An influential American think tank reportedly fired a top analyst who was critical of Google’s market dominance after allegedly being pressured by the tech company’s chairman and a major donor.
Barry Lynn worked as a senior fellow at Washington think tank the New America Foundation and had spent years studying the quick growing power of tech companies like Facebook and Google.
But Lynn was axed from the New America earlier this week by foundation president Anne-Marie Slaughter after the New York Times published emails that suggest Google was not pleased with his research.
Since 1999, Google and executive chairman Eric Schmidt have donated $21million to New America as he has chaired the organization for a number of years.
The New America Foundation reportedly fired senior fellow Barry Lynn (above) after he was critical of Google’s market dominance. Lynn says he believes Google’s top executives pressured the influential think tank to fire him
Lynn worked as a senior fellow at Washington think tank the New America Foundation and had spent years studying the quick growing power of tech companies like Facebook and Google (file above)
Lynn thinks that Google is a monopoly and he thinks his opinion of the company that’s within his research cost him his job.
‘I’ve been there for 15 years,’ Lynn told the Guardian. ‘And for 14 everything was great. In the last year or so it has got more difficult.
‘And from every piece of evidence that we are seeing that has to do with pressure from Google.
‘Everyday I see people waking up to the power of Google, Facebook and Amazon. We have to do something as a people, we have to do something through our government and address the power of these companies.
‘The number of congressmen and others making statements on Capitol Hill about this is growing very rapidly.
Lynn was axed from the New America earlier this week by foundation president Anne-Marie Slaughter after the New York Times published emails that suggest Google (file above) was not pleased with his research
‘The number of businesses who are saying that something must be done about the power of these companies and the way they use their power.’
Lynn ran the think tank’s Open Markets initiative and said that his problems started last June when the European Union fined Google a record $2.7billion for breaching antitrust rules and abusing its market dominance.
He posted a quick note that applauded the decision and called on regulators in the US ‘to build upon this important precedent.’
Lynn claims that the note ended his career at the New America.
Slaughter called Lynn’s claims ‘absolutely false’ in a statement and blamed his ‘repeated refusal to adhere to New America’s standards of openness and institutional collegiality’ to relieve him from the job, the Guardian reported.