUCH better in the long run.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: I saw an article earlier today

No interest in Microsoft Internet Explorer for a dirty $1 note ?

[PerlyKing]

Re: making the search traffic go to Perplexity's AI

While I don't entirely disagree, isn't this much the same as what Google is in trouble for now?

[IGotOut]

Ahhh modern economics

"three-year-old startup, with an estimated value of $18 billion"

And actual profit? Hon on, give us a clue .. Any? Not even 1¢?

I wonder if I walk into a Ferrari dealership and say "I'll take that one, as I'm worth £1billion" they'll go. Sure, here you go. Pay us back when you get chance".

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Ahhh modern economics

Exactly. The correct estimate of their value is a negative number.

[vtcodger]

Re: Ahhh modern economics

Hey man. This is the era of AI, blockchain and cryptocurrency. Profits are so ... like ... nineteenth century.

[steviebuk]

Re: Ahhh modern economics

And maybe they are trying to get something they assume is valuable with money they don't have before the AI bubble bursts. Thinking owning Chrome will keep them afloat.

These large tech companies appear,at times, to just be large money laundering schemes.

[vtcodger]

Re: Ahhh modern economics

Money laundering schemes? Closer to Ponzi schemes I should think. It appears to me that most of the "money" sloshing around in big tech is in the form of IOUs of dubious quality. It seems to me entirely too likely that the motto of the 2020s will turn out to be "Think Big, Fail Big"

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Ahhh modern economics

Anyone interested in some new coloured tulip bulbs?

On the principle that there's nothing new under the Sun, US business valuations seem to be based on an economic model that might have been recognised in New Amsterdam.

[vtcodger]

Re: Ahhh modern economics

By a curious coincidence, I was pricing tulip bulbs on Amazon a couple of hours ago. They're mostly going for over a dollar a bulb this year. If memory serves that's a bit more than last year. Looks to me like a better long term investment than, for example, Tesla TSLA which closed today at 339.38 giving it a price earnings ratio of around 200. By way of comparison, the long term average PE ratio of the S&P500 is around 15. Perhaps a bit of irrational exuberance there.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Ahhh modern economics

Isn't Perplexity being courted by Apple? Since many business valuations are based on potential, rather than actual, values, the actual money isn't real. Not that that is anything new - most modern currencies are based solely on a promise that it has its face value, and that someone will honour it at that.

[Blackjack]

Perplexity doesn't have the money, so this is fishy as hell.

[Anonymous Coward]

"Hey VC funders, we can totally make money out of this browser using AI. Don't ask for details, you wouldn't understand - just remember that AI is magical. Give us the money to buy it. We promise you'll make a huge return"

*VC funders empty wallets into Perplexitys pocket due to being immensely stupid, staggeringly gullible and addicted to gambling*

That's basically how the AI side of the stock market works.

[Charlie Clark]

They do it with equity and leave investors to pay the tab.

But I think this was just cheap and cheeky PR.

[Fido]

Whether Perplexity or some other company buys Chrome, the result will be similar to when Oracle bought Solaris (by way of the Sun acquisition) or when IBM bought RedHat: What was open source ceases to be so within a couple years.

In my option the benefits resulting from companies who have built products based on the open source web rendering and JavaScript engines created by Google far exceed the advantage of letting a third party monitise Chrome by making its code closed source.

[elsergiovolador]

I will always view people contributing to "open source" software, without getting paid, as mugs.

[DrewPH]

Sad but true. They are the chum for the sharks like Google, Oracle, M$ et al.

Been there, done that, eventually closed my FOSS repos.

[midgepad]

You could consider applying to join society.

[GNU Enjoyer]

Correct - if you program "open source" with weak licensing and/or a CLA, the software will be used to attack you and humanity every time.

If you contribute to free software, with strong licensing, you are contributing to a community - where you decide not to contribute unless payment is made upfront or you write something to benefit yourself and further the community by sharing that.

[Smeagolberg]

That says nothing about contributors to open source and much about your view of the world. You have my sympathy.

[Charlie Clark]

I do it, though sometimes I even get paid and I'd argue I've been paid for other stuff partly because of my work on open source.

Personally, I've always thought arguments about payment and copyright completely miss the point: open source is a mixture of hobby and scientific research.

[midgepad]

What was open source licenced

Remains so.

Copyright infringement, passing off for gain, plagiary, etc are not prevented by that or much else, nor is writing new code and licencing it as you think fit.

There is extensive published work on this, and a large population of criminals.

[Throatwarbler Mangrove]

Simple enough, really

Perplexity gets a cash infusion from investors who are definitely not Google to support them taking Chrome and relieving Google of that burden while granting those same investors who, again, are definitely not Google access to Perplexity's AI expertise.

[Anonymous Coward]

User.js

Speaking of web browsers….

I was poking around inside tmy moziila Firefox profile folder using a little know Firefox addon called mozlz4edit (I think that’s what it’s called) and unpacked a pending ping I found in the glean directory that was sending alll my low-level sprivacy settings I had made in about:config back to Mozilla.

I spent several days searching the internet and using Wireshark and the Firefox commandlline creating test profiles and finally was able to get a screenshot of my browsers privacy and security settings that said I was no longer sharing data with Mozzilla and that they would delete all my data within 30 days.

I accomplished this by creating a huge user.js file that I placed in the root of my Firefox profile that has several hundred modifications, mostly disabling things .

The vast majority of the settings came from and amazing user.js file found on GitHub from the user: Arkanfox and another user.js file found on GitHub as well as some settings from Librewolfs .cfg file and from from my own privacy settings and permissions pulled from my preffs.js file after days of digging through about:config.

LibreWolf’s browser has very sensible settings if you don’t have the time to play around with user scripts but it is not as comprehensive as the user.js I combined using sort and grep and will not get the browser to send a deletion request to Mozilla.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: User.js

Is there any browser out there that isn't a data honeypot for someone!

[nonoj]

Re: User.js

Take a look at Tor, Mullvad and DuckDuckGo browsers, in that order.

Some might suggest Brave as well. But when I read some time ago they would let select ads through I stopped using it and haven't looked at it since. They may have discontinued that practice and if so are worth a look as well.

[Anonymous Coward]

Name

Sounds like $35B just for a name. I guess they would also get the customer base, dev team and marketplace. Doesn't sound like $35B in value to me, but I am no expert to really know the business value. I'm sure they could create their own brand based on Chrome but obviously think they couldn't get take up.

[PhilipN]

“Comet, based on Chromium”

But which their website describes as “our new browser built from the ground up”.

[Tubz]

No advertising or AI company should be allowed to own any browser, too much power and they are known abusers, yes includes Microsoft, Apple, Samsung, ChatGPT, OpenAI the list keeps getting bigger.

I would even dare to say, all browsers should be forced to be 100% compliant with a basic core version, that is W3C compliant, allows all the basic things a user would do and then let them add features if they add value to entice users.

[heyrick]

Given how scummy Perplexity is with their bots...

...this would be a really bad thing.

For those unaware (those living under a rock), the PerplexityBot visits your site and clobbers it with no attention paid to anything in robots.txt. If you block the bot, you'll find a regular-looking user agent comes back and does exactly the same thing, but it's now harder to block because it looks like any other user. Oh, and a range of IP addresses are used as well.

Icon, because there's no erect middle finger.

[CorwinX]

Major difference I think

Between Chrome the browser and Chromium the rendering engine.

The latter is open source - so they don't own it and so can't be forced to divest it.

Anyone can build a browser around Chromium.

I suspect they deliberately called their browser Chrome to deliberately obsfucate what they do and do not own.