[HN Gopher] Commission opens non-compliance investigations again...
___________________________________________________________________
Commission opens non-compliance investigations against Alphabet,
Apple and Meta
Author : impish9208
Score : 474 points
Date : 2024-03-25 10:38 UTC (12 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (ec.europa.eu)
(TXT) w3m dump (ec.europa.eu)
| smartbit wrote:
| Original
| https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_24_...
| see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39814690
| ktosobcy wrote:
| Awesome!
|
| https://twitter.com/EU_Commission/status/1772207590212063397
|
| ~~
|
| I wish they would also push forward with cookie consent pop-up -
| 1) enforce easy reject (as it should be but dumb websites hide it
| away, which is illegal) and better yet 2) enforce it on a browser
| config level like we have do-not-track config but should be with
| 3 levels and enforceable.
| whywhywhywhy wrote:
| > cookie consent pop-up
|
| The second you call it a pop-up it's just more hell, should
| just be a browser setting that has to be abided by. No popup,
| no constantly asking me for consent.
|
| I should consent once, ONCE!
| bootsmann wrote:
| The biggest browser manufacturer is not interested in making
| it easy to opt out of tracking cookies for some reason,
| wonder why that is...
| ktosobcy wrote:
| And because of that it should be _forced_ to do so...
| atomicUpdate wrote:
| They're literally working on a feature to disable third
| party coookies by default:
|
| https://blog.google/products/chrome/privacy-sandbox-
| tracking...
|
| How does that fit in with your conspiracy theorizing?
| bootsmann wrote:
| Tracking cookies != Third party cookies
| sofixa wrote:
| A browser setting would be binary - yes or no.
|
| A per site consent dialog, with per "partner" option, with
| easy to use "Decline all" / "Allow all" buttons, is much more
| granular. Maybe you're OK with a random community website
| "tracking" you because you know it makes them more money from
| ads; but you're not OK with Meta tracking you across the
| whole web.
| flanked-evergl wrote:
| > A browser setting would be binary - yes or no.
|
| Many other browser settings are specific per site. This can
| also be.
| ktosobcy wrote:
| Other settings are per site and this one can be as well -
| you can select "reject all", "accept all" (or "reject non-
| essential") and be done with that... or use "ask each time"
| like with mic/camera and there would be small, tiny,
| browser-ui pop-up in usual place...
| tbrownaw wrote:
| > _should just be a browser setting that has to be abided by_
|
| It should be a browser setting that is enforced by the
| browser.
|
| If I open something in private mode, or use the multi-account
| containers extension (Firefox), cookies are isolated or
| forgotten _without any involvement from the remote party_.
| The site doesn 't need to know or care.
| oaiey wrote:
| a precedence in pay-or-consent would uproot a lot of news
| business. Overdue because this is illegal since GDPR but this
| is a tough cookie (oh the wordplay) for many organizations.
| boxed wrote:
| I guess they don't feel comfortable mandating how open source
| software is written?
|
| Safari could be mandated to do something like this and honestly
| I think Apple would be very happy to do it, but it's a bit
| weirder with Firefox...
| ktosobcy wrote:
| I'd say that Firefox would be even on board with the idea
| (weird they haven't proposed it themselves).
|
| Besides - EU could create a law saying: "website should obey
| browser setting and if such setting is not present allow user
| to consent to tracking"
| vmfunction wrote:
| Cookies in 2024 is kinda irrelevant, more important is to
| prevent fingerprinting of veriest kind (CSS, fonts, GPU, screen
| size etc).
| ben_w wrote:
| The actual law is about any kind of personal data, including
| but not limited to fingerprinting web/app users, which can be
| associated with a real human.
|
| European fear of harms caused by malicious use of databases
| of personal data go back to actual harms caused by such
| databases when they were still paper-based and the first
| transistors had not even been demonstrated.
| noirscape wrote:
| They're also on the way out because Google is moving to turn
| Chrome into a massive tracking black box on it's own.
|
| There's no need to use cookie-based fingerprinting if you
| control ~97% of the browser market and you can just install
| the tracking tools directly in the software used and keep
| them active with maliciously crafted (dark pattern) popups.
| Deukhoofd wrote:
| Yeah the ePrivacy Regulation, which would overhaul cookie
| consent, was supposed to pass alongside the GDPR. I don't think
| any real progress has been made on it for years. The last
| update on the text itself was in 2021.
|
| https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/policies/eprivacy-r...
| ktosobcy wrote:
| This sounds awesome! Comission is again a step ahead ;)
|
| > Simpler rules on cookies: the cookie provision, which has
| resulted in an overload of consent requests for internet
| users, will be streamlined. The new rule will be more user-
| friendly as browser settings will provide an easy way to
| accept or refuse tracking cookies and other identifiers. The
| proposal also clarifies that no consent is needed for non-
| privacy intrusive cookies that improve internet experience,
| such as cookies to remember shopping-cart history or to count
| the number of website visitors.
|
| basically what I mentioned before
| lioeters wrote:
| Website: "We and our 281 partners value your privacy.. Click to
| accept and continue, or click here to waste your time with this
| massive list of checkboxes."
|
| Me: _Close tab._
| robin_reala wrote:
| 281? Peanuts, try 1,609: https://www.allrecipes.com/
| trompetenaccoun wrote:
| The supporters don't seem to understand how much of their
| lifetime gets wasted with clicking through those popups. This
| should be a once for all setting in the browser that the
| websites can access.
| ulucs wrote:
| It's called uBlock
| stahtops wrote:
| NO MORE POP UPS
| Vinnl wrote:
| Non-Twitter link:
| https://social.network.europa.eu/@EU_Commission/112155867623...
| mupuff1234 wrote:
| Why isn't Microsoft on this list?
| pkphilip wrote:
| Good point. I guess the world recognizes that MS isn't quite as
| dominant as it was before - aleast on the operating systems
| side with Apple and Linux gaining reasonable share
| Ekaros wrote:
| Also Windows is comparably open to other environments. The
| Windows and Xbox stores exist, but you are not forced to use
| them or does MS take a cut on software sold.
|
| Only potential issue I see is bundling of Office 365 and
| Teams. And they already fixed that one. So they are the least
| worst player on market.
| robertlagrant wrote:
| Can you install a game on an Xbox with no disc drive
| without using their store?
| Ekaros wrote:
| No... Same goes for Sony. And Nintendo just stopped
| running their OS on not their hardware... I hope EU gets
| around to fix those later...
| threeseed wrote:
| That would destroy the console industry as we know it.
|
| Consoles are sold at close to break even with money made
| back through game sales.
|
| If EU allowed third party stores and stripped their
| commissions it would trigger a mass consolidation where
| Sony, Nintendo etc would buy developers, game engine
| vendors etc en masse and force exclusivity.
|
| Indie developers in particular would have no way to
| compete. And consumers would be forced to buy multiple
| consoles.
| inexcf wrote:
| I don't know how you arrive at those conclusions. None of
| this make sense to me. The thing you fear is already
| reality. Console manufacturers have always been trying to
| force exclusivity. Which they can because they own the
| store. For a long time exclusives were the only thing
| carrying console sales, and forcing customers to buy
| multiple consoles.
|
| Why would anyone want to be bought? There would be
| nothing to gain for devs. No one would need to accept any
| deals to get on a platform since they wouldn't need to
| use the manufacturer's store. Currently the deal is
| "Money + Access to the platform". Third party stores
| would cut this deal down to just "Money". Thus
| exclusivity deals would get a lot more expensive for
| Sony, Nintendo etc. Thus they would be able to buy less
| "developers, game engine vendors etc en masse".
|
| Indie devs would have a much easier time competing
| without having to bow to the gatekeepers demands. I
| really don't get your reasoning.
| robertlagrant wrote:
| The info you're missing is: game dev companies already
| get bought.
|
| The question you should answer is: how much would an
| unsubsidised console cost?
| Qwertious wrote:
| >The question you should answer is: how much would an
| unsubsidised console cost?
|
| (I'm not the person you replied to, but)
|
| About as much as a gaming PC, because that's exactly what
| it is these days. Except actual gaming PCs of the same
| price would have lower TCO, since you don't need to pay
| for an Xbox Live/PSN subscription.
| robertlagrant wrote:
| > Except actual gaming PCs of the same price would have
| lower TCO, since you don't need to pay for an Xbox
| Live/PSN subscription.
|
| Gaming PCs should still cost a bit more, because:
|
| 1. they aren't sold in vast quantities with the same
| spec, and so supplier can't negotiate vast discounts
|
| 2. they often don't have games nearly as optimised for
| them, because different PCs have different
| configurations, so you need to buy much specs for the
| same performance
|
| 3. consoles likely factor in total procurement costs over
| the lifetime of the console, and so they can be cheaper
| initially and lower price more slowly than they lower
| costs, to recoup some of the deficit
|
| However of course in practice if you can't subsidise your
| game console with game sales, then (2) and (3) probably
| vanish.
| inexcf wrote:
| > game dev companies already get bought.
|
| That is what i am saying. It already happens. Opening
| more markets makes it less attractive for games companies
| to accept getting bought, doesn't it? If manufactures had
| the money to buy all the devs on masse they would
| already. Third party markets would only lessen their
| negotiation power. Devs could just go somewhere else.
| Especially with your other point below.
|
| > how much would an unsubsidised console cost?
|
| More and they would sell less of them? Making it less
| attractive for game devs to develop for said console. So
| what am i missing?
| robertlagrant wrote:
| > Opening more markets makes it less attractive for games
| companies to accept getting bought, doesn't it?
|
| Not really, unless it suddenly becomes easy to develop
| and market a game for all platforms. Pushing your code to
| a shop instead 3 shops won't be an amazing saving.
|
| > More and they would sell less of them? Making it less
| attractive for game devs to develop for said console. So
| what am i missing?
|
| Well - if fewer consoles exist, each with 10 different
| store fronts you have to now push to, presumably that
| means games cost more, as they're selling fewer units,
| and (less important, but still painful) they have to
| figure out which store should have which integrations /
| price / deals/ etc.
| dotnet00 wrote:
| Things have pretty visibly been getting pushed away from
| exclusivity by the console makers. MS commits to bringing
| all first party Xbox games to PC and Sony has ported over
| a lot of its most popular titles as well.
| stavros wrote:
| Instead of just raising the price of the console so it
| makes a profit?
| Qwertious wrote:
| Mandating consoles be opened up _would_ destroy the
| console industry as we know it, but that would be a good
| thing - the only reason consoles were a good thing in the
| first place was because they were specialist devices that
| drove hardware innovation that simply wasn 't feasible
| otherwise. Nowadays consoles aren't specialist hardware;
| they're PCs that have been slightly modified. The value
| proposition for consoles have almost nothing to do with
| new hardware capabilities like the N64 or PS3 promised
| (PS3 _promised_ ; the PS3's launch flopped due to Sony's
| arrogance and failure to cater to devs, not due to lack
| of power in the hardware itself - as later PS3 games
| demonstrate).
|
| So suppose consoles were forced to open up - if Sony and
| Nintendo bought devs en masse, then 1) that sounds like
| an end-run and could easily open them up to a product-
| tying suit, 2) that would lose them _tons_ of money,
| because now they 're losing money on their hardware _and_
| their devs (because forcing exclusives loses more than
| half of your potential sales base), and 3) indies wouldn
| 't give a shit, because Steam already exists and in fact
| could be one of those third-party stores that the EU
| specifically forced consoles to allow, in this
| hypothetical.
|
| This wouldn't catch the industry _completely_ flatfooted
| either, because back in the Windows 8 era Microsoft
| managed to scare Valve enough that they started investing
| in Linux as a backstop. The _Steam Machines_ were a flop,
| but they 've since released the Steam Deck to fill the
| portable console niche, and they've kept working on
| SteamOS and Big Picture mode to fill the gaming HTPC
| niche.
|
| Also, you're claiming that Microsoft might buy Unreal
| Engine or Unity in order to force it to be Xbox-
| exclusive; that _would_ bring the antitrust hammer down
| like nothing else. The only result of consequence in the
| 0.0002ns before the EU carpetbombs Redmond, would be a
| huge upsurge in suppport for Godot. Godot isn 't ready
| for primetime just yet (especially in 3D) and games can't
| practically switch engine mid-development, but people are
| already on edge from Unity's recent "charge per download"
| (scandal? controversy? worrying incident? whatever you
| call it.)
|
| Also, there are entire markets where game consoles don't
| have all that much penetration. China, in particular, who
| had banned consoles entirely until 2015, and restricted
| them until at least 2018. Convincing the Chinese market
| to buy even one console, let alone multiple, is
| unrealistic and platform holders know it.
| robertlagrant wrote:
| > the only reason consoles were a good thing in the first
| place was because they were specialist devices that drove
| hardware innovation that simply wasn't feasible
| otherwise. Nowadays consoles aren't specialist hardware;
| they're PCs that have been slightly modified
|
| Not just that. They're a standard spec that people build
| to, and wring performance out of, and consult to
| game/engine manufacturers, and they sponsor tournaments
| and do marketing. They're also sold below cost, both
| because they can order in bulk, but also because they can
| assume future components will be cheaper for the same
| spec, and they might be able to lower their internal
| costs eventually.
|
| You can already buy a PC and play games on it. Consoles
| are an additional thing you can buy, and removing them
| removes choice.
|
| > Also, you're claiming that Microsoft might buy Unreal
| Engine or Unity in order to force it to be Xbox-
| exclusive; that would bring the antitrust hammer down
| like nothing else. The only result of consequence in the
| 0.0002ns before the EU carpetbombs Redmond, would be a
| huge upsurge in suppport for Godot.
|
| It won't be this simple. It'll just be better support on
| Microsoft platforms, and cross-play between PC and Xbox,
| to drown out Steam a little and Playstation a lot.
| robertlagrant wrote:
| The EU can't fix what isn't broken. They can break what's
| working, perhaps, but I doubt they'll do it as the
| results would be too obviously bad in this case.
|
| My real point is in asking: why are people not allowed to
| sell what they want, without massive fines coming their
| way (that don't come the way of others doing what they
| do)?
| kristjansson wrote:
| AFAIK, MSFT still takes 12% of PC game sales in the windows
| store, and 30% of sales in the xbox store.
| Vespasian wrote:
| Which is fine because there is ample competition on
| Windows and MS does very little to hamper it (as far as
| the DMA is concerned).
|
| Apple would also be allowed to charge whatever they want
| in the app store if there were actual competition on the
| platform.
|
| Since there isn't they have to play by the rules.
| Ekaros wrote:
| In store yes, on platform no. Like Steam makes what
| hundreds of millions with no cut to MS.
| epolanski wrote:
| Because MS does not prevent me from anything like different
| stores or installing anything I want.
| chucke1992 wrote:
| Because Microsoft does not have consumer facing products where
| they have the ultimate control over.
| progbits wrote:
| Here's the list: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Mark
| ets_Act#Sectors_...
|
| Windows and LinkedIn should be covered.
|
| Maybe there isn't anything that the commission wants to
| investigate there because they did a good enough job
| complying. But future can bring more probes.
| PlutoIsAPlanet wrote:
| Microsoft didn't really have much to change on Windows
| outside of restoring the ability to uninstall system apps
| in the EEA and turning things off, and making users aware
| of such ability.
|
| They don't control distribution of software on Windows (no
| one uses MS Store), it already has major stores owned by
| different companies such as Steam, Epic etc that have as
| much access to the OS that the MS Store does.
| diggan wrote:
| I think it's because while Microsoft tries their hardest to nag
| people about their products (like Edge ads forcible injected
| into Chrome somehow), they don't prevent alternatives like
| Apple, as an example.
| oaiey wrote:
| Microsoft is a very open platform regards many of the aspects
| of the DMA. There is app sideloading, alternative app stores,
| alternative browsers, alternative payment methods,
| alternative hardware, license-free ports, and there are now
| more laptops than ever offered without windows. In the cloud,
| they have valid competition (Google, AWS) in both IaaS, PaaS
| and SaaS (Office).
|
| Microsoft got regulated since before Google was founded (to
| put in context).
| supriyo-biswas wrote:
| The more uncharitable interpretation of this would be that
| Microsoft has enmeshed itself to such an extent such that the
| bundling of Office365+Entra+Azure+Teams isn't worth the loss of
| these services to governments who may potentially want to
| launch an investigation.
| thiago_fm wrote:
| Lots of governments in the EU uses Linux and non-Microsoft
| alternatives.
|
| I'm guessing the EU is focused on consumer, not B2B focused
| companies
| filleokus wrote:
| > Lots
|
| Citation needed as they say. Even if it's true that's it
| more than 0, my estimate would be far in excess of 90% (of
| governmental employees who do their work inside of the
| Microsoft ecosystem).
|
| But your other point about not focusing on B2B is probably
| more true. However recent stuff like the cloud egress fees
| (EU Data ACT) shows that they do care about B2B sometimes
| at least.
| kypro wrote:
| Not suggesting this is the reasoning, but interestingly same
| is true of Amazon which powers a lot of gov infrastructure.
| supriyo-biswas wrote:
| For Amazon, they've been unable to enmesh themselves in the
| same way, and with the EU DATA act passed, I'd assume
| they'd make quick work of the egress fees which are the
| main barrier towards multi-cloud architectures.
| concinds wrote:
| Not at all. The EU announced just days ago that they're
| investigating MS Entra+365
|
| https://www.theregister.com/2024/03/22/eu_antitrust_microsof.
| ..
|
| They started an investigation on 365+Teams a year ago:
|
| https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_23_.
| ..
|
| And Microsoft complied by unbundling Teams in the EEA:
|
| https://www.reuters.com/technology/microsoft-unbundle-
| teams-...
|
| and late last year, the EU asked Teams rivals whether they
| still thought there was an issue:
|
| https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/microsoft-rivals-
| asked-...
| dacryn wrote:
| whilst similar, an antitrust investigation is different
| than this one. Microsoft should be on both lists.
| concinds wrote:
| They are "on both lists". The DMA is about platform
| gatekeeping, and the EU _did_ designate Microsoft a
| gatekeeper with Windows.
|
| Microsoft's DMA changes include allowing Edge to be
| uninstalled, interoperability in Search and Widgets,
| asking users for consent before syncing content through
| the connected Microsoft account, and more strictly
| respecting browser defaults.
| noirscape wrote:
| Mostly because Microsoft doesn't really gatekeep Windows and is
| actually compliant with the DMA; they were motioning to the
| same tricks as the other gatekeepers (main one is forced
| bundling), but the DMA caused them to retract on all of those
| changes.
|
| Right now, you can properly remove all Windows apps from W11,
| which was really the big one that they started doing with
| Windows 10 alongside the Microsoft account push in OOBE (dunno
| if that one is still required). They also supposedly made
| actually disabling the Windows telemetry much more feasible
| than it used to be.
| bilbo0s wrote:
| Not tryiing to be argumentative, rather I geenuinely have a
| serious question.
|
| But doesn't MS gatekeep xbox?
| noirscape wrote:
| They do, but Xbox isn't considered a large enough market to
| be considered a gatekeeper affected by the DMA. None of the
| major console makers are.
|
| The platform must have any of the following to be a DMA
| gatekeeper:
|
| * Market capitalization of at least EUR75 billion.
|
| * More than EUR7.5 billion turnover from EEA residents.
|
| * At least 45 million customers in EEA.
|
| * At least 4.5 million business customers in EEA.
|
| Once any of those criteria are met for 3 years, they
| qualify as a Gatekeeper. While the gaming market is
| _massive_ , any individual console platform still sits
| pretty comfortably below those criteria. You can find the
| customer number by googling around a bit - Xbox only has
| around 3 million active customers if I'm not mistaken
| (counted by Xbox Live accounts that were active in the past
| year).
|
| A platform truly needs to be collosal to be considered a
| Gatekeeper. This law is specifically for the large
| platforms, not small fry.
| InsomniacL wrote:
| > Xbox only has around 3 million active customers
|
| This seems very low given:
|
| > As of 2022, Microsoft announced around 120 million
| monthly active users (MAUs).
| noirscape wrote:
| Mind that Xbox is _much_ smaller outside the US and the
| UK compared to the other console makers.
|
| From the top of my head, the percentage counts for Europe
| in console market share are around 50/40/10
| (Nintendo/Sony/Xbox).
|
| So yes, they probably have 120 million MAUs globally, but
| the overwhelming majority of those will be coming from
| the US, where Xbox controls about half the console
| market. (Just for completeness sake: Xbox has almost no
| presence in Asia, South America or Africa - their
| failures in Asia are well documented and Xbox does no
| advertising whatsoever in South America whilst the
| African gaming market isn't large enough to be worth
| considering since there are other priorities there). And
| of course, those users aren't considered for EU
| legislation since the US isn't part of the EEA.
| nottorp wrote:
| Interesting enough, back in the ps3/ps4 days everyone in
| my corner of Eastern Europe seemed to have gone for an
| xbox (and maybe even an xbox 360).
|
| In the past few years, the xboxes were always in stock
| while people were joining waiting lists and lotteries *
| for the PS5.
|
| * One large electronics chain actually had a lottery for
| the PS5 preorders at launch, because they weren't getting
| enough to cover what was already paid for! Some lucky
| people got a PS5 the rest got their money back :)
| bombcar wrote:
| Every generation has the "most piracy friendly console"
| and that one often does quite well, for that and other
| reasons.
|
| The Xbox was _king_ there for awhile.
| nottorp wrote:
| That too. I guess people have got used to paying for
| games now and are picking the console based on
| exclusives/general experience.
|
| In my mind the xbox is for dudebro shooters and the
| playstation is for original, creative games. Things may
| have changed from the original xbox but it's too late for
| me.
| bombcar wrote:
| Halo and XBMC really shaped (at least) my perception of
| the consoles even to this day; but I got an Xbox X
| because it plays blu-ray and was in stock.
|
| Later I learned the PS5 can't even play CDs so maybe I
| dodged a tiny bullet.
|
| Of course, most of the actual _gaming_ happens on the
| Switch, but if it 's cross-platform I'll probably get it
| on the Xbox (Hogwarts, for example).
| nottorp wrote:
| > Halo and XBMC really shaped (at least) my perception of
| the consoles even to this day; but I got an Xbox X
| because it plays blu-ray and was in stock.
|
| Sorry. I played the windows port of the first Halo until
| some level with a jeep. I got lost in it, didn't know
| where to go, and I abandoned it. I kinda weaned myself
| off shooters (except Serious Sam) about then, or with
| some return to castle wolfenstein game which i found
| about as boring. And that was even before cover based
| shooters...
|
| As for XBMC... I don't like having a noisy power hungry
| box on when I watch a movie. Had different solutions,
| right now using a Chromecast.
|
| > Of course, most of the actual gaming happens on the
| Switch
|
| It's interesting from the outside how Nintendo has
| captured the minds of gamers everywhere where they grew
| up with those gameboys and NESes...
|
| Me, I grew up with ZX Spectrum clones that were 'just a
| computer'. Then I got different computers. Fine. Not
| really a fan of a platform.
| somenameforme wrote:
| They seem to be going to PC, at least assuming few people
| are replacing consoles with mobile gaming. [1] I gamed on
| consoles for nearly 3 decades, but I don't understand the
| current appeal. 'Back in the day', consoles were heavily
| subsidized loss leaders, and launched with extremely high
| end hardware. The video card in the original XBox was not
| only a beast, but also worth substantially more than the
| entire console was sold for!
|
| At the same time PC gaming was pretty tough. Steam didn't
| even exist until 2003, and in it's early days - it was
| little more than a DRM wrapper for Counterstrike. And
| that was also the era when a new PC was outdated in a few
| months, and completely obsolete in a few years. Now we're
| in the era where consoles launch with midrange PC
| hardware sold at a markup to hit profitability ASAP,
| console games have things like day 1 patches/ad-filled
| dashboards/pay to use your own internet/etc, PC gaming
| has become amazingly convenient, and a decent PC from 5
| years ago can still run nearly all new games today, with
| no performance issues whatsoever.
|
| [1] - https://www.visualcapitalist.com/50-years-gaming-
| history-rev...
| nottorp wrote:
| > but I don't understand the current appeal.
|
| Well I don't have a gaming video card atm. If i were to
| get one it would cost as much as i paid for the ps5.
|
| So I play indies and strategy on my pcs and macs (amd APU
| and a M2) and i get the few AAAs I'm interested in on
| console. For one a good bunch of them are Sony stuff and
| either show up on the playstation first or the pc ports
| are problematic.
|
| For two, if i ever got another Rockstar game, for
| example, I'll get it on console because Sony doesn't
| allow the mandatory account crap.
| bombcar wrote:
| I can tell you what the appeal is - watching "normies"
| try to use the Xbox/PS5 compared to the Switch (and even
| the Switch is sometimes complicatedly annoying for them).
|
| Consoles are still way closer to "plug and play" than
| even the best PCs. Phones have them beat, however.
| nottorp wrote:
| > Phones have them beat, however.
|
| But phones sadly don't have games. They only have
| predatory gambling apps with game skins.
| ambichook wrote:
| genshin is fun on its own but a friend of mine spends so
| much money on it that it's honestly terrifying, puts me
| off of playing it all that much. i would love it if it
| were $60 and everything was unlockable with a reasonable
| time investment, or even if it were a sub model like a
| lot of MMOs
| nottorp wrote:
| ... which is exactly what I was saying.
| ambichook wrote:
| i misread your intent then, to me at least "gambling apps
| with game skins" and "fun games with predatory
| monetisation" are distinct :>
| snowpid wrote:
| Xbox is rather unimportant in the EU.
| https://www.vgchartz.com/article/456571/ps5-vs-xbox-
| series-x...
| tyfon wrote:
| This is not really Xbox, but also Minecraft, Roblox,
| windows game pass etc, and it is for the whole world.
|
| Xbox the console is almost non existent among users and
| in stores here in Europe, it's all Nintendo and
| PlayStation
| pera wrote:
| I believe the threshold for DMA is 45m MAU inside the EU.
| ryandrake wrote:
| I wonder if the monetary values will be regularly
| adjusted for inflation. If not, then it's only a matter
| of time, waiting for money to be devalued and then the
| platforms qualify.
| p_l wrote:
| As far as I know game consoles live in a slightly different
| legal space where there's no assumption that they are
| supposed to be "open" systems.
| 3836293648 wrote:
| Nope, they're just not big enough to be covered by the
| relevant parts of the DMA. Only "gatekeepers" are.
| grishka wrote:
| Xbox is a video game appliance, not a general-purpose
| computing platform.
| askonomm wrote:
| You can? Last I tried I couldn't remove Edge, could not
| change search engine used in the Windows search to anything
| other than Bing, every new windows update would default
| install new apps like Candy Crush and Amazon Prime I never
| wanted, and so on, and disabling Windows telemetery seems
| impossible without registry hacks. Ever installed a new
| Win11? Riddled with dark pattern UX to deceive you into extra
| telemetry.
| nottorp wrote:
| I think they only allow all those things in the EU, and
| only in a very recent update.
| saratogacx wrote:
| The way MS did this was kind of dodge but fits the letter
| of the law.
|
| On a new install of Windows 11, if you select an EU region,
| you will have the options to remove things like edge in the
| OS. You can move off that region because this flag is set
| only on install. If you install with a non-eu region, you
| don't have access to those options.
| faeriechangling wrote:
| It's hard to buy windows without buying Teams along with it,
| that's how they crushed slack.
| rezonant wrote:
| That's easy. I think you mean it's hard to buy _Office_
| without buying Teams, which is true.
| slartibutfast wrote:
| They are, kinda.
|
| > The Commission has also adopted five retention orders
| addressed to Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Meta, and Microsoft,
| asking them to retain documents which might be used to assess
| their compliance with the DMA obligations, so as to preserve
| available evidence and ensure effective enforcement.
|
| So, they are not under active investigation at the moment, but
| they are being monitored.
|
| source
| https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_24_...
| https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_23_...
| multimoon wrote:
| I'm not in support of the DMA and I'm not in favor of the US
| suit against Apple, and I too have been wondering how Microsoft
| - who I'd argue is the most anticompetitive of all, with the
| longest history of doing so - has escaped all of this lately.
| They really must be funding some important people's pockets.
| spogbiper wrote:
| Its simple: Microsoft doesn't do the things that the DMA says
| companies can't do.
|
| They may do other anti-consumer things, but they don't do
| these things.
| toast0 wrote:
| Microsoft has been through this before. EU windows has a
| browser choice screen and you can buy it without windows
| media player (I think for the same price or darn near as
| with). Microsoft is good at painting in or near the lines,
| from decades of practice. They _probably_ also respond to new
| regulations without an excess of foot dragging.
|
| Also, they weren't able to turn their dominant position in
| desktops into anything in mobile.
| layer8 wrote:
| Maybe the EU Commission hasn't received DMA-related
| complaints from other companies about Microsoft. The
| Commission seems to be careful to base investigations on
| competitor statements.
| majani wrote:
| For browser bundling, Chrome has beaten Edge out handily, so
| there's no case there. For Office bundling, they charge
| separately for it, so there's no real case their either
| dkjaudyeqooe wrote:
| It's a good idea to regulate and examine companies with over a
| certain share of the market and over a certain size since it's
| almost guaranteed they will abuse their market position one way
| or another.
|
| These companies pose a general threat to the proper functioning
| of a healthy market due to network effects and compatibility
| issues, things that regulators should always be working to
| counteract.
| stingraycharles wrote:
| Especially because in a global market, these kind of companies
| can be more powerful than governments. So it's a good thing
| that large countries, or unions of countries, attempt to push
| back a little bit on their power.
|
| I think EU has an easier case, because the way I understand it,
| in the EU anticompetitive behavior in itself is illegal, while
| in the US, as long as you can argue the consumer benefits (eg
| Amazon selling stuff at a loss), it's no problem.
| nameless912 wrote:
| I think you can replace "can be" with "are".
|
| If Google, Apple or Meta feel like what you're saying is not
| in their interest for the public to hear it, you just...
| can't say it. Apple can remotely disable your iPhone. Google
| can remove you from search results. Meta can nuke your social
| media presence from orbit.
|
| This is by no means an endorsement of the guy because he's a
| complete piece of shit, but the one thing Alex Jones got
| right during his temper tantrum when he got deplatformed is
| that getting deplatformed is not a thing that only happens to
| people you don't like; theoretically, and in fact quite
| regularly, large multinationals can simply decide that
| someone should cease to exist in the public sphere, and they
| can legally disappear people more effectively than the CIA.
| Today it's anti vax loonies and racist conspiracy theorists,
| tomorrow it's folks reporting on Apple's Foxconn factories in
| China or Meta's content moderation staff or Google's spying
| on people's private communications.
|
| We live in a world where we've created the marketplace of
| ideas, which necessarily means that those who hold the
| marketplace have to give everyone a stall, almost regardless
| of how vile their ideas are. Not doing so is a great way for
| large corporations to silence their critics on a scale never
| before imagined. I'm not exaggerating when I say these three
| companies can _erase you from existence_. Losing your Google
| account, Apple ID, and Meta accounts all at once would be an
| excellent way to prevent a corporate dissident from accessing
| the info they need to keep these companies accountable. It 's
| terrifying, and it's also a mundane kind of terrifying that
| requires what might seem like overly aggressive government
| regulation, but I really don't see another way forward.
|
| And before someone comes in and says something to the effect
| of "well, isn't all of the above still true if you replace
| Google, Apple and Meta with $COUNTRY?" and of course the
| answer is yes, but at the very very least, countries are
| theoretically accountable to their citizens. Corporations are
| effectively accountable to no one, which is certainly worse.
| robertlagrant wrote:
| > in fact quite regularly, large multinationals can simply
| decide that someone should cease to exist in the public
| sphere, and they can legally disappear people more
| effectively than the CIA
|
| This also happens jointly, I think. E.g. Russell Brand
| after sexual assault allegations came out was demonetised
| on YouTube following a letter from the House of Commons
| media committee to YouTube. I can't be bothered to find an
| exact article, but Rumble got the same letter, but didn't
| comply, in this BBC article[0].
|
| [0] https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-66875128
| ben_w wrote:
| As a non-American looking in from outside:
|
| "De-platformed" and "cancel culture" seem to be the names
| given when the it's done by a left-associated corporations
| or governments.
|
| "Black-listed", "not renewed for another season", "banned
| from VISA/PayPal etc. payment providers due to ToS
| violations", and "violating public decency" seem to be the
| names for the same actions when taken by right-associated
| corporations or governments.
|
| (${team}- _associated_ because this is about perceptions
| rather than any actual political preference).
| cmrdporcupine wrote:
| The answer here is not necessarily for the govts to force
| big $$ platforms to act like neutral carriers, but for govt
| to enact and encourage policies to stop/slow the
| centralization and monopolization of information and
| entertainment around centralized $$ platforms, and to
| prevent such behemoths from sucking all the air out of the
| room in the first place.
|
| (Which, frankly, includes not using said platforms for
| their own communications. Not sure why Twitter is treated
| like a generic newswire and announcement system by schools,
| community groups, governments, etc ... after everything
| that's happened.)
|
| That's the vision we had of the Internet in the 90s:
| decentralized, publish your own content and link-out to
| other's. Not sure why we let that get derailed into the
| closed boxes we have today.
|
| Asshats like Alex Jones or Russel Brand wouldn't even be a
| concern and we wouldn't be talking about "deplatforming" as
| a thing really if the "platform" hadn't grown so
| unreasonably big and powerful in the first place. The Age
| Of Narcissism is entirely our own fault.
|
| If you build a huge giant megaphone and leave it lying in
| the middle of the playground, inevitably some jerk is going
| to "misuse" it.
| amelius wrote:
| Consumers would be helped more if these large companies are
| broken up.
|
| We could have so much more competition if Apple was divided
| into software, hardware and services companies.
|
| And these companies (except perhaps the services company) would
| be more pro-consumer, making stuff that we actually want
| instead of stuff that Apple wants us to have (and vendor-locks
| us in).
|
| It is also a bit ridiculous that some of the best CPUs out
| there are available only for consumer products.
| threeseed wrote:
| This comment is pretty ignorant of the history of computing.
|
| Apple tried to allow competition in their ecosystem. And all
| that happened is that vendors like Power Computing went
| straight for Apple's most profitable markets and nearly
| bankrupted the company.
|
| The only reason Apple is successful is because people like
| the console-esque experience of having one vendor do
| everything.
| aurareturn wrote:
| It's about choice. I want a tightly integrated experience on
| my iPhone and Mac. I don't want regulators as designers.
|
| iPhone and Macs own a small fraction of their markets around
| the world. Clearly there are alternatives and you don't need
| to choose an iPhone or a Mac.
| simion314 wrote:
| >It's about choice. I want a tightly integrated experience
| on my iPhone and Mac. I don't want regulators as designers.
|
| if you are from outside EU then you are fine for now, you
| will not have this freedoms.
|
| If you are from EU then keep calm, nobody will force you to
| use a better application or service then the default ones
| from Apple. Side loading was available on Android and
| facebook Messenger and whatsapp are still on the official
| store despite all the FUD from Apple extremist fanboys, you
| can continue sitting inside the Apple walls.
| dkjaudyeqooe wrote:
| Even so Apple shouldn't be able to use its position to
| disadvantage users. I believe being able to run whatever
| software you want on the hardware you buy is a basic right.
| If you want to forgo that, fine, but you should have the
| choice.
|
| The fact that they have a small market share is not
| relevant when they have many millions of users.
|
| This kind of thing leads to oligopolies that disadvantage
| consumers, which is what we have with phone app stores on
| Android and iPhone.
| burnerthrow008 wrote:
| > I believe being able to run whatever software you want
| on the hardware you buy is a basic right. If you want to
| forgo that, fine, but you should have the choice.
|
| Ok, so then why do you support the EU denying me that
| choice?
| amelius wrote:
| > It's about choice. I want a tightly integrated experience
| on my iPhone and Mac.
|
| If it's about choice, then Apple performs very poorly at
| it. Apple is great if your requirements are average. A
| large minority of people still have to look elsewhere.
| burnerthrow008 wrote:
| Apple performs poorly at giving you choice by... making
| something _different_ to everyone else? Do you understand
| what choice means?
| dkjaudyeqooe wrote:
| I don't think that's necessarily the answer. Often these
| things arise out of market failure.
|
| For instance Apple couldn't sell its ARM processors even if
| it wanted to because ARM's licence agreement with Apple
| forbids it. The problem is that the market for CPUs lacks
| choice. Hopefully RISC-V will alleviate that, eventually.
| nottorp wrote:
| > For instance Apple couldn't sell its ARM processors even
| if it wanted to because ARM's licence agreement with Apple
| forbids it.
|
| First time i hear that. Isn't Apple a founding member and
| can do whatever it wants?
| dkjaudyeqooe wrote:
| No they sold their ARM stock decades ago, they have no
| special rights.
|
| They bought an architectural licence, but those always
| come with limitations, or you just don't get one. See
| Qualcomm's litigation against ARM.
| nottorp wrote:
| Okay, but hell will still freeze over before Apple sells
| even a resistor they make to a 3rd party. Let alone a
| CPU.
| ankit219 wrote:
| Continuous examining for abuse is great and what a proactive
| regulator should be doing anyway. Question is, does it
| incentivize these companies to reduce their market share by
| different means - going low on a certain marketing campaign,
| release a subpar product, or make choices that alienate say
| bottom 10-20% of users and cause them to leave. Once they
| reduce the market share, would they not be examined till they
| attain that market share back? (that is after the market
| definition is clear)
|
| In India, there is UPI which at it's core is dominated by 2-3
| apps. Regulator is trying to reduce market share but to no
| avail. The thing is, service is free for end user, so the only
| way a service provider app (links user with banks on whose
| rails the tech works) earns money is via advertising. Others
| dont take it up because returns are only possible once you burn
| money to attain a certain scale. No one in the chain earns
| anything on a single transaction except banks(paid for by other
| banks). Think while regulator should be watching the apps (and
| banks) closely, they should instead also work on an incentive
| structure which could open the market further for newer
| entrants.
| _visgean wrote:
| > Question is, does it incentivize these companies to reduce
| their market share by different means - going low on a
| certain marketing campaign, release a subpar product, or make
| choices
|
| I dont think anybody expects them to reduce their market
| share. Thats what competition is for.
| ankit219 wrote:
| In the hypothetical that the OP shared, they mentioned
| scrutiny for firms above a certain market share.
| dkjaudyeqooe wrote:
| Yes, because you can't abuse (substantial) market share
| unless you have it.
|
| It's like having a gun. Perfectly fine unless you go
| around threatening people with it.
| dkjaudyeqooe wrote:
| Market share is fine, honestly earned. Abuse of market share
| or product is not.
|
| You might make a world beating product and achieve 100%
| market share. That's great!
|
| If you then use that market share, or your product, to resist
| competition, or if that happens naturally, so that by doing
| nothing you are guaranteed 100% market share, then regulators
| have to step in to ensure a healthy market going forward.
| techpression wrote:
| It's a bit too late for that. The big players just buy any
| competitor coming anywhere close to be relevant, a boat load of
| money for said company, peanuts for the ones buying. I'd say
| the market is defunct since decades ago.
|
| I don't think EU not the US is ready to implement rules against
| smaller companies being bought, I mean Microsoft could by
| Activision Blizzard.
| ameister14 wrote:
| These rules already exist, it's just enforcing them that is
| the issue.
| olivierduval wrote:
| Actually it's better than that: medium corp will go against
| buying small player to avoid being subjected to DMA ! It will
| slow or stop growth because it will lower or cancel the
| advantage of being so big as having no competitor
|
| In the end, markets will optimize to have 2 or 3 big players
| in each fields to avoid that kind of problem...
| yard2010 wrote:
| Proper functioning of a healthy market is hardly the worst.
| These giants would sell people if they could get away with it
| and make money doing it. The people behind them would not think
| twice before damaging the society if there were few bucks in it
| for them to hoard.
|
| It's making me sad that this world is full of so many people
| and massive states/corps and only the EU tries to navigate the
| new challenges of integrating technology in our lives
| responsibly. It feels like the world is full with idiots, cry
| babies, and evil geniuses and just the EU which is such a small
| fraction of the world acting like a grown up.
|
| I mean, many people would agree that the US is the face of the
| western world. How come such a massive group of people act so
| irresponsibly making the same mistakes over and over again,
| causing a significant amount of suffering, and then saying the
| east is evil. The EU is the only body that advocates socialism
| and democracy while the US doesn't live to its standard, which
| is a shame really. In these challenging times the west needs
| strong leaders, not the horrifying shit show there is now.
| dkjaudyeqooe wrote:
| The best thing the EU can do is demonstrate that there are
| other ways to do things, often as a counterpoint to the US.
|
| Both a large liberal democracies (for now) but they live on
| opposite sides on the (center) left/right spectrum.
|
| There is a real benefit to humanity with competing ideas
| being put into practice at scale.
| mebazaa wrote:
| I love the DMA. But if you have to launch a long, sprawling
| compliance investigation the minute the law enters in force, it
| might mean you didn't write it with enough precision...
| ivan_gammel wrote:
| ...or it means that subjects didn't take it seriously enough or
| are ready to die on this hill.
| izacus wrote:
| What does checking whether companies actually complied with a
| law that's been published for years have to do with precision?
|
| (Lack of precision tends to be a US legal weasel word actually
| meaning "you didn't leave us loopholes to exploit".)
| kristjansson wrote:
| A company will obey the law _exactly_ to the point it's
| binding. Intentionally making the boundary of law fuzzy[1]
| with the hope of restraining actors to its _inner_ margin is
| foolish; they're going to push to the absolute _outer_ margin
| of plausible interpretations, and find out where the line
| really is when they get fined.
|
| [1]: sorry sorry sorry, predicating an entire system of law
| on 'I mean when I mean not what I say'
| boxed wrote:
| Doesn't it just mean the companies affected are flaunting the
| law?
| chongli wrote:
| I think you mean flouting (ignoring or defying) the law.
|
| Flaunting means to display or show off, like going to the
| beach in a bikini after working so hard to get in shape.
| hyperdimension wrote:
| Wow, I've said flaunting (the law, rules, et c.) the whole
| time. Thanks!
| yard2010 wrote:
| Well they kinda do that. "Look at what we can do, normal
| laws don't apply to us"
| chongli wrote:
| That's flaunting their sense of impunity though, not
| flaunting the law itself which they didn't draft.
| kristjansson wrote:
| or the law is ill-specified enough that 'complying' is
| impossible.
| rsynnott wrote:
| Realistically, unless a law is so targeted that it's basically
| an act of attainder, you're going to need an investigation, and
| if the target of the investigation is a multinational, that
| investigation is going to be long and complex.
| noirscape wrote:
| It's moreso that all major gatekeepers under investigation
| (note that not all Gatekeepers are under investigation - Amazon
| and ByteDance aren't) didn't even try to be compliant with the
| proposed legislation - they attempted to lobby against it, take
| overly literal interpretations to make the legislation seem
| crazy and so on and so forth.
|
| They had 2 years to be compliant with the DMA. All of them
| waited until the last second and all of them have attempted
| some degrees of malicious compliance with it. Apple is the most
| outstanding horrible one, but they're all trying to avoid
| proper compliance as much as possible because they think it'll
| allow them to squeeze out just the slightest amounts of more
| profits.
| paulryanrogers wrote:
| Malicious compliance appears more focused on increasing the
| pain to the point that users will demand the law be
| overturned.
| poloniculmov wrote:
| It convinced me not to buy a new Iphone because Apple is
| acting like a big baby.
| seszett wrote:
| That's because management of these companies is all based
| in the US, and they apparently don't understand that these
| tactics just don't work at all in the EU.
| wahnfrieden wrote:
| Their campaign is effective when people like OP say they are
| innocent victims of regulation which must be tossed
| malfist wrote:
| The presumption of innocence shouldn't be extended to
| trillion dollar companies. You don't get there by being
| wholesome.
|
| My statement only applies to the court of public opinion,
| not legal courts.
| Rinzler89 wrote:
| _> But if you have to launch a long, sprawling compliance
| investigation the minute the law enters in force_
|
| "Trust but verify"
|
| Or
|
| "Trust AND verify."
|
| Pick your answer, but how else do you want the EU to make sure
| that Google is now compliant with the law if they don't check.
| Should they just take Google's word for it?
|
| If you go to a concert they always check everyone's tickets at
| entry. You can't complain they don't let you in by taking your
| word for it.
| ttepasse wrote:
| Or there is a difference between RFCs and laws - and possibly
| between american and european law culture.
| _heimdall wrote:
| Wouldn't a compliance investigation effectively just be the
| evidence collection phase before a charge is filed, assuming
| the evidence supports it?
|
| I wouldn't expect them to write the law and immediately charge
| Google, for example, based only on public knowledge and no
| compiled evidence.
| Vespasian wrote:
| Yes. It's basically the reply to their (in my layman's view)
| offensive non-compliance.
|
| They had plenty time to figure it out and now they may reap
| what they sowed. Not everybody tried to play games e.g.
| notice how Microsoft is not a subject of this specific
| investigation.
|
| This is probably also a final warning shot. I'm certain that
| if they "suddenly" and "on their own" find ways to "correct"
| their software and business practices this investigation can
| be closed without charges brought forward.
| lucianbr wrote:
| The length of the investigation is so far less than 24h, no?
| And how sprawling can it be, after less than 24h.
|
| If it eventually takes two years, yeah, it will be proof
| somebody didn't do their homework. But it seems a bit early to
| tell.
|
| Also, I guess some of the size of the investigation is
| correlated with the size of the company being investigated. And
| especially with the size of the company's legal team.
| eigenspace wrote:
| Huh? IMO it's much more indicative of the idea that the
| companies didn't actually make a good faith effort to comply
| and are trying to see what they can get away with.
| Havoc wrote:
| Or you wrote the law to address an obvious issue that needs
| immediate action
| justinclift wrote:
| Oh, is there a fast way of collecting the needed evidence
| instead? ;)
| zoobab wrote:
| "I love the DMA."
|
| It might strengthen oligopolies on mobile. And even cement
| them.
| jmholla wrote:
| > It might strengthen oligopolies on mobile. And even cement
| them.
|
| Can you expand on this? This is the first time I've heard
| this claim.
| kristjansson wrote:
| These threads have been rife with the 'teleological
| interpretation' explanation i.e. the law means what it's
| intended to mean, not what it says, and firms just have to try
| their best to meet those expectations.
|
| or, y'know, it might be good to try their least, and find out
| where the constraints of the law are _actually_ binding in the
| inevitable investigation and fine, since it seems like that's
| an essential part of figuring out what an EU law actually
| requires.
| floydnoel wrote:
| i wonder how much these changes are costing Apple vs how much
| they make in Europe. would be interesting to know if there's an
| amount of compliance costs and complexity that could see Apple
| leave the EU market!
| varjag wrote:
| The EU is a huge market of people with deep pockets, I
| conjecture the break even point is not anywhere on the horizon.
| flenserboy wrote:
| At some point control of one's own business future balances
| out a certain level of profit.
| mdekkers wrote:
| Have you seen how much they all bend over backwards for
| China?
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| As far as I know, only Apple and Microsoft operate in
| China.
| techpression wrote:
| At least iCloud is run by a third party and not Apple
| (GCBD). Similar to how Blizzard does with their games and
| why World of Warcraft disappeared over night. Important
| distinction to make when it comes to privacy and security
| (there's none) and how Apple washes their hands clean
| while keeping the Chinese government happy.
| st3fan wrote:
| It is pretty much a requirement if you want to do
| business in mainland China.
|
| Firefox also had a set of China-owned servers to sync
| data from Chinese users to.
|
| ("Had" because I think they officially stopped the
| relationship with Mozilla China)
| pavlov wrote:
| Meta doesn't. Their products have never been available in
| China.
| Rinzler89 wrote:
| Probably because the Chinese market is already full of
| Chinese social media companies. How do they expect to
| compete if they enter? It's not 2004 anymore where
| starting a social media on Harvard campus was a big
| ticket.
| quadcore wrote:
| I also wonder if personel/talents/headcount to handle all
| that crap can become an issue. VPs (CEOs even) distracted
| with compliance etc.
| krzyk wrote:
| Ones crap is anothers feature.
| rekoil wrote:
| When all they need to do for compliance is to enable EU
| users to install apps without Apple as a middle-man then
| not much in the way of "personell/talents/headcount to
| handle all that crap" is actually necessary. What's
| costing them resources (and eventually money in the form
| of fines) is _not complying_.
| nozzlegear wrote:
| You are vastly oversimplifying the issue. It's not like
| there's a bit that Apple can flip to just let EU citizens
| sideload apps.
| PodgieTar wrote:
| I'd argue you're vastly over complicating it.
|
| There's already mechanisms to side load, and install
| IPAs..
|
| Why would it be more complicated?
| akaij wrote:
| It feels like some people don't imagine these companies
| to be ready for compliance. As if they don't have all the
| knobs ready to turn on a per-region/country/state basis
| as soon as the law changes and it becomes possible to
| lose even the smallest amount in stock value.
| oaiey wrote:
| These DMA like changes are now coming from everywhere. It is
| just that EU has teeth, not to ignore and usually moves first.
|
| California has adopted GDPR, there are ongoing probes in the US
| just last week, etc.
|
| Time is up for regulation-free business in IT. We had 50 years
| of freedom (compared to let us say: drugs, medical devices,
| cars, airplanes, ...). It is normal cycle for a market
| brtkdotse wrote:
| > We had 50 years of freedom
|
| More "Wild West gold rush" than "freedom"
| oaiey wrote:
| I think for many people that is the same ;). But I agree
| with your differentiation.
| rsynnott wrote:
| > Time is up for regulation-free business in IT. We had 50
| years of freedom (compared to let us say: drugs, medical
| devices, cars, airplanes, ...)
|
| This is an odd reading of the history, tbh. The US regulators
| were generally more active on competition in the industry in
| the 90s than today; see the Microsoft and Intel
| investigations, for instance.
| jpambrun wrote:
| That would be a net positive as we would all benefit from new
| players that would emerge and fill that void. Obviously your
| question was rhetorical and this won't happen.
| zarathustreal wrote:
| New players emerging in the high-end smartphone space? You
| seriously believe that a comparable player to *Apple* is
| going to emerge any time in the next decade? Lol
| spiderfarmer wrote:
| Normally, no. But in the hypothetical situation of Apple
| leaving the EU up for grabs for new players, maybe.
| chippiewill wrote:
| The threshold is nowhere near close.
|
| You forget that these companies already operate in China which
| is a massive pain in the backside for all involved.
|
| The only reason why a company might threaten to pull out is if
| they wanted to stop other countries getting similar ideas.
| aurareturn wrote:
| China isn't threatening Apple's entire App Store model
| though.
| Rinzler89 wrote:
| The point of the EU is to protect consumers and small
| businesses, not the business of multi trillion dollar
| market leaders who engage in anti-competitive practices.
|
| Maybe Apple should focus back on making money through
| innovation instead of coasting on rent seeking.
| aurareturn wrote:
| If EU is so good at promoting innovation and competition,
| why couldn't they compete at all in hardware, software,
| and AI?
|
| If they're so good at dissuading gate keepers, then why
| is LVMH everywhere and so dominant in luxury goods? Why
| is it that every single glasses shop in every mall is
| owned by Luxottica no matter the brand.
|
| The truth is that EU is not good at promoting
| competition. They're good at preventing innovation.
| They're good at protectionist policies.
|
| How many more cookie prompts do people have to click
| because of idiotic EU laws?
| vages wrote:
| I recommend the article "Facing reality about the EU is a
| core requirement for good management":
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39602417
| viraptor wrote:
| > why couldn't they compete at all in hardware,
|
| Like Arm? Or raspberry pi? (Both existed pre-exit)
|
| > software,
|
| Too many companies to list.
|
| > and AI?
|
| Like Mistral?
|
| > How many more cookie prompts do people have to click
| because of idiotic EU laws?
|
| It's up to the companies. Every time you see a banner it
| means the company values selling your information more
| than pissing you off. We could have no banners right now.
| Isn0gud wrote:
| Cookie prompts is the best example of bad faith
| compliance. Please inform yourself and don't spread this
| narritive further.
| YetAnotherNick wrote:
| IMO if anything it's the opposite. EU could have made law
| to respect DNT header if they wanted privacy but they
| won't because it would hurt "their" companies. Instead
| they tried to be super vague and preferentially sue
| companies who they have qualms with and the companies
| which they could get money from.
|
| My previous company hired a lawyer from EU for sorting
| out GDPR, and even according to him the law didn't
| prevented all things which hurts privacy like a normal
| person will assume.
| doublepg23 wrote:
| I am once again posting the EU official site using cookie
| pop-ups https://european-union.europa.eu/index_en
| maxcoder4 wrote:
| >The 3 types of first-party cookie we use are to: >(...)
| >gather analytics data (about user behaviour).
|
| Well they _do_ collect user data using third party
| services. A bit disappointing, but banners seem to be
| necessary in this case.
| doublepg23 wrote:
| Quoting OP
|
| > Cookie prompts is the best example of bad faith
| compliance
|
| If cookie prompts are used by both by the official EU and
| GDPR sites then that was clearly the intent of the law.
| shagie wrote:
| https://gdpr.eu is an interesting site to visit on the
| matter, surely they have the best and most compliant
| implementation.
|
| https://i.imgur.com/Ftuv74P.png
| amadeuspagel wrote:
| They kind of do with WeChat.
| aurareturn wrote:
| Example?
|
| Anyone can make an app like WeChat with mini programs
| inside. No one has exceeded because people in the west
| simply don't want that ui.
| resolutebat wrote:
| Virtually all Meta and Google services are blocked in China.
| Only Apple has significant consumer presence (and
| manufacturing) there.
| DanielHB wrote:
| Not for a lack of trying (at least on the google side).
| Took google getting hacked and IP stolen to fully move out
| of china
| akaij wrote:
| Google didn't 'fully' move out of China; it still has
| offices there, doing some business as usual.
| rsynnott wrote:
| I mean, the US is also pursuing competition investigations into
| Apple; if the strategy is to just flee anywhere that the
| regulators ask them mean questions, then they're probably
| realistically looking at only operating in developing nations,
| and not all of those.
| xandrius wrote:
| And that would literally mean that the probe was warranted.
| alberth wrote:
| $94B
|
| https://www.businessofapps.com/data/apple-statistics/
| rekoil wrote:
| Did the math, 24.5% of their global 2023 revenue.
| danieldk wrote:
| And Apple's iPhone market share in Europe (yes, the EU is
| not Europe) has been steadily growing since 2019:
|
| https://www.statista.com/statistics/639928/market-share-
| mobi...
|
| Apple would be crazy for leaving the EU. Even the
| suggestion would probably lead to a shareholder revolt and
| the removal of some executives.
| t-sauer wrote:
| If they leave the EU market, Android immediately becomes a much
| bigger focus for every app developer which can have an effect
| on the quality of apps available on the app store around the
| world.
| mleo wrote:
| Android is already the dominant mobile OS in Europe by market
| share. Why would quality increase by going from dominant to
| more dominant?
| guappa wrote:
| Companies might decide to stop bothering with ios apps
| altogether, which could have an effect in USA as well
| eventually.
| danieldk wrote:
| Two things: iOS has been eating into Android marketshare in
| Europe since 2019:
|
| https://www.statista.com/statistics/639928/market-share-
| mobi...
|
| However, more importantly, iPhone users have more
| disposable income [1][2]. So, if Apple would pull from the
| EU, all those iPhone users with a lot of disposable income
| would be in the market for Android phones and apps,
| creating a lot of opportunities in the Android market.
|
| [1] There are various studies, e.g.:
| https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/iphone-users-
| spend-...
|
| [2] If you look at the most popular Android phones, they
| are often dominated by cheaper models, e.g. Samsung's A
| lineup. See e.g. current Android usage in France:
| https://www.appbrain.com/stats/top-android-phones-tablets-
| by...
| izacus wrote:
| Remember how the US tech market went into layoff spree just for
| a slight dip in profits and slightly higher rates?
|
| Think what does same investors will do to the company that
| leaves a 300mil people market over a legal spat.
| godzillabrennus wrote:
| Think about all of the innovations those terminated people
| will bring to the market when they are no longer shackled in
| golden handcuffs.
| kevin_thibedeau wrote:
| They mass hired too many unqualified people in 2021.
| northhanover wrote:
| Hopefully the EU countries choose to invest these fines into
| their military spending to get themselves up to their agreed
| upon 2% of GDP.
| sloowm wrote:
| You would not only need to consider how much it brings in but
| also how much it would cost to pull back. They would have to
| unwind a ton of legal structures, get rid of employees and live
| up to contracts that are already in place. This would take
| years and would be more than enough time for competition to
| smoothly make a transition.
|
| Then you are also thinking of Apple as some kind of US entity.
| It's a faceless shareholder owned business. The shareholders
| would somehow need to agree to leave a still very profitable
| region. They would only agree to that if they think the company
| can force other regions or the EU to not legislate Apple. It's
| a risky strategy that could work but I don't think you can get
| the majority of shareholders to try it. Even then it could fail
| and just bankrupt the company.
| rekoil wrote:
| You also have to consider how much it costs to actually
| comply. The board would probably much rather Apple comply and
| keeps selling iPhones and services in the EU vs not getting
| ANY profits at all from their currently second largest region
| in the world.
| tyingq wrote:
| I don't think it's that unusual for companies to have wildly
| different margins in different markets. Apple's margins leave
| quite a lot of room for a market to still be worth pursuing.
| cqqxo4zV46cp wrote:
| Apple would first have to determine if it's worth continuing to
| act like petulant children instead of just complying. They
| could not reasonably classify what they're taking on now as
| simply "compliance expenses". They're doing it BECAUSE they see
| the worth in fighting back.
| legacynl wrote:
| I'd say that it's realistically not possible for any amount of
| cost or complexity of compliance to make them leave the EU
| market.
|
| Apple has a vested interest in being able to offer their
| services worldwide. If one part of the world is not included,
| companies in that part will have a much easier time to develop
| and grow their own alternatives. If these alternatives gain
| enough traction in that part they might then be able to
| threaten Apples services globally.
|
| Therefore I'd assume that even if they will only break even (or
| operate at a manageable loss) they would still stay in the EU.
| layer8 wrote:
| A quarter of Apple's total revenue comes from the EU (with
| Apple's average profit margin of ~40%), but only 7% of the app
| store revenue. Which means that even if Apple gave up on all
| app store revenue from the EU, they wouldn't lose that much. In
| any case, the resources they put into compliance is certainly
| much, much less than a quarter of their total resources.
| st3fan wrote:
| I doubt they would leave the EU. I do think it is expected
| that they will design their products or features with the EU
| in mind and probably not even ship specific things in that
| region to avoid risk of being micromanaged / product managed
| by authorities.
| IshKebab wrote:
| All sounds great. I'm quite curious what their objection to
| Apple's browser choice screen is though:
|
| > The Commission is concerned that Apple's measures, including
| the design of the web browser choice screen, may be preventing
| users from truly exercising their choice of services within the
| Apple ecosystem, in contravention of Article 6(3) of the DMA.
|
| Looks relatively reasonable to me:
|
| https://preview.redd.it/ios-17-4-db1-new-default-browser-pop...
|
| Is it because they always put Safari at the top and then try to
| randomise in a mix of browsers most people won't have heard of?
| threeseed wrote:
| When you look at the list you have to be concerned about the
| state of the browser market.
|
| Chromium is going to dominate desktop and mobile and entrench
| pro-advertising measures eg. browser fingerprinting, long term
| first party cookies etc for years to come. Meta and Google must
| be thrilled.
|
| Of course it makes a mockery of GDPR and other privacy measures
| EU has been pushing.
| shuckles wrote:
| But users are demanding choice in browsers, and they are
| picking the least private, most pro-advertising one en masse!
| What's its biggest benefit? It offers a suite of native-
| replacement, in-the-standards-process-but-not-finalized APIs
| so developers can write slow, bloated applications once and
| run them everywhere! This is what users want!
| st3fan wrote:
| It is only good for Google. Not for the web.
| hu3 wrote:
| Thanks for sharing.
|
| I'm curious about the sorting of that list. From the image
| (mirror: https://i.imgur.com/pjo78lS.png):
| Safari Vivaldi Opera Web@Work Edge
| Onion Browser Seznam.cz Brave Firefox?
| (cut in half)
|
| Is it Safari first then randomized names? It doesn't look
| alphabetical order to me.
|
| Chrome doesn't even show up, Firefox is almost hidden.
| microtherion wrote:
| I don't know how the list is generated. But as others have
| pointed out, there seems to be established precedent that
| hardcoding Safari first would not be compliant. And
| alphabetizing would create bad incentives (Calling dibs on
| "Aardvark" as a browser name, BTW).
|
| The problem I see with randomization is that with all the
| browsers that are skins on Chromium nowadays, this would be
| likely to steer users into a Chromium based browser.
| Macha wrote:
| > Calling dibs on "Aardvark" as a browser name, BTW
|
| It's ok, I'm naming mine after Aachen
| throwaway-blaze wrote:
| AABrowser is mine.
| a1369209993 wrote:
| Dibs on !0A Aangstrom.
| oaiey wrote:
| This screen has already so much dark history by Microsoft on
| Windows.
| jsnell wrote:
| Having Safari hardcoded to the first position in the list
| certainly won't fly. The Windows browser choice ballot and the
| Android search engine choice screens eventually settled on a
| two tier with the five most popular options in a random order
| at the top, and a second tier was shown after them also in a
| random order.
|
| But the other problem is the "not now" button, because it's
| what the large majority of users will click. Does it by any
| chance have the effect that Safari is kept as the default, and
| the question is never asked again? The Windows browser choice
| ballot and the Android search engine choice screens forced the
| user to make a choice.
| bilbo0s wrote:
| Isn't having the 5 top choices always be the same kind of the
| same violation?
|
| It entrenches the big guys.
| zarathustreal wrote:
| The idea that any of this is or ever was a problem to the
| end user is laughable honestly, this is political theater.
| End users want to be able to browse the web, that's the
| point of a web browser. Most of them are based on the same
| underlying technology and implementations. Throwing around
| political power to force OS teams to spend engineering
| resources on the illusion of choice is actively harmful for
| basically zero benefit to the end user.
| Hasu wrote:
| It's not a problem for the end user to be unable to pick
| which browser they want to use?
|
| Speak for yourself, I would consider being forced into a
| single browser choice a huge problem, to the point that I
| will not buy a device that does it.
| Ajedi32 wrote:
| The fact that alternate browser engines were banned on
| iOS was indeed a huge problem, but I think the current
| legislation goes too far. As the GP said, many users
| won't care. I think trying to _force_ them to care by
| presenting a randomized list of a dozen different options
| at setup time is misguided. I don 't see the issue with
| merely _having_ a default so long as there 's an easy way
| to change it and Apple isn't applying any rules or
| restrictions to competing browsers that they don't apply
| to their own.
| johannes1234321 wrote:
| Indeed, outside Hackernews hardly any user cares about
| the browser.
|
| However it becomes relevant once a dominating vendor uses
| the monopoly to limit the capabilities of the browser to
| benefit their app store etc. and that is hard to notice.
| For good competition the EU tries to limit that early.
| thejohnconway wrote:
| Yeah, and what they've done here will result in a Chrome
| monopoly everywhere. They needed to break Chrome before
| going after Safari and Apple.
| talldayo wrote:
| Apple really shouldn't have used a monopoly strategy to
| block another, more theoretical monopoly from happening.
| Y_Y wrote:
| And inside hackernews nobody cares what the outside
| people care about.
| jsnell wrote:
| I can see that some people would think that, but it's a
| design that was converged on after several iterations and
| seems to have worked for both the regulators and the
| companies. I think both of the previous examples actually
| started with just enough entries for a single screen, and
| were later expanded to include more entries in a second
| tier.
|
| From the user's perspective, having to make a choice from
| an unsorted list of hundreds or thousands of items would
| not work. That's why the regulators seem to accept the idea
| that not every product has the right to be on those choice
| lists, and not every listed product needs to be equally
| prominent. What's important is that the criteria are
| objective and don't give an unfair advantage to the
| platform owner.
| zamadatix wrote:
| When Microsoft was made to do a browser choice screen for
| the EU in 2010 they had a two tier system and it seemed to
| go well with the EU. On one hand, sure - it is an advantage
| for the popular browsers. On the other hand the goal is
| more that the manufacturer not be using their position to
| force the browser so heavily not necessarily to put every
| Joe Schmoe Browser in front of the same number of eyes.
| From a practicality perspective it solves the main problem
| without becoming a complication in itself.
| fh9302 wrote:
| Safari is not hardcoded to the first position, it is fully
| randomized.
| threeseed wrote:
| From all the comments in the Reddit thread and from Apple's
| documentation it's entirely random.
| jsnell wrote:
| Thanks, I was going just by the OP. Then I'd have to
| imagine that the problem is with the "not now" button.
| lycos wrote:
| Interesting! When I got presented this list Safari wasn't even
| "above the fold" which surprised me, so I assumed it was
| randomised.
|
| When I clicked Safari it also opened an App Store sheet for
| Safari, which I thought was weird but probably done to keep it
| consistent with the other options (more like "see more details"
| before making the choice definitive/installing)
| ergonaught wrote:
| "Select your birthdate from this randomized list of possible
| dates."
|
| You wouldn't.
|
| Cannot imagine why this is being downvoted. Presenting users
| with a randomized list is a dark pattern that discourages use
| of the associated feature.
| shuckles wrote:
| Randomization is required by the regulation. Another instance
| of what a smart person wants out of a feature and what the EU
| wants being very different things.
| dotnet00 wrote:
| It's being downvoted because randomizing something that is by
| its nature chronological is very obviously different from
| randomizing the order of something where you want to
| explicitly avoid giving the impression that one takes
| priority over another.
| sloowm wrote:
| It might be that Apple enforces the use of webkit.
| krzyk wrote:
| Are those real browsers or just reskins of Safaris inner web
| components?
| wmf wrote:
| For now they're all WebKit. Apple now allows other browser
| engines to be used but they'll probably take a while to come
| out, if ever.
| Vinnl wrote:
| Criticism I have seen:
|
| - Safari will always still be installed and have its icon on
| the first page of your home screen by default, even if you
| choose another browser.
|
| - Choosing another browser doesn't actually select it - it
| brings you to their app store page, where you still have to tap
| the (relatively tiny) install button.
|
| - If you already have other browsers installed that are not
| included in the choice screen (e.g. Firefox Nightly, I
| believe), then you're still forced to install/pick a different
| browser.
| concinds wrote:
| More:
|
| - you can't uninstall Safari. The DMA clearly requires Apple
| to allow uninstalling it.
|
| - the Share Sheet for in-app webview privileges Safari
| (Safari-specific "Add to Reading List", "Add Bookmark" at the
| top) regardless of default browser.
|
| - apps with in-app webviews can roll out a custom engine, but
| otherwise it uses WebKit regardless of default browser. It
| should obviously use the webview facility provided by the
| default browser, if it offers one.
|
| - confusing to change defaults. There's no central "Default
| Apps" screen in Settings. You have to go in the Settings app,
| scroll way down to a given browser, and then you can change
| the default. So the default browser setting is weirdly
| treated as an app-specific setting rather than a system
| setting.
|
| - If Safari is not the default, you can change your default
| browser within "Settings.app >> Safari". If Safari is the
| default, you can't change your default browser there at all.
| Whereas the default browser selection menu will always be
| shown in the Settings.app submenu of third-party browsers.
| throwaway-blaze wrote:
| The default browser has no technical ability in iOS
| (currently) to supply an in-app component to replace
| WKWebView or SFSafariViewController, and frankly as an app
| developer I shudder at the idea of having to test our use
| of in-app browsers against every browser, every release.
| layer8 wrote:
| I think that in-app browsers that are solely used to
| render the app, and not separately accessible web pages,
| should be considered an implementation detail of the app.
| That also means that apps should be free to bring their
| own browser engine for that purpose (a la Electron).
| However, where apps provide access to web sites that are
| also accessible outside the app, the user should be able
| to configure the browser for that (possibly different
| from the system default). That should pose no particular
| problem for app developers, as those external web sites
| need to work under different browsers anyway.
| giantrobot wrote:
| > as those external web sites need to work under
| different browsers anyway
|
| You say that but many sites essentially only support
| Chrome (and Edge by extension). If you install Firefox,
| or keep Safari, and the external sites just continues to
| assume everyone downloads Chrome you get nice broken web
| views. Or if a user changes the default browser (and thus
| web view engine) after the fact.
| layer8 wrote:
| > many sites essentially only support Chrome
|
| Yes, but they shouldn't, and it's not that difficult, so
| I have no sympathy. It's also not that many.
| shuckles wrote:
| "It's fixable so it should be fixed, and even if it's not
| fixed, it doesn't matter," is a pretty good summary of
| how much thought the pro-regulators are bringing to the
| topic.
| giantrobot wrote:
| I'm not saying sites _can 't_ or _shouldn 't_ be fixed to
| support browsers other than Chrome. The fact of the
| matter is these sites exist and aren't incentivized to
| support anything but Chrome. When an overwhelming
| proportion of visits are through Chrome they only support
| Chrome, just like when those visits were IE6 and sites
| only supported IE6. Their advertisers love all of
| Google's web API proposals because they feed
| fingerprinting mechanisms.
|
| Sites that only support Chrome and have no need to
| support Safari (WebKit) will continue to support Chrome.
| Users that want to have a third party browser handle web
| views in apps or web apps won't have meaningful options
| as WebKit won't be a requirement so every site will code
| only to Chrome. The status quo at least requires a vendor
| support WebKit if for no other reason is to support web
| views in their iOS apps.
| layer8 wrote:
| I don't see why the situation for viewing public websites
| from within apps should differ from the situation on the
| desktop. People choose which browser they use on the
| desktop, and live with any difficulties that may or may
| not bring. (E.g. I'm using Firefox and have few
| problems.) So the same would be the case for browsers in
| mobile apps.
| giantrobot wrote:
| Firefox isn't a transitive dependency on the desktop. If
| an app uses a WebView[0] control on Windows, Firefox has
| no effect on its behavior and performance. It uses the
| Edge engine to power WebViews. On iOS WKWebView currently
| uses WebKit.
|
| The EU apparently wants to change this behavior on iOS. A
| WKWebView would be backed by the system's default browser
| selection if it made claim to support WKWebKit views. So
| your third party app with no direct connection to Firefox
| that uses a WKWebKit view now depends on Firefox handling
| the loaded pages in the view. If they don't work in
| Firefox or whatever browser the user has selected the
| third party app is affected by the choice of browser.
| This also has an affect on web apps on the Home Screen.
|
| The issue with Chrome is it already dominates the web.
| App vendors _will_ drop Safari WebKit support as soon as
| WKWebKit no longer mandates the site work in Safari
| WebKit. Without iOS enforcing support for Safari WebKit
| by being the only option for the non-trivial number of
| iOS users of the web, Chrome will be the only supported
| browser in apps and the wider web.
|
| [0] https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-
| edge/webview2/?f...
| noway421 wrote:
| > It should obviously use the webview facility provided by
| the default browser
|
| Android doesn't do that either. You get Android System
| WebView which is always WebKit/Blink.
|
| Windows didn't provide any browser engines apart from
| Trident through mshtml.dll either.
|
| It would make iOS development harder - instead of getting a
| web view working just for WKWebView, you would need to get
| it working for every WebView out there. Given that they are
| not full browsers, it's not as simple as following web
| standards/caniuse. For example, service worker support in
| in-app browsers is limited.
|
| If this actually gets implemented, every app out there will
| most likely pin the in-app browser engine to WKWebView OR
| bundle a binary blob with their own browser engine directly
| into .ipa. Bundled browser engine in .ipa has privacy
| implications - the app will be able to fully read secure
| HTTPS cookies of the sites that user visits - something
| that's currently protected.
| st3fan wrote:
| > Android doesn't do that either. You get Android System
| WebView which is always WebKit/Blink.
|
| Not if the application uses Custom Tabs to start a web
| browsing activity.
|
| https://developer.chrome.com/docs/android/custom-tabs/
|
| Firefox fully supports this and if you set it as a
| default browser you will many apps open content in a
| Firefox powered webview. (Activity)
|
| Apple can do the same. Not trivial but definitely
| possible.
| concinds wrote:
| Thanks to you and others for pointing these out. I want
| to make clear that this isn't the EU's list and is just
| stuff I could observe disregarding my default browser
| choice. But if there's good reasons, by all means, don't
| make developers' lives hell.
| jwells89 wrote:
| > apps with in-app webviews can roll out a custom engine,
| but otherwise it uses WebKit regardless of default browser.
| It should obviously use the webview facility provided by
| the default browser, if it offers one.
|
| This has massive potential to break an unbelievable number
| of things, first-party and third-party alike. WebKit is
| used in all sorts of places people wouldn't expect, for
| example at one point UILabel (the native control
| responsible for displaying non-scrolling text and labels)
| used WebKit under the hood for rendering attributed
| strings.
| shuckles wrote:
| Users want to truly exercise their choice of browser screen
| so badly that a list of nitpicks about the ordering of
| options in the share sheet and the prominence of an "Open"
| button which works the same way for every other app install
| flow is thwarting them from doing so.
| fassssst wrote:
| Chrome is the most popular browser and Apple's largest
| competitor and isn't on the first page?
| madmask wrote:
| After "EU launches probes.." i was hoping to read planet names
| oaiey wrote:
| After reading your comment, I really appreciate it. The
| thinking has a positive world spin (progress for all mankind)
| instead of the ugly truth of our word.
|
| We all should think like that.
| ttepasse wrote:
| That's ESA. :)
|
| (Next launch to another planet seems to be ExoMars 2 to Mars in
| 2028, carrying the Rosalind Franklin rover. Originally planned
| for 2022 on a russian rocket, now with a european launcher.)
| dmathrowaway wrote:
| Throwaway account for obvious reasons:
|
| As a SRE SWE at Alphabet/Google, I find this assumed-guilt and
| assumed-lack-of-giving-a-shit irritating.
|
| For the past several quarters we have spent a significant
| proportion of our effort on DMA compliance, right down to the
| infrastructure & RPC level. It is top priority mandate level
| stuff and getting absolute top billing from managers and TLs in
| planning and day-to-day activities.
|
| I have spent a long time over the past few months working almost
| entirely on DMA projects so it is pretty aggravating to then see
| these "probes" into if we are taking it seriously.
|
| Don't get me wrong, I think the DMA is a good thing and it is
| totally the right thing to do. But this assumption that Google
| don't care and are ignoring it or whatever is just exasperating
| when myself and many other good engineers are working their
| hearts out to implement it.
|
| </rant>
| McDyver wrote:
| If there wasn't a DMA, and no prospect of probe or
| accountability, google, and the likes, wouldn't give a shit. As
| we can see from the current state of affairs (that led to DMA
| and all that)
| izacus wrote:
| I mean, if you did a good job, then this is no extra work for
| you. But there's very little reason to trust any of you right?
| Especially after stunts Apple is constantly pulling, everyone
| in EU leadership would have to be a brain dead moron to believe
| whatever US corps are telling them without any kind of
| verification.
|
| If you pass with flying colors, that doesn't diminish any of
| your work - it confirms that you did it well.
| hn_go_brrrrr wrote:
| You've very clearly never participated in an audit if you
| believe this. Audits are a ton of work, to prove in
| excruciating detail that things actually work the way you
| claim they do.
| izacus wrote:
| I have participated in such audits (and actually worked on
| things like GDPR compliance on rather large corporations).
| Yes, they're a ton of work. But that's what the job is,
| sorry if now developers need to work to undo
| anticompetitive crap they pulled in their products.
| hn_go_brrrrr wrote:
| You're again assuming remediation work. Just the work
| required for an audit that you end up passing can take
| weeks.
| izacus wrote:
| Yes, I know. What of it? Comes with the size and money.
|
| Just like when we were building medical stuff that came
| with it's own audits and how banking also does.
|
| Cost of earning all that sweet cash.
| yau8edq12i wrote:
| I'm sure a trillion dollar company can manage to do that.
| Why should the EC trust these companies? My local
| government will go through any plan I make for
| modifications to my house. Why should trillion dollar
| companies get a pass? Because some engineer will feel bad
| about a probe that is a mile over their head?
| Rinzler89 wrote:
| You rant feels unnecessarily emotional and victim assuming.
|
| _" WAH! WAH! The EU doesn't apreciate the job at Google I
| signed up for and getting paid $400k+ to do."_
|
| If you don't like your job, quit and find something you'll find
| fulfilling because you're not gonna get any sympathy for you
| not getting public government appreciation for the very well
| paid job you singed up to do at a private company. Go out and
| get some perspective, there's people out there with real
| problems in their lives, breaking their backs and barely
| scraping by. Seriously, the entitlement of some well paid big-
| tech workers is astonishing.
|
| The EU hasn't got any beef with you or your job. Nobody at EU
| said that Google engineers aren't working hard on DMA
| compliance.
|
| It's Google's (management's) responsibility to prove to
| regulators that they're DMA complaint, not their employee's to
| go public under burner accounts to say this.
|
| "Trust AND verify".
|
| Blame your management for lack of (proactive) action and lack
| of communication to the authorities, not the EU for looking
| into your employer.
| InsomniacL wrote:
| Alphabet is under investigation for, among things:
|
| > Whether Google preferences the firm's own goods and services
| in search results
|
| Are you saying that Google doesn't preference it's own goods
| and services on the 'Google' platform ahead of it's other
| competitors on that platform?
| DuckyC wrote:
| "past several quaters". The DMA entered force November 1. 2022.
| gabipurcaru wrote:
| There are multiple parts to it --
|
| "The 2 May 2023, 6 months later, the regulation started
| applying and the potential gatekeepers had 2 months to report
| to the commission to be identified as gatekeepers. This
| process would take up to 45 days and after being identified
| as gatekeepers, they would have 6 months to come into
| compliance, at the latest the 6 March 2024.[8][32] From 7
| March 2024, gatekeepers must comply with the DMA. [33]"
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Markets_Act
| xandrius wrote:
| So are we all going to just trust your word? That ship has long
| sailed, the trust is not there anymore.
|
| This is what tech companies deserve to get (not just Google)
| when they try to play the different laws and circumvent them.
| usea wrote:
| Google can spend a lot of money on it, and still be non-
| compliant. How much time has been spent on it, or how seriously
| it's being taken, is not really indicative of anything
| relevant.
| bayindirh wrote:
| > I find this assumed-guilt and assumed-lack-of-giving-a-shit
| irritating.
|
| Europe's probes works differently w.r.t. US. It's not "assumed
| guilt", it's "we want a clearer picture".
|
| If you did everything alright, there's nothing to be afraid or
| be irritated of. You answer your questions and move on.
|
| If you tried to work your way around, then, well...
| serial_dev wrote:
| It's possible that both are true at the same time: 1. Google
| doesn't really give a shit and will do the very least they
| think can get away with, 2. They have some people working on it
| out of the 27k engineers they have.
|
| I'm not even sure how it's controversial, I assume you are
| biased and emotional as a Googler, but every company will do
| the very least possible to loosen their grip on the market.
| aurareturn wrote:
| I book flights with Google Flights. It's way better than
| anywhere else. I'd be annoyed if it isn't the #1 result when
| I do a search for flights.
| gbear605 wrote:
| I book flights with Google Flights and other options
| (Kayak, my credit card's travel portal, airlines directly),
| and Google Flights is kind of mid. It's annoying that
| Google pushes it to the #1 result for lots of searches that
| it shouldn't be.
| creato wrote:
| I guess it depends on what you look for. I haven't bought
| a flight in a while, but I just looked at kayak and
| google flights for comparison. Google flights is a much
| simpler, more direct UI, and it feels a lot more
| responsive. In particular, kayak violated one of my huge
| personal pet peeves: page content moving around while
| it's loading.
|
| That said, the gap is a lot smaller than it used to be.
| There was a time in the past where google flights was
| _light years_ ahead of priceline, kayak, etc. in bloat,
| bugginess, responsiveness, etc. That gap has shrank
| considerably and it 's more a matter of preference today.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| I don't see what is better about google flights. Sometimes
| I get the cheapest price on the airline's website and
| sometimes on Expedia. Google flights' price is almost
| always the same as the airline website's price.
| Retr0id wrote:
| Google only cares about DMA compliance because they don't want
| to get in trouble. Otherwise you wouldn't be so busy with it
| right now, you'd already be compliant.
|
| I have sympathy for you as a SWE, but I have no sympathy for
| megacorporations - they should never be trusted.
| personafan wrote:
| Looks like the EU are investigating Alphabet for "Alphabet's
| rules on steering in Google Play and self-preferencing on
| Google Search".
|
| Is it possible Alphabet has complied with some parts, but not
| all?
|
| This might not be pedantic. Maybe they're missing important
| details?
| bluesign wrote:
| > Don't get me wrong, I think the DMA is a good thing and it is
| totally the right thing to do.
|
| This is the part that you and Google don't agree. If you look
| at your comment from that perspective, you can see why probe
| makes sense.
| woolion wrote:
| How many other good engineers at Google are working on anti-
| competitive practice by pushing Google as default browser,
| providing a worse service on non-Chromium based browsers (like
| slowing YouTube for Firefox), etc? [Microsoft Edge does worse]
|
| How many other good engineers at Google are working on
| ethically dubious practices, like tracking users that are in
| explicit do-not-track mode through browser fingerprinting?
|
| How many other good engineers at Google are working on <insert
| any other terrible practices>?
|
| Maybe paying a few engineers to clean up their reputation is
| not enough? Maybe you just picked a bad role and are looking
| for the wrong culprits?
| GeoAtreides wrote:
| This reminds me of a conversation from Dune, between Count
| Fenring and the Baron:
|
| "The Emperor does wish to audit your books," the Count said.
|
| "Any time."
|
| "You... ah... have no objections?"
|
| "None. My CHOAM Company directorship will bear the closest
| scrutiny."
|
| The point is if everything is in order (or made to look as if
| it's in order), then Google has nothing to fear, no matter how
| many probes the EU launches. And the Baron didn't take it
| personally, and neither should Google. It's all in the game,
| after all.
| izacus wrote:
| Thinking of your last paragraph it's rather interesting to
| see how, when corporations hurt people, a lot of people just
| say "it's business, they're making profit"... but when it
| comes to these laws, it gets strangely emotional instead of
| just saying "well, it's business".
| _visgean wrote:
| > I have spent a long time over the past few months working
| almost entirely on DMA projects so it is pretty aggravating to
| then see these "probes" into if we are taking it seriously.
|
| Well just because you take it seriously does not mean you have
| done a good job in implementing the changes? I dont know about
| google but apple certainly flaunted the rules completely so its
| a good thing that they are not letting it go.
| lioeters wrote:
| Google is one of the reasons why this law had to be created in
| order to protect the users from its systemic dark patterns. I'm
| glad they're spending significant effort on DMA compliance, it
| means the law is working.
| concinds wrote:
| Except Google isn't complying.
|
| Google charges 12-17% for "linking out" to a web purchase
| screen (aka "external offers").
|
| > has opened proceedings to assess whether the measures
| implemented by Alphabet and Apple in relation to their
| obligations pertaining to app stores are in breach of the DMA.
| _Article 5(4) of the DMA requires gatekeepers to allow app
| developers to "steer" consumers to offers outside the
| gatekeepers ' app stores, free of charge_
| alsothrowawaydm wrote:
| Ha! Just because you're only getting flack for this, I once
| upon a long ago worked on gdpr implementation and it was
| exactly the same thing.
|
| Our entire team was working overtime and liaising with
| regulators to figure out what some of those pretty vague
| statements actually meant when it came down asking user
| permission for third party analytics and how to ensure we were
| compliant (what counts as essential, how many non-essential can
| you reasonably ask someone to review, who creates that list,
| what happens to the companies not in it, etc.etc.).
|
| Nobody else knew either because they were all looking at us, as
| we'd be likely to get sued first anyway. Cue the articles after
| launch on how we either didn't care to do it right or we were
| actually being our usual evil selves in sneakily not
| implementing it in properly.
|
| I feel your pain
| maxcoder4 wrote:
| Sorry for being cynical, but from your message it sounds like
| you were working hard with regulators to comply as little as
| possible not to get sued. Which makes sense - I mean it was
| probably just business - but doesn't mean you were not being
| "your evil selves" (whoever your were).
|
| Maybe I'm underestimating the complexity at scale, but I've
| read GDPR in original (it's not long), and the intentions and
| what's required seem pretty clear. I only have practical
| experience with it from a regulator side, though.
| alsothrowawaydm wrote:
| Genuinely not, though I can understand that you're cynical.
| How do you prove intention anyway?
|
| As context with these kind of regulations it's not always
| bad for the big players when it gets implemented across the
| market. Many smaller companies will not have the regulatory
| bandwidth to figure out compliance, and as the regulation
| acts as a way to level or cap what everyone can do, it's
| not like you will lose customers to someone else.
|
| Complexity was mostly either definitional, e.g. some
| markets (ironically Germany's big publishers in particular)
| were absolutely convinced that almost anything they did on
| their sites fell under legitimate interest, even though we
| tried to convince them many times that would not fly.
|
| Or it would be on specifics such as how many non-essential
| data providers can you reasonably ask a user to review?
| Keep the number too small and you'll be accused of favoring
| the big players, make it too big and you'll swamp users.
| Who decides?
|
| By the way I agree that GDPR is pretty well written. Just
| that implementing these type of things and getting
| stakeholders to agree to it can be extremely complex. Fun
| days
| pashadee wrote:
| Shows how NON compliant Alphabet was before DMA ;)
|
| "Make infra compliant, but try to pull some shit with billing,
| to see how serious the EC is about DMA. That way, if they're
| serious, we're ready, but if not, we can still make money."
| 3836293648 wrote:
| And yet all the gatekeepers have publically taken action to
| actively try to undermine the DMA. Admittedly Google is nowhere
| near as bad as Apple, but it's still happening. So of course
| investigations have been launched
| ible wrote:
| Even on a law and implementation effort like this with such
| large impact there are maybe 10,000 people in the world
| involved who actually understand it in any significant sense,
| and they all have a strong reason not to post about it on a
| public forum, or even a private one.
|
| And even those people will only understand a limited aspect or
| perspective.
|
| So the people commenting can only comment based on their
| outside impressions and emotions about generalities and how the
| specific implementation details seem to affect they as an end
| user.
|
| I try to take anything said with that in mind. There is
| information in the comments about user experience but anything
| else is at the level of bullshitting at the bar with your
| friends, and not to be taken personally.
| whaleofatw2022 wrote:
| > I find this assumed-guilt and assumed-lack-of-giving-a-shit
| irritating
|
| Web Environment Integrity.
|
| Those three words burned up a lot of what little goodwill was
| left for google.
| oaiey wrote:
| > The Commission is concerned that Alphabet's and Apple's
| measures may not be fully compliant as they impose various
| restrictions and limitations. These constrain, among other
| things, developers' ability to freely communicate and promote
| offers and directly conclude contracts, including by imposing
| various charges.
|
| Oh that hurts Apple. "directly conclude contracts". That goes
| deep.
| jojobas wrote:
| Now imagine if TTIP was signed, EU would most likely be forced to
| abolish DMA or GDPR altogether.
| inetknght wrote:
| That is not a good thing.
| jojobas wrote:
| I guess my bad for sounding ambiguous, of course it's very
| good that EU is not obliged to bow to US "investors".
| jpgvm wrote:
| A terrible thing in fact. We should instead hope for a trade
| treaty that abolishes the DCMA. It's policies like these that
| make it clear that the government only serves special
| interests and not the average voter.
| ronsor wrote:
| > We should instead hope for a trade treaty that abolishes
| the DCMA.
|
| Trade agreements have weaseled more copyright and DMCA
| nonsense into just about every treaty now. Good luck going
| against the grain there.
| davikr wrote:
| I wish Discord was affected by the DMA so we could get some kind
| of official interoperability.
| aurareturn wrote:
| What product do you work on? Let's make that DMA as well.
| yesyessickospng wrote:
| I work on an opensource ssh server, so I don't think that it
| really matters if it were to somehow be affected by the DMA,
| as its an open standard and interoperates with opensource
| options, which hasn't killed the company I work for.
|
| If discord cant compete with email because its too hard to
| comply with open standards, maybe that particular rent
| seeking chat app wasn't actually all that innovative
| joshuamorton wrote:
| Email is good for a very particular set of things. Those
| things (including the way it is open and standardized) also
| make it very very bad for a lot of other things.
|
| For example, I don't need a spam filter on my discord. My
| signal is actually encrypted reasonably and provides
| reliably secure communication. I can send things like gifs
| and emoji in-line in a reliable, cross-platform way. Group
| communication isn't cursed, "top- or bottom- posting" isn't
| a thing people discuss.
|
| Requiring people to build only on widely accepted standards
| prevents any kind of innovation in features, because before
| you can ratify anything, you have to get it approved by
| everyone else, which means that you're now in a land of
| super-ultra-waterfall design-by-committee that gives
| everyone the least-common-denominator communication
| features. That isn't good.
| Sakos wrote:
| It's crazy how the 00s was this golden age of interoperability.
| You could use almost every messaging service with a third party
| client. Now all we have is walled gardens.
| kmlx wrote:
| i was there, i was developing on those systems.
|
| i think you're romanticising things.
|
| the whole situation with interoperability was not
| sustainable, as evidenced by the fact that it was dropped by
| every player as soon as possible.
|
| one of the reasons why it was not sustainable was that the
| standards at that time were conceived for a different era,
| and everyone wanted special features not available in the
| standards.
|
| it does seem like we're having much better success with
| interoperability nowadays, but only because the standards are
| much better today.
| thomastjeffery wrote:
| No, people left because a large enough percentage of their
| friends and coworkers did. That's how walled gardens work:
| exclusivity demands participation.
| kmlx wrote:
| you're describing the "network effect". but it only
| happens once people actually move away from certain
| platforms. why did they move away? features that couldn't
| be implemented using a shared standard.
| thomastjeffery wrote:
| "move away" is a tenuous assertion. If someone puts the
| majority of new content on another platform, is that
| "moving away"? What if they only use the old platform
| once a week? What if they only use the new platform once
| a week, but that's when an important discussion happens?
|
| No one moved away from email.
| guappa wrote:
| Players always drop it to trap their users to their
| service.
|
| See how google closed hangouts to being able to communicate
| with other XMPP servers, or how slack dropped IRC and XMPP
| when they felt they had enough adoption to be able to do
| that.
|
| So in the beginning you want interoperability so it's "just
| the same", then you drop it so the users are stuck.
| kmlx wrote:
| > Players always drop it to trap their users to their
| service.
|
| i understand what you're writing and i agree. but in my
| case all our enterprise clients were demanding features
| that had us circumventing interoperability since the
| features they were asking for would never make it into
| the standards.
| Sakos wrote:
| > i think you're romanticising things.
|
| I don't think I am. As a user, I could use Pidgin or Gaim
| and talk to my friends across every service I used. This
| only stopped when companies started consciously working
| against these efforts. Discord explicitly and openly banned
| third party clients. They didn't have to do so. It has
| nothing to do with standards and everything to do with
| companies becoming aggressively and openly hostile towards
| anything that isn't directly under their control.
| DaiPlusPlus wrote:
| > You could use almost every messaging service with a third
| party client
|
| Not because of open-standards - but because that was when IM
| protocols were straightforward to reverse-engineer and
| interop with, and this was before mass-adoption of SSL/TLS
| (let alone certificate-pinning).
| unstatusthequo wrote:
| Where do people get this notion that every system has to work
| with their competitors' system? Genuinely curious. Why would I
| spend resources making sure to accommodate connection to
| something that competes?
| Sakos wrote:
| 1) It used to work that way. You didn't even have to put in
| special effort. It takes more effort to do what these
| companies do today to ensure nobody can interface with their
| service.
|
| 2) Apparently we need regulation to make companies do it
| today, and that will force these companies to allow
| interoperability.
| shagie wrote:
| What would it take to get gcc to export its AST so that
| greater interoperability could be achieved with other FOSS
| packages (like Emacs)?
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8861360 (one of the
| indexes of the issue)
| krzyk wrote:
| Because clients expect it to?
| guappa wrote:
| Imagine if you had to own the same phone brand to call
| someone else...
| rustcleaner wrote:
| Because one day We The People will pass Apple Laws which levy
| a 100% final point of sale sales tax on products (containing
| at least one universal machine) and services which reduce
| owner sovereignty.
|
| If a product could conceivably do X and steps were taken in
| R&D to keep it from doing X (not that it wasn't implemented,
| but was specifically designed to prevent owners from doing X
| even though otherwise it could if steps weren't taken), or if
| the product maker does not publish protocols, formats,
| standards, etc, or designs those with the intent to thwart
| interoperability; or if the owner is prevented from changing
| programming code on a universal machine regardless of the
| product's function (phone, PC, microwave, washer, blood sugar
| monitor, automobile) with well-known interface hardware and
| communication protocols; or anything else in this spirit I
| have missed, will be in violation of Apple Laws and must have
| a 100% final point of sale sales tax levied so that
| philosophically highly anti-Stallman products can't compete
| easily against near-Stallman compliant products.
|
| Closed source proprietary software and hardware are huge
| national security problems. Even if USGOV can sign an NDA to
| inspect source code and chip design, it's still a national
| security issue that you and I can't. It is a national
| security issue when decade-old idiot-TVs and idiot-cameras
| long out of software updates pwn computers and/or get turned
| into remote surveillance devices for digital voyeurs paying
| top dollar to collect private feeds into peoples' lives
| (don't ask).
|
| Phew! I hate mobile keyboards!
| rustcleaner wrote:
| Yeah my delivery is bombastic and maybe sounds a little
| schizo: sure you got me, probably why I am downvoted.
|
| Then again how many salaries would my schizo-presented
| ideas impact (many), and what is their intersection here
| (at least moderate)?
|
| Probably the former, the latter would mark me as paranoid
| schizophrenic. :^)
| hackable_sand wrote:
| ActivityPub discord would be lit
| _factor wrote:
| The web as designed by Tim Berners-Lee was a decentralized system
| where you could host a website and others could see it.
|
| Google came along and made finding these websites much more
| convenient and accessible. Along the way Microsoft IE began using
| monopoly advantage to make the web in Microsoft's image. It was a
| clunky unstandardized mess for many years as only Microsoft could
| officially push a standard. You could build for Netscape/Firefox,
| but you would be breaking 90% of your users due to undocumented
| and tailored code.
|
| Now Google has the market share. The standards are much more
| aligned amongst the major players, and it would be a stretch to
| call it a monopoly. That's the goal.
|
| Google unofficially pushes the new browsers standards towards
| Google's image, just as Microsoft had before. Just look at Chrome
| extensions for an example. It's not a coincidence ad blockers are
| becoming weakling in the name of "security".
|
| Apple has their entrenched user base, solidifying with every iOS
| app unavailable to other ecosystems. Compound the issue when
| people have paid real money for useful apps that they don't wish
| to sink the cost for.
|
| It's better than before, but companies will never have your best
| interests at heart. Profit is incentivized first, then product
| (including you).
|
| A decentralized web is possible, we have the technology. There is
| no reason a static site server couldn't be implemented with a
| proxy hiding feature, even using IPFS potentially. Large plates
| can still cache and serve data to get paid, but your data doesn't
| have to be centralized.
|
| Moreover, serving up a web server from your local machine could
| be as easy as opening a custom pinned tabbed and sharing it out.
| CRDTs and homomorophic tech open worlds of possibility with
| secure p2p applications at scale.
|
| But this is not what a cloud provider wants. It is not the
| direction we are heading. We are trained to be paranoid (rightful
| so unfortunately), and cloud providers tout themselves as the
| panacea. In some ways they are, but at what cost?
|
| We no longer trust the user to have a direct connection. All of
| your services should be on the cloud if you're "enterprise"
| enough, and you'll pay for it accordingly.
|
| What I want to see: Governments recognize that the internet is a
| public utility at this point, and reduce the roadblocks to
| hosting your own data. Allow all GUA IPv6 addresses to be static
| if requested. Don't allow carriers to give special preference to
| business accounts vs personal for static assignment. There is no
| technical reason for this if a customer requests it. We're not
| running out of IPv6 addresses.
|
| This fixes the STUN/TURN debacle created by NAT, and opens up the
| field for new possibilities. It also allows for real
| decentralized competition with cloud providers.
|
| It used to be that I got excited about the random blog posts I
| could find. Simple HTML sites from interesting people, which I
| mostly get on Hacker News now. Search engines filled with ads and
| SEO/AI garbage only exist because of the profit structure and
| centralized control.
|
| With ID verification a certainty due to AI advances, we're going
| to be even more locked into these monopolistic systems. We need
| competition, and as long as they hold the search screen, we're
| only going to move towards higher profits for them. Yet something
| tells me our governments have something to do with it. Data
| collection isn't just profitable, it's potent.
| thomastjeffery wrote:
| There is one reason left: copyright.
|
| A true decentralized content sharing platform cannot prevent
| copyright infringement. That's the guarantee that we have built
| our entire society around. Copyright isn't even about artists
| making money anymore. It's the tool we use to litigate fraud.
| It's the tool we use to demand privacy. It's the foundation for
| content-moderation.
|
| If we want a decentralized web, we need to leave copyright out
| of it. The greatest challenge for that is moderation. I
| advocate that we replace moderation with curation.
| rustcleaner wrote:
| Best bet is to build the network to be resistant to
| government, police, and (underlying layers 2/3) network
| censorship. You work to make protocols which make individuals
| and small groups as equally powerful as large groups when it
| comes to meeting physical/biological survival needs. You
| promote personal sovereignty even if it means some random nut
| can kill a bunch of randos as a negative six-sigma result.
|
| Instead of building systems which try to subsume individual
| mental sovereignty into the group mind (all is one, all is
| god), promote technologies which enable minds to grow in
| capabilities and independence (you too can grow into a god).
| Governments are examples of the former.
|
| It is better the government or any other powerful group not
| be able to handcuff the guy you don't like today, lest they
| come to handcuff you tomorrow. Everyday you give up your
| sovereignty like a currency for some form of benefit (try
| manufacturing methamphetamine while skipping property taxes,
| you are not sovereign): always evaluate if you are still
| getting a good deal, and build technologies which make it
| harder (NOT EASIER) to both give up or take away that
| sovereignty.
|
| This is almost a religious thing.
|
| (Caveat: I am big-A Atheist.)
| thomastjeffery wrote:
| Such networks already exist. There's a reason most people
| won't use them: moderation.
|
| Most people don't want to spend their time on 4chan. If you
| want interesting content, then you want users, which means
| you want moderation.
|
| The problem with moderation is that it's a hierarchy.
| That's exactly what a decentralized network exists to
| avoid. We need a decentralization-compatible moderation
| alternative. I think reframing top-down moderation as
| bottom-up curation could work.
| wepple wrote:
| I strongly agree with the general gist of your post; I don't
| use any social media and a piece of me dies anytime a twitter
| link is shared that I can't read because I don't have an
| account.
|
| That said, I don't think the technologies and solutions you've
| proposed will take flight unfortunately.
|
| I've been very curious about IPFS for the longest time, but it
| seems to fit into the same category as blockchain: beautiful
| technology that could solve a lot of problems, yet the barrier
| to entry vs just doing it the status quo way is too high.
|
| If the general public can't be bothered having their own
| Wordpress blog, the jump to running a server or writing a
| single HTML tag is far too difficult.
|
| I'd love to see a fully not-for-profit social media
| organization whose only goal is the wellbeing of users
| bcye wrote:
| Does someone know what the minimum fine is gatekeepers face? All
| sources I find only talk about the maximum fine of 10%
|
| EDIT: Or maybe rather an expected fine, we saw with GDPR that the
| maximum fine isn't really used much, if at all.
| wdr1 wrote:
| The DMA does not specify a minimum fine for violations.
| polycaster wrote:
| I'm not a lawyer, but I guess that would be zero.
|
| The maximum in absolute numbers would be ~40B USD or ~80B USD
| for repeated violations, as I read it.
| layer8 wrote:
| There is no minimum fine. But: "In fixing the amount of a fine,
| the Commission shall take into account the gravity, duration,
| recurrence, and, for fines imposed pursuant to paragraph 3,
| delay caused to the proceedings." (Article 30 paragraph 4)
|
| So you might compare the actual noncompliance to the worst
| conceivable noncompliance with respect to those factors and
| make a guess.
|
| Edit: There's also this quote by Thierry Breton, Commissioner
| for Internal Market, on the linked page: "[...] Should our
| investigation conclude that there is lack of full compliance
| with the DMA, gatekeepers could face heavy fines." This would
| imply that anything but full compliance could already incur
| "heavy" fines.
| bcye wrote:
| Thank you. I think Big Tech is already quite close to the
| worst perceivable non compliance, but I guess we'll see.
| shuckles wrote:
| Imagine how much time will be wasted to comply with crazy demands
| like making the Photos app uninstallable which help basically
| nobody.
| trompetenaccoun wrote:
| The EU has long lost the plot with all the bureaucracy and
| rules. People like it when the government cracks down on
| powerful corporations, not understanding that the government
| apparatus is the most powerful and dangerous institution of
| them all. I'm not fully against that part of the DMA, breaking
| up these walled gardens could be positive. But history has
| shown once they start meddling with the markets, governments
| rarely know when to stop. That's because people in positions of
| power generally think they're in control and know what they're
| doing.
|
| Look at the recent bottle cap directive for a more insane
| example. There are sadly hundreds of such cases at this point
| and the number of rules keeps growing year by year. Doing
| business in the EU will become more and more difficult and
| especially the cost for starting a new business is growing
| massively because of what needs to get invested in compliance
| before you even get started. This will be devastating for
| innovation and their economy as a whole.
| yokoprime wrote:
| I'm sorry, but what was that? The economy will collapse due
| to bottle cap directives? You know that these arguments have
| been thrown around by anti-EU interests since the 90s and its
| never ever panned out
| sweeter wrote:
| "step off the multi-billion dollar corporation, bully!"
|
| seriously though, it never ceases to amaze me the level
| people repeat corporate propaganda and conflate corporate
| success with their own self-worth. These companies
| literally spend billions in lobbying the government to
| "influence" their decisions and run rigorous ad campaigns
| that smear any sentiment that isn't vehemently pro-
| billionaire, pro-corpoate, pro big-tech etc... so its not
| all that surprising that people fall for it but it is truly
| astounding.
| dkjaudyeqooe wrote:
| > conflate corporate success with their own self-worth
|
| I think that's what happens when you become a
| stockholder.
| dkjaudyeqooe wrote:
| > not understanding that the government apparatus is the most
| powerful and dangerous institution of them all
|
| OK, but we can vote government out at regular intervals,
| meanwhile we're supposed to just accept anything corporations
| do because... they're not government? Cherry picking and
| misrepresenting EU regulations doesn't make your argument any
| clearer.
|
| But where your argument really fails is that you don't really
| have one beyond ideological claptrap, taken solely on faith,
| or perhaps with specious arguments about out of control
| government and how markets and corporations are innately good
| and cannot be "interfered" with, lest the economy and
| "innovation" collapse. Please give us all a break.
|
| Business don't get started and fail not because of government
| regulation, but because of huge corporations that crush
| competition, withhold access, promote incompatibility, etc.
| They use their size to ignore regulation and warp markets to
| their benefit.
|
| Of course not all corporations are bad but some are, and
| that's why we have regulations.
| madsbuch wrote:
| Do you enjoy pre-installed aware, shareware, demoware etc. in
| general? or is this only because it is Apple products and his
| is about?
|
| like having a demo version of Norton installed on your new PC.
|
| or having Facebook OEM installed with no way to remove it?
|
| you are the first one I have ever heard of, who actively
| encourages and enjoys that.
|
| impressive.
| gleenn wrote:
| Honestly, hard disk space is cheap. The thing that bothers me
| is when e.g. Norton is naggy and pops up UIs to make me
| interact with it despite opting out over time. Things like
| the Photos app sit there and occupy space but zero percent of
| my brain and perhaps some gigs of storage I personally am not
| missing.
| concinds wrote:
| The Apple Music app makes my 32GB iPad unusable. It takes
| up 10GB of my 32GB, despite having 0 songs downloaded. I
| have no idea what takes up that space (album art alone
| can't account for 10GB). There's no option to clear that
| "Documents & Data" cache in the "iPad Storage" settings
| menu. _Uninstalling the Music app does not remove this
| data._ I could reset the iPad but I can 't be bothered. I'm
| also stuck with Safari because I can't afford Chrome's
| 200MB, and with Mail because the Gmail app is 500MB.
| rmah wrote:
| Something is very wrong with your iPad storage. My Apple
| Music (also mostly unused) takes up a grand total of 28
| MB, of which 23.5 MB is the app.
| talldayo wrote:
| > hard disk space is cheap
|
| Are we referring to the same Apple company right now?
| willmadden wrote:
| >Honestly, hard disk space is cheap.
|
| Not on Apple's laptops. They also markup hundreds of
| dollars for +8 GB of RAM, which probably costs them 10-20
| USD.
| madsbuch wrote:
| in my opinion it is about controlling "what you have in
| your fridge".
|
| if I want to loose weight but cannot remove the chocolate
| from my fridge I am at the mercy of my supplier of fridges.
| it is the same here.
|
| if I don't want to spend time on Facebook, gambling, etc.
| then I should be able to clear away these types of apps
| from my system.
| shuckles wrote:
| It's already possible to hide the Photos app from the
| system, so you are wrong on the facts. And the photos app
| is a lot more like the compressor in your fridge, not
| like the contents of it. But the point of reasoning by
| metaphor a lot of commenters on here employ is to
| obfuscate any assertions. So what do you think: should OS
| vendors not be allowed to supply default software beyond
| a kernel? The Settings app should also be customizable?
| And this is good for users how? Keeps them from getting
| fat?
| foooorsyth wrote:
| People buy Apple products because they don't have that crap.
| What are you talking about?
|
| If there's one company that DOESN'T bloat your computing
| device with worthless junk from third parties, it's Apple.
| rustcleaner wrote:
| It is extremely difficult to make someone understand
| something, when their salary depends on their not
| understanding it.
|
| This is HN and surveillance capitalism rules the internet, of
| course we will see commenters here whose wealth depend on it.
|
| Now I will garrison for the next brigade... :^)
| phatskat wrote:
| This is apples to oranges - the stock Photos app isn't
| shareware/demo ware etc. it's a basic photo gallery app with
| a really solid search feature, and it integrates into the
| camera app just liked you'd expect on any other mobile OS.
|
| And just for both of you, you can indeed tap and hold the
| Photos app and then choose "Remove Application". I'd be
| surprised if this did anything beyond hiding the app, and
| also the Photos app is completely innocuous imo.
|
| Norton preinstalled on a Windows XP machine is more like if
| your phone came with Weather Underground preinstalled.
| shuckles wrote:
| The commenter apparently can't tell the difference between
| a best in class photo management app made by the creators
| of Aperature with bloatware. I don't fault them: most users
| can't either which is why giving them a "choice" is
| extremely overrated!
| madsbuch wrote:
| I am sure Norton also think they are best in class anti-
| virus software.
|
| and luckily we don't govern by My Opinion(tm).
| shuckles wrote:
| If Windows needs a best in class antivirus to use basic
| hardware features, it is pretty reasonable to bundle it
| in the OS!
| shuckles wrote:
| Your reply is a non-sequitur bordering on rude.
|
| It is also ironic because the EU-mandated browser choice
| screen offers users such stalwart top browsers such as
| "Browser" by Maple Media Apps, LLC. a holding company for
| category leading apps, "Web@Work", and "You.com AI Search and
| Browse". Bloatware lovers rejoice!
| madsbuch wrote:
| my comment might have sarcastic undertones, but it is
| definitely serious.
|
| I understand that the original commenter might not have
| thought thiur argument through and the implications of it.
| That is fair, that is why we debate.
| shuckles wrote:
| It's not serious, as evidenced by nobody building an
| argument on your ridiculous comparison to bloatware. And
| the offensive part of it was not the poor, sarcastic
| metaphor but instead the fake indignation that someone
| could believe something different from you.
| madsbuch wrote:
| And you make yourself guilty of the exact same bad
| rhetorics here. Let's call it a day - it is OK to just
| let bad comments be and let them sink. Give them a down
| vote instead.
| shuckles wrote:
| No actually I think HN works best when people call out
| bad behavior. Your original comment violates every other
| guideline for behavior in comments, most notably:
|
| > Be kind. Don't be snarky. Converse curiously.
|
| > Please respond to the strongest possible interpretation
| of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to
| criticize. Assume good faith.
| __alexs wrote:
| Imagine how much time could have been saved if they had just
| made Photos a normal app from the beginning?
| shuckles wrote:
| In reality it would play out a lot more like the Web Apps
| episode: if the barrier to entry for any new idea was it had
| to meet the EU's extensive list of arbitrary rules, most new
| ideas would never be realized. I guess it's time saved, but
| not in the sense you think.
| st3fan wrote:
| You can uninstall the photos app. And reinstall it from the
| App Store via
| https://apps.apple.com/ca/app/photos/id1584215428
|
| Or you can install a completely alternative app to manage
| your photos.
|
| The only thing iOS does in that case is provide the "Album"
| functionality.
| noapologies wrote:
| Please do tell us more about why the Photos "app" is unique and
| wasn't uninstallable to begin with, surely it's not a business
| decision made explicitly to increase vendor lock-in and
| introduce friction to consumer choice (like the rest of the
| Apple suite of "apps").
| shuckles wrote:
| Are you seriously asking why Apple offers its users a built-
| in app to view the photos taken with their phone? You'd
| prefer if users had to choose and install a photo management
| app before they could take a picture?
| noapologies wrote:
| > Are you seriously asking why Apple offers its users a
| built-in app ...
|
| As you may have already read in my comment, I'm asking why
| it wasn't uninstallable to begin with.
| shuckles wrote:
| The burden of proof is on the people requesting the
| feature. The reason for not building any feature is
| simple: users don't care about it and there are more
| valuable other features to build. (As evidenced by system
| apps not being deletable on iOS for its first decade.)
| noapologies wrote:
| > The burden of proof is on the people requesting the
| feature.
|
| Fortunately there are other reasons why a business may be
| forced to do something, and not allowed to be the sole
| judge/jury/executioner.
|
| One of those is anti-trust action - something that
| greatly benefits humanity as a whole, even though the
| alternative may (or may not) be cheaper for the business.
|
| Other examples are employee protections, consumer
| protections, constitutional amendments etc.
| shuckles wrote:
| Which goes back to my original point: there is literally
| no benefit besides navel gazing for requiring the photos
| app to be deletable. Just because there are many reasons
| one could compel a company to do something does not mean
| any of them are applicable to this request.
| st3fan wrote:
| Many system apps that are bundled with iOS can already be
| uninstalled and reinstalled via the App Store.
|
| Photos also has an "Uninstall" button. Won't feel like trying
| out what that does.
| 1letterunixname wrote:
| In turbulent times, the tallest grass gets chopped first.
|
| But also, a few megacorps increasingly occupy increasingly
| numerous facets of lives of billions of people and should be
| carefully monitored so that they don't abuse their power.
| glitchc wrote:
| These megacorps have been avoiding paying taxes in the
| jurisdictions where they make most of their money. It's only
| natural to expect govts. to claw some of that revenue back.
| People think it's about privacy but it's really about tax
| revenue.
| meristohm wrote:
| And I would appreciate it if those companies currently
| getting away with paying too little in taxes paid more,
| perhaps commensurate with the amount they benefit from
| existing infrastructure.
| avianlyric wrote:
| That doesn't really stack up as an argument. From 2004 to
| 2014 Apple used the "double-Irish" tax arrangement to shield
| 110B USD of profits from taxation, EU corporation tax is
| about 20% (taken as an average over all the countries), which
| would amount to about 22B USD of "unpaid" taxes. Since 2014
| Apple's revenues have doubled, if their profits have done the
| same, and they're following the same broad profit margin and
| tax avoidance schemes (and everything suggests they do), then
| Apple's "unpaid" tax is at least 66B USD.
|
| Apple's global revenue for 2023 was about 400B USD, and the
| DSA caps the fines at 10% of global revenue, so 40B USD for
| Apple. It's very unlikely that Apple will be hit with a
| maximum out of the gate, that's not really how these
| regulators work (you want to make sure you can always issue a
| bigger fine later).
|
| How is clawing back at most 57% of the unpaid taxes, in a one
| time fine, a good strategy for tax revenue? And of all the
| big tech companies, Apple has the lowest profit margin at a
| mere 25%, Facebook has higher margins of 30-35%, so the fines
| make even less sense a tax clawback mechanism there.
|
| All of that is of ignoring the fact the EU and European
| Commission isn't a federal government, and doesn't have any
| tax revenue at all. Member states charge tax (or not in the
| case of Ireland), but the EU as an entity most certainly does
| not. Indeed countries like Ireland have been fighting tooth
| and nail _against_ EU to _avoid_ clawing back taxes.
|
| So in reality, the idea the DMA is about tax revenue simple
| doesn't stack up. It doesn't stack up economically, it
| doesn't stack up politically, and it doesn't stack up
| practically either.
| andrewla wrote:
| > In turbulent times, the tallest grass gets chopped first.
|
| This is an incoherent metaphor. Why would turbulent times cause
| a change in grass-chopping behavior?
| willmadden wrote:
| Indeed, why would you avoid shortest straw, if the tallest
| grass gets chopped first?
|
| I think he meant "The tallest blade of grass is the first to
| be mowed down", but that's not during "turbulent times", it's
| when you are mowing your lawn. I guess that's turbulent for
| the grass.
| karmakaze wrote:
| That's not how a lawnmower works. The first blade of grass
| taller than the lawnmower blade height encountered is cut
| first.
|
| I suppose what it could mean is the field with the tallest
| grass gets the lawnmower first. Then again all that matters
| is if the grass is taller than the blade, not how much
| taller.
| idle_zealot wrote:
| The most interesting thing here to me is this bit
|
| > Apple's new fee structure and other terms and conditions for
| alternative app stores and distribution of apps from the web
| (sideloading) may be defeating the purpose of its obligations
| under Article 6(4) of the DMA
|
| because, well, yeah, that's exactly what they do! When Apple
| users complain about the DMA forcing Apple to allow other stores
| and sideloading they often predict that Meta and other nefarious
| corporations will launch their own distribution as the exclusive
| source of their popular or near-required apps in order to skirt
| Apple's privacy rules. That is a possibility (though it hasn't
| happened on Android), but I feel that the benefit of sideloading
| community-made apps that break Apple's rules by interoperating
| with services unofficially would more than offset any losses to
| privacy. However, as Apple's implementation stands the fees and
| agreements necessary to distribute apps would keep most FOSS or
| community-maintained apps from being distributed, while allowing
| rich bad actors an avenue of further abusing their users. It's
| the worst possible world; a free-for-all for rich corporations to
| distribute whatever garbage they want and no balancing pressure
| from unofficial apps keeping their behavior somewhat in check.
| Moving from a world where Apple gets to decide what code runs on
| your phone to one where anyone with sufficiently deep pockets
| makes the call. I hope that the EC finds that the spirit of the
| DMA is that users decide what runs on their phones, and that
| Apple's proposed changes are not in that spirit.
| aednichols wrote:
| CTF is waived for nonprofits, which is how a lot of FOSS
| projects are structured.
| giantrobot wrote:
| > That is a possibility (though it hasn't happened on Android)
|
| Android as a platform has far fewer default privacy controls as
| iOS. Meta doesn't need an alternate App Store to slurp up
| Android users' data. They _would_ need one on iOS which gives
| them and everyone else impetus to create alternate stores which
| allow them to slurp up more data. Apple 's opt-out by default
| data policies cost Meta _billions_ of dollars the quarter it
| was introduced in the OS update. Meta would assuredly restrict
| their apps to a Meta store to get back those billions.
| idle_zealot wrote:
| > Meta would assuredly restrict their apps to a Meta store to
| get back those billions
|
| Unless, of course, the friction introduced by requiring users
| leave the App Store they're comfortable with costs them more.
| jmholla wrote:
| > Apple's opt-out by default data policies cost Meta billions
| of dollars the quarter it was introduced in the OS update.
| Meta would assuredly restrict their apps to a Meta store to
| get back those billions.
|
| How would a different app store change these OS policies and
| features?
| burnerthrow008 wrote:
| Because, as has already been explained _ad nauseam_ ,
| Apple's control measures are partly technological and
| partly contractual. If Apple catches you tracking users
| after users opt out of tracking, Apple will de-list you
| from their store.
|
| If Meta can simply set up a different storefront (or
| directly side load), they merely have to follow the EU laws
| (which are less restrictive than Apple's).
| giantrobot wrote:
| The question is about the level of entitlements alternate
| app stores have and whether Apple has any oversight of
| those entitlements. If the EU decides anyone can make an
| App Store and Apple has no say, then iOS would need to
| trust the entitlements (and signature chain) from those
| alternate stores. If the alternate store allows
| entitlements to suck up user data with no say from Apple,
| then the mechanisms to prevent access to that data are
| toothless on the device. ACLs aren't effective without
| controlling the underlying authentication mechanism.
|
| Things like accessing the address book and photos are
| behind entitlements. If the app's entitlements (from the
| App Store) don't even permit usage the API will throw an
| error. A third party store that Apple has zero input on
| could just allow all API access with super loose
| entitlements.
|
| If there's no control of who can start a store and Apple is
| forced to allow that, then it's trivial for big vendors
| like Meta but also vendors like Epic to start stores with
| zero access controls to data on the device.
|
| It gets even worse with web views apps use. A web view has
| access to the unencrypted data that goes through the view.
| If Meta launches Meta Browser that backs web views inside
| apps they can see all the traffic from all third party
| apps.
|
| If Apple puts additional protections at the OS level to
| gate access to sensitive data the same complaints will be
| leveled against them as today. By forcing consumer choices
| into the system the very likely end result will be less
| consumer privacy. If a person buys an iPhone that's an
| affirmative signal they trust Apple. If they then have to
| make additional choices about browsers and app stores
| they're not necessarily going to be able to make _informed_
| choices.
| idle_zealot wrote:
| Access to sensitive data an features is gated behind
| entitlements and user permission. What any reasonable
| sandbox needs to do is make it difficult for an sandboxed
| app to tell whether it actually has a permission it has
| asked for or not by providing the user an option to
| provide scoped or fake data. Oh, Facebook won't run
| without me giving it access to my contacts? Ok, here you
| go, but gee, it looks like I don't have any contacts
| outside of the iPhone defaults.
| msdrigg wrote:
| I don't see a lot of discussion of the Meta "pay or consent"
| investigation. Why wouldn't giving users the option to pay for
| tracking-free, ad-free service meet the requirement? Is the
| concern that the $10/month price too high? Would this kind of
| model be acceptable at a more reasonable price point?
| acedTrex wrote:
| Ya I am also not following what the problem is with this
| approach. Is that not the entire point of options? Do people
| feel entitled to have all free services with no obligations of
| their own?
| msdrigg wrote:
| So from the articles I can find about the complaints filed
| against Meta [1] I can't find any explanation of what would
| be an acceptable price for non-consent besides free.
|
| I mean like it's their right as a government to say 'you
| can't charge for consent. either charge everyone or no-one',
| but I wonder how it'll all pan out.
|
| [1](https://techcrunch.com/2024/02/28/meta-consent-or-pay-
| consum...)
| epolanski wrote:
| I think the idea is that you cannot have these options like
| denying access to content only if user pays with $ or
| personal data.
|
| But the issue I find here is that Meta has not premiered
| this technique, the first offenders were Italian digital
| newspapers either requiring your data or a subscription.
| somenameforme wrote:
| I'm never fond of these sort of comparisons, because size
| _does_ matter. Meta services billions of customers around
| the globe - a sizable chunk of the entire human species,
| with a defacto monopoly in terms of raw reach and scale.
| For them to be held to a higher standard than e.g. an
| Italian newspaper is not at all unreasonable.
|
| In an ideal world the rules and regulations companies
| have to follow would be strongly correlated against their
| size, with penalties growing increasingly harsh for
| violations. In reality, it's the exact opposite. Small
| companies can get destroyed by even minor rule
| violations, whereas massive corporations will endlessly
| litigate out even absolutely overt violations, and even
| when they lose the cases after dragging them out
| endlessly, the penalties they face are entirely
| inconsequential - a few days of revenue at worst. That's
| just so wrong on so many levels.
| epolanski wrote:
| Yes but Italian newspapers which started the trend have
| faced so far no consequences and they should be more
| aware of our law than a US company.
| idle_zealot wrote:
| If the policy is "you can't sell you privacy" that would be
| pretty cool. It would require tech companies to come up with
| a business model that doesn't profit from pervasive
| surveillance. It is well within our rights as a society to
| deem such a model unacceptable.
| nickff wrote:
| > _" It is well within our rights as a society to deem such
| a model unacceptable"_
|
| Do societies have rights? Where are these rights defined,
| and how are they limited (if they are at all)? Are you
| talking about constitutions (and therefore states), or
| 'international law'?
| idle_zealot wrote:
| The right I am referencing is that to self-governance.
| SiempreViernes wrote:
| Are you genuinely, in good faith, asking if societies can
| define rules?!
| nickff wrote:
| Anyone or any group can make a rule; highwaymen and
| pirates can make rules. The parent comment was about a
| "right" to do so, which begged the question as to the
| origin of the right.
| msdrigg wrote:
| Obviously within the context of this discussion, we are
| talking about states (in this case the EU) making laws.
|
| As to whether or not, they have a right to make laws? I
| think that's outside of the scope of this discussion
| because they clearly already made the law and meta isn't
| challenging their right to do so.
| nickff wrote:
| I did not think it was obvious, and thought that the
| parent's definition of 'society' was significant to the
| discussion. The EU is not a state, though it does make
| laws. As to whether it has a 'right' to make laws, that
| depends on your view of rights, and may involve Political
| Authority (which is somewhat problematic).
|
| I was replying to a comment, not directly addressing
| Meta.
| jermaustin1 wrote:
| > It is well within our rights as a society to deem such a
| model unacceptable.
|
| Then... pay for it?
| Fargren wrote:
| No one is saying it's illegal for companies to demand pay
| as cost of access. What they can't legally do is take
| your privacy in lieu of payment. So "pay or don't use" is
| legal, and always has been. "Surrender your data to use"
| is not, and following that "Surrender your data or pay to
| use" isn't either.
| what wrote:
| Aren't there actually three options?
|
| 1. Pay
|
| 2. Give them data
|
| 3. Do not use
|
| Why are people not allowed to consent to (2)?
| burnerthrow008 wrote:
| The same reason they're not allowed to choose a phone
| with a walled-garden ecosystem: A few bureaucrats in
| Brussels don't like it.
| idle_zealot wrote:
| Because basically everyone giving up all privacy for a
| modicum of convenience makes the world a worse place.
| It's a seatbelt situation; people consistently make the
| wrong decision, so the option is removed. In the abstract
| it's distasteful to remove autonomy like that, but on
| occasion we need to make collective calculated decisions
| like this.
| 9dev wrote:
| That is exactly what EU laws say -- privacy is a right. You
| cannot give up your rights in exchange for money, just like
| you cannot legally sell yourself as a slave to someone, as
| that would be illegal for both parties.
| verisimi wrote:
| If you pay, you have to be being tracked surely?
| bluesign wrote:
| I think tracking-free and ad-free are different concerns here.
| Basically you can offer ad-free for $X/month, but tracking
| consent should be separate ( basically anyone would be able to
| deny tracking )
|
| Same issue on the Apple side will play out probably similar;
| either they can charge every developer some technology fee, or
| they cannot charge to anyone.
| burnerthrow008 wrote:
| > I think tracking-free and ad-free are different concerns
| here
|
| Maybe in theory, but in practice they are one and the same.
| The CPM on ads where you don't know the audience is so low
| that you might as well skip the ads entirely.
|
| > Same issue on the Apple side will play out probably
| similar; either they can charge every developer some
| technology fee, or they cannot charge to anyone.
|
| Yes, and the result for both will be that there is no free
| tier in the EU anymore. All EU developers will pay the CTF
| and all EU users will pay $10/month for for ad-free FB.
| pashadee wrote:
| I wrote about it months ago when they did it. Why wouldn't it?
| Because... it's illegal (under EU law)
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38192620
|
| But the answer is: pay or consent "does not achieve the
| objective of preventing the accumulation of personal data by
| gatekeepers". See
| https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_24_...
| (also linked via the tweet elsewhere in this discussion)
| gpm wrote:
| My understanding, and the understanding of the EU commissioner
| [0], is that _any_ amount is too high.
|
| Consent must be _freely_ given under EU law, not given in
| exchange for not having to pay money. You can 't give a
| discount on the services for consenting.
|
| [0] https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2024/03/apple-google-
| and...
| nickpsecurity wrote:
| I've long promoted this. Many others did, too. I went as far as
| suggesting they charge above the per-user profit of the
| surveillance business just to increase odds it would be
| profitable. I wanted that for Google apps on alternative
| Android's and Facebook.
|
| That they won't release such products despite the demand shows
| they're just evil. They believe they can squeeze more money and
| power out of ever-increasing surveillance.
| noapologies wrote:
| A lot of people are quick to lock themselves into a gatekeeper's
| walled garden, and throw away the keys.
|
| That Linux has not only survived for so long, but thrived, is a
| true testament to the will, technical expertise, and product
| vision of community developers.
|
| FOSS was founded on the principles of openness and collaboration,
| something that we need now more than ever, as the largest
| companies of the world have managed to weaken that resolve
| through slick marketing and anti-competitive practices.
|
| Think of what truly open VR headsets, smartwatches, tablets and
| smartphones etc. would be capable of, the rich ecosystem of apps
| and capabilities that could exist - but greed is literally
| holding us back by decades.
|
| Think of the kids growing up now, forced to be consumers rather
| than producers. And compare them to the last century, the sense
| of wonder and expression that the internet and infinitely
| hackable devices brought.
|
| It was revolutionary, and many of the giants that exist now were
| built literally on the backs of that openness.
| wilg wrote:
| > Think of what truly open VR headsets, smartwatches, tablets
| and smartphones etc. would be capable of, the rich ecosystem of
| apps and capabilities that could exist - but greed is literally
| holding us back by decades.
|
| Nothing is stopping anyone from making these devices, and I
| think many do in fact exist but are not popular.
| fsflover wrote:
| > Nothing is stopping anyone from making these devices
|
| Anti-competitive practices do. Example of a struggle:
| https://puri.sm/posts/breaking-ground/
| wilg wrote:
| That article is about how they weren't stopped, and there's
| nothing anticompetitive in it.
| fsflover wrote:
| Purism almost went bankrupt due to challenges like this
| one. They had to choose a relatively outdated, slow
| hardware and reverse engineer many things to make them
| work, e.g., camera. All companies producing the required
| chips refuse to work with FLOSS -- if this isn't anti-
| competitive and destroying competition, I don't know what
| is.
| wilg wrote:
| Yeah, I mean you have to do the work. It doesn't seem
| like they refuse to work with FLOSS on principle, just
| that it's difficult to them.
| staplers wrote:
| A parallel is Disney taking public domain stories and then
| dramatically manipulating copyright law to monopolize them.
|
| The "pull the ladder up behind you" mentality is so pervasive
| in modern business it's amazing anything new gets built at all.
| handwarmers wrote:
| > FOSS was founded on the principles of openness and
| collaboration, something that we need now more than ever, as
| the largest companies of the world have managed to weaken that
| resolve through slick marketing and anti-competitive practices.
|
| Some of the best open source software was developed, open
| sourced and maintained by the largest companies of the world.
|
| >Think of what truly open VR headsets, smartwatches, tablets
| and smartphones etc. would be capable of, the rich ecosystem of
| apps and capabilities that could exist - but greed is literally
| holding us back by decades.
|
| Do you think an open source group could build an Apple watch?
|
| > That Linux has not only survived for so long, but thrived, is
| a true testament to the will, technical expertise, and product
| vision of community developers.
|
| That Linux is still mostly used as a server OS, and not as a
| viable OS by the general public is a true testament that there
| are things that matter to people that community developers
| don't care about.
|
| >Think of the kids growing up now, forced to be consumers
| rather than producers. And compare them to the last century,
| the sense of wonder and expression that the internet and
| infinitely hackable devices brought.
|
| Techie kids growing up now are on average an order of
| magnitudes better than their equivalent from last century. As a
| matter of fact, there are more great and creative coders
| nowadays compared to any time in history. Just look at the
| amount of open source projects on github.
|
| Idealism that is as far disconnected from reality as yours is
| one of the issues plaguing FOSS today. I have no idea how your
| comment can be as upvoted as it is - maybe selection bias based
| on the nature of the article. It is still concerning though.
| stcredzero wrote:
| _Idealism that is as far disconnected from reality as yours
| is one of the issues plaguing FOSS today._
|
| Let's unpack this even more. A quite potent problem, is when
| _something else_ is posing as or sneaking into activism and
| movements like Open Source and FOSS. This _something else_
| can take the form of cliques, hipsterism, or the use of
| movements to vent anger or aggression.
|
| The best way to hurt a cause is to represent it badly.
|
| _> FOSS was founded on the principles of openness and
| collaboration, something that we need now more than ever, as
| the largest companies of the world have managed to weaken
| that resolve through slick marketing and anti-competitive
| practices._
|
| _Some of the best open source software was developed, open
| sourced and maintained by the largest companies of the
| world._
|
| Scapegoating people and groups merely by taxonomy has had a
| bad record across history. Hold people and companies to
| account for the things they do, not for their
| characteristics. That's the only fair form of accountability.
| y04nn wrote:
| > Do you think an open source group could build an Apple
| watch?
|
| Surely not, but Apple could have worked on integrating and
| participating to the development of an open source software
| for the Apple watch.
|
| In another world, MeeGo[1] would have take off and we would
| use it on every smartphones (no iOS/Android incompatibility),
| every car systems, every tablets, every smart watches and
| everything would work seamlessly. Hardware manufacturers
| would concentrate on hardware and we would be able to buy the
| hardware we want and it would connect every devices we
| already own.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MeeGo
| Draiken wrote:
| Why not?
|
| It's a question of resources. If you put the equivalent
| money into open source instead, why would they not do it?
|
| I find these claims that only private entities can build
| quality completely unfounded. It's all about resources.
| fragmede wrote:
| > That Linux is still mostly used as a server OS, and not as
| a viable OS by the general public is a true testament that
| there are things that matter to people that community
| developers don't care about.
|
| Given the success of Android, I'm not sure how true that is,
| but ignoring that, the success of Chromebooks says something,
| but ignoring _that_ , the fact that I can't wander into best
| buy and get a laptop with Ubuntu preinstalled is what makes
| the vast majority people end up with Windows laptops, and
| then some small percent with MacOS, not some holy testament
| against the viability of Linux as a desktop operating system.
| superb_dev wrote:
| From a quick google, here are the actual market share
| numbers: Windows ~70% MacOS ~15% Linux ~5%
|
| https://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-
| share/desktop/worldwide
| DeusExMachina wrote:
| The success of Android and Chromebooks is because of the
| investments of a for-profit multi-billion company.
| Narishma wrote:
| That's no different from the success of Windows or iOS or
| Playstation or what have you.
| nickpsecurity wrote:
| I think it was originally VC-funded company whose code
| was copyleft. Google acquired them. It's probably still a
| huge, open-source ecosystem because of the copyleft
| license.
| tredre3 wrote:
| The fact that Chromebooks are a success is, if anything,
| the true testament that there are things that matter to
| people that (desktop linux) community developers don't care
| about.
| fragmede wrote:
| Personally I think it says more that community developers
| don't have the millions of dollars to outspend Microsoft
| and Apple to get products onto shelves and into
| customer's hands, but to each their own.
| TaylorAlexander wrote:
| > Do you think an open source group could build an Apple
| watch?
|
| Apple Watch? Depends on what you mean by that but they 100%
| could build a smartwatch, such as the open source $27
| Pinetime watch:
|
| https://wiki.pine64.org/index.php/PineTime
|
| https://pine64.com/product/pinetime-smartwatch-sealed/
| Karrot_Kream wrote:
| Indeed, case in point. The Apple Watch was first released
| on 2015-04-24. The PineTime was announced on 2019-10-05. If
| it requires 4.5 years of commercial success for a FOSS
| competitor to be announced, well, FOSS certainly isn't
| pushing that product development envelope.
|
| It's a common pattern. Linux GUIs only came about once
| other commercially successful GUIs existed. The Linux
| Desktop was a reaction to the commercial success of Windows
| and Apple desktops. FOSS often ends up cloning existing
| successful products. Of course there's nothing wrong with
| creating open alternatives after the fact, but to pretend
| that FOSS is driving product vision is disconnected
| idealism at its finest.
| TaylorAlexander wrote:
| Sure but for this discussion this feels like moving the
| goalposts. Is it possible for FOSS to make a smartwatch?
| The answer is yes. Apple tends not to lead product
| categories either, letting companies like Samsung and
| Meta try new features before they are proven. That's more
| a development strategy than a limitation on what FOSS can
| do. Look at 3D printers, which exploded in popularity in
| the OSS world after the patents expired. Yes a commercial
| company made them first, but the wealth of
| experimentation on new price points and features happened
| in the FOSS world.
| robertlagrant wrote:
| The root comment of this thread is all about demonising
| companies and lionising open source. That's why this
| discussion isn't moving the goalposts. You've moved them
| to "OSS can also do this" which is not where it started.
| Karrot_Kream wrote:
| GP's claim is that corporate development is _holding
| product development back_. That 's what I'm responding
| to. I have no doubt that FOSS can produce clones of
| existing products, occasionally even clones as good or
| better than the original. But FOSS is not driving any
| form of product development at all. The anti-corporate
| pro-FOSS thing is just disconnected online idealism.
|
| FWIW I own a PineTime and enjoy hacking on it quite a bit
| but a commercial smartwatch it is not. For me that's fine
| as I don't use a smartwatch as a daily driver, but if I
| did a PineWatch would be a nonstarter. I do hope that the
| PineTime can drive an ecosystem of open smart watches
| that occupy different points in the cost, functionality,
| customizability, and reusability space than commercial
| smartwatches do, especially those that may not be
| profitable to tape out large runs for, but I'm also
| thankful for commercial product development to drive new
| innovative products into our hands.
| TaylorAlexander wrote:
| Ah, sorry I was on the go and responding to the specific
| sentence I highlighted in my original comment, I must
| have missed the thrust of the thread.
| cvwright wrote:
| I have a PineTime. Two actually - one for me and one for my
| kid.
|
| It's the perfect "smart" watch for children who are too
| young to have a "real" smart device. It shows the time, the
| date, a basic step counter, and not a heck of a lot more.
|
| I have an Apple Watch too. There is no comparison. It's
| like the iPhone vs an old Motorola flip phone.
| mistercheph wrote:
| The same thing but Really Big so everyone knows I'm the
| biggest monkey in the room and I can watch TikTok on it?
| Sign me up, this thing sounds like it's from the future!
| ryanobjc wrote:
| As a long time Linux user, a long time Mac and iPhone user....
|
| In terms of "capabilities that could exist" - I honestly have
| no idea what you are talking about! I use iOS and Mac because
| it has _more capabilities_ than anything from the FOSS arena.
| Last time an "open source competitor" to airdrop came around
| here it was hilariously unusable!
|
| There are undeniable advantages to vertical integration. The
| miracle of apple bluetooth headphones is a stark example. The
| enhanced pairing/hand off that airpods have is insanely
| superior to the stock standard. Even iMessage has superior
| default encryption than anything short of Signal (maybe).
|
| Alas the "product vision" of community developers is rather
| short sighted and stymied by lack of hardware manufacturing
| capability. Linux on the desktop is barely usable, so I really
| wouldn't get too excited about the product vision.
|
| There's a lot to be said about Linux and such, but the idea
| that Apple/Google/etc are limiting innovation is just not based
| in reality!
| fragmede wrote:
| iMessage does _not_ have better encryption. If the recipient
| 's phone dies and is unreachable, it will resend the text as
| a plaintext SMS, which is kind of a problem.
| daaaaaaan wrote:
| That's an option (and probably the default option), but
| it's also configurable to not do that.
| YetAnotherNick wrote:
| Most active FOSS are there just because big companies supports
| it with their multiple 6 digit salary employees. Only 3.9% of
| linux changes comes from developers without company
| attribution[1]. Pytorch and react and lot of other things came
| from company which is worst violator of their monopoly status.
| Same with unix, transistors, C etc.
|
| [1]: https://lwn.net/Articles/775440/
| tsimionescu wrote:
| > Think of what truly open VR headsets, smartwatches, tablets
| and smartphones etc. would be capable of, the rich ecosystem of
| apps and capabilities that could exist - but greed is literally
| holding us back by decades.
|
| This is a bit of a non-sequitur. Far and away the biggest
| ecosystem of apps ever created for everyday users existed on
| Windows, an infamously proprietary platform. Nothing on Linux
| or Unixes has ever compared (unlike server software, which is
| the opposite). But, of course, Windows was always open in a
| different sense, one in which non-PC devices have never been,
| even those built with open-source software (Android). So yes, I
| do agree that open-ness is important, but I don't think FOSS
| has much to do with that.
| threeseed wrote:
| Also Android is very loosely considered as open.
|
| Samsung and Google layer so many proprietary components on
| top that it's more of an open foundation rather than a true
| open platform.
| Draiken wrote:
| But that's merely because of market share. If the majority
| started using Linux, you'd see the same growth of the app
| ecosystem.
|
| But it's a chicken and the egg problem. Without more users,
| we don't have more apps/polish on Linux, but without polish,
| it's not going to get any more users.
|
| Do you have stats to back that claim? Isn't the biggest
| ecosystem of apps ever created on Android (Linux)? We have
| way more smartphones than PCs.
| pembrook wrote:
| > _companies of the world have managed to weaken that resolve
| through slick marketing_
|
| Ah yes. The only reason people chose "closed" source products
| over FOSS is because they're less intelligent than you. All the
| dumb people (not you of course) got tricked by slick marketing!
|
| It couldn't possibly be that the companies behind "closed"
| products are invested far more in understanding and serving
| what their users actually need/want, since their users pay
| them. It couldn't possibly be that "closed" products focus on
| actual product-market-fit instead of developer-enthusiasm-fit.
|
| Open source has absolutely made some amazing contributions to
| the software ecosystem of today. But let's not kid ourselves,
| we need those "evil" profit-seeking companies as well.
| mvkel wrote:
| > Think of what truly open VR headsets, smartwatches, tablets
| and smartphones etc. would be capable of, the rich ecosystem of
| apps and capabilities that could exist - but greed is literally
| holding us back by decades.
|
| What has not been holding Linux etc back, but has been holding
| smartphones etc back?
|
| To expect people to contribute their minds out of the kindness
| of their hearts and not deserve compensation feels a lot like
| "greed," too.
|
| And let's not understate the value of vertical integration,
| something that open source fundamentally diverges from
| tsunamifury wrote:
| FOSS has been a narrow and self-congratulatory group of people
| who, while making great core contributions, have done little in
| the way of product development required to actually help the
| world compute.
| ephemeral-life wrote:
| Does anyone know of good online resources to teach yourself law.
| CS and engineering have great courses online, surely there are
| some hidden law gems.
| dmoy wrote:
| By law here, you mean EU style civil law?
| ephemeral-life wrote:
| I mean any set of resources that after studying it will make
| you confident in reading material in law. It doesn't
| necessarily have to be a specific law system, or is that not
| how things work?
| dmoy wrote:
| There's some overlap, but yea it's really not how things
| work.
|
| If you're in the US, UK, Aus, Canada, etc, the common law
| system in use is fundamentally quite different.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > I mean any set of resources that after studying it will
| make you confident in reading material in law. It doesn't
| necessarily have to be a specific law system, or is that
| not how things work?
|
| That's mostly not how things work, at least if you mean to
| imply "justifiably" before "confident".
|
| Law isn't physics where there is a universal underlying
| truth; it is a social construct, and each system of law is
| its _own_ construct.
| MBCook wrote:
| What changed that caused all this? They can do this now because
| of the passage of the DMA but was there some specific event that
| triggered the creation and passage of that?
|
| I'm surprised that so little happened for such a long time in
| terms of regulation (EU or US) and then suddenly it feels like
| the EU really jumped in to the fray.
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