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Same here. EU makes up such a small amount of or customer base, and EU customers spend far less money with us. Which is generally true in most industries, US co

Same here. EU makes up such a small amount of or customer base, and EU customers spend far less money with us. Which is generally true in most industries, US consumers spend far more than consumers anywhere else in the world. If we ever choose to enter the EU again, it will be a careful and deliberate choice, and will likely only ever happen if our growth slows in other regions.

dboreham 8y ago
As a formerly European person running internet companies in the USA this baffles me. Why the teeth gnashing over being told not to spy on your users?
- downandout 8y ago
  GDPR and “not spying on your users” are not even remotely related. GDPR is a massive regulation requiring significant resources that most small businesses simply don’t have.
  - dboreham 8y ago
    Can you list one or two of those "significant resources" you need and tell us why you need them, and didn't need them last year?
    - downandout 8y ago
      Insurance to cover the liability of GDPR fines, massive legal fees, and development time to name a few.
      - dboreham 8y ago
        Surely you already had "cyber" coverage on your general liability policy, right, since you are handling users' data? I haven't been notified of any changes in premium for our policy related to the new regulations, fwiw. Massive legal fees for what, exactly?
        Mirioron 8y ago
        >I haven't been notified of any changes in premium for our policy related to the new regulations, fwiw. I don't see how you can legitimately believe that there is not going to be an increase in costs. Either the insurance company was overcharging you before, they're lowering their margins or the price goes up. Anything else would require that the risk would be basically non-existent. The price might not increase right now, but it might increase next year or the year after that or the service might get worse. >Massive legal fees for what, exactly? To deal with situations that you didn't expect to happen, but did happen anyway. Even if you try your best, mistakes can happen.
- AmericanChopper 8y ago
  We’ve got a great privacy policy, and don’t abuse our customers data in any way. However compliance would be very expensive for us, largely due to some of our early architecture decisions. The liability is also insane, and we don’t want anything to do with it. When we looked at how little our EU customers were worth to us, it was a very easy decision to simply abandon them.
  - jiveturkey 8y ago
    so you say. if you don’t have strong processes to make sure that is true, it isn’t true. gdpr is mostly about ensuring you have such processes. if you can’t do things such as tell the user what data you have, and delete it, you do not have a great policy. methinks you need some advice from better counsel. i bet that you are closer to compliant than you think.
    - AmericanChopper 8y ago
      Do you actually think the only way to respect users privacy is to comply with GDPR? That is an absurd and narrow minded opinion. Do you also actually believe that the entire regulation is reflected in your two line comment? Listen, you’ve said higher up the thread that you are plan to spread FUD about all companies that don’t comply with GDPR as a marketing strategy for your own product. I don’t see how anybody here could possibly take you seriously. GDPR is going to have a lot of unintended consequences, and people aren’t going to be happy with all of them. One of them is that small to medium sized companies will reconsidering doing business in the EU, another is that the scope of the legislation is especially anti-competitive for small EU based businesses. There’s been a lot of FUD going around HN recently that the only reasons a company would plan to pull out of the EU are hysteria and malevolence. That’s not true, and for many companies this is just a simple business decision.
      - DanBC 8y ago
        > That’s not true, and for many companies this is just a simple business decision. But likely based on incorrect advice. You haven't said why you think your company isn't compliant with GDPR, and it's possible your company is compliant with GDPR, or would require only minor tweaks to privacy policies to make it compliant.
- Grue3 8y ago
  This argument makes about as much sense as "if you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear" in support of surveillance laws. Presumption of guilt is a terrible rule to live by.
  - dboreham 8y ago
    Actually your argument makes no sense because it amounts to : I am honest therefore there is no need for laws. Thousands of years of human history suggests you are wrong.
dalore 8y ago
One could read this as you're being dodgy with your user data. If you were reasonable with the data in the first place, then compliance costs nothing.
- apple4ever 8y ago
  That doesn’t compute. There is a difference between what GDPR says is okay with user data and what is actually okay with user data. We may be reasonable with user data, but either disagree with a portion of GDPR (like IP addresses) or do not have the time or money to very we comply.
  - dalore 8y ago
    Still don't understand the issue. IP addresses are being kept private like with all the other user details right? You still can have web logs with ip addresses without needing consent. And also (as stated in numerous places) that you won't get hit with fines. If you aren't compliant (and it would take a big violation to get their notice) you are given ample time to comply. Or you could in your case if you really are violating it flagrantly then you could just block access to EU. But you would have to a big violater. So if you look at a prisoners dilemma outline you've got: - you are violating / you block EU: outcome is no market access to EU - you are violating / you don't block EU: you have access to the market and if you are caught violating you got ample time to change or you can just block EU and you're in the same boat as before - you aren't violating / you block EU: you just blocked access for no reason and losing out on a market - you aren't violating / you don't block EU: You have access to the market So if you don't know you're violating or you wonder about the IP address and weblogs issue which is minor, then the prisoners dilemma show that best go with continue as normal. There is no case were you would be hit with big fines.
Animats 8y ago
In most industries, US consumers spend far more than consumers anywhere else in the world. Not any more. China's citizens spend twice as much on international tourism as US citizens do. The EU has 508 million people. The US has 325 million.
- AmericanChopper 8y ago
  The GDP, the consumer spending market and the consumer spending per household is all higher in the US than the EU. You can cherry pick out a few industries where other countries spend more than the US, but it's still the most valuable market by far in most industries.

dboreham 8y ago

As a formerly European person running internet companies in the USA this baffles me. Why the teeth gnashing over being told not to spy on your users?

downandout 8y ago
GDPR and “not spying on your users” are not even remotely related. GDPR is a massive regulation requiring significant resources that most small businesses simply don’t have.
- dboreham 8y ago
  Can you list one or two of those "significant resources" you need and tell us why you need them, and didn't need them last year?
  - downandout 8y ago
    Insurance to cover the liability of GDPR fines, massive legal fees, and development time to name a few.
    - dboreham 8y ago
      Surely you already had "cyber" coverage on your general liability policy, right, since you are handling users' data? I haven't been notified of any changes in premium for our policy related to the new regulations, fwiw. Massive legal fees for what, exactly?
      - Mirioron 8y ago
        >I haven't been notified of any changes in premium for our policy related to the new regulations, fwiw. I don't see how you can legitimately believe that there is not going to be an increase in costs. Either the insurance company was overcharging you before, they're lowering their margins or the price goes up. Anything else would require that the risk would be basically non-existent. The price might not increase right now, but it might increase next year or the year after that or the service might get worse. >Massive legal fees for what, exactly? To deal with situations that you didn't expect to happen, but did happen anyway. Even if you try your best, mistakes can happen.
AmericanChopper 8y ago
We’ve got a great privacy policy, and don’t abuse our customers data in any way. However compliance would be very expensive for us, largely due to some of our early architecture decisions. The liability is also insane, and we don’t want anything to do with it. When we looked at how little our EU customers were worth to us, it was a very easy decision to simply abandon them.
- jiveturkey 8y ago
  so you say. if you don’t have strong processes to make sure that is true, it isn’t true. gdpr is mostly about ensuring you have such processes. if you can’t do things such as tell the user what data you have, and delete it, you do not have a great policy. methinks you need some advice from better counsel. i bet that you are closer to compliant than you think.
  - AmericanChopper 8y ago
    Do you actually think the only way to respect users privacy is to comply with GDPR? That is an absurd and narrow minded opinion. Do you also actually believe that the entire regulation is reflected in your two line comment? Listen, you’ve said higher up the thread that you are plan to spread FUD about all companies that don’t comply with GDPR as a marketing strategy for your own product. I don’t see how anybody here could possibly take you seriously. GDPR is going to have a lot of unintended consequences, and people aren’t going to be happy with all of them. One of them is that small to medium sized companies will reconsidering doing business in the EU, another is that the scope of the legislation is especially anti-competitive for small EU based businesses. There’s been a lot of FUD going around HN recently that the only reasons a company would plan to pull out of the EU are hysteria and malevolence. That’s not true, and for many companies this is just a simple business decision.
    - DanBC 8y ago
      > That’s not true, and for many companies this is just a simple business decision. But likely based on incorrect advice. You haven't said why you think your company isn't compliant with GDPR, and it's possible your company is compliant with GDPR, or would require only minor tweaks to privacy policies to make it compliant.
Grue3 8y ago
This argument makes about as much sense as "if you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear" in support of surveillance laws. Presumption of guilt is a terrible rule to live by.
- dboreham 8y ago
  Actually your argument makes no sense because it amounts to : I am honest therefore there is no need for laws. Thousands of years of human history suggests you are wrong.

dalore 8y ago

One could read this as you're being dodgy with your user data. If you were reasonable with the data in the first place, then compliance costs nothing.

apple4ever 8y ago
That doesn’t compute. There is a difference between what GDPR says is okay with user data and what is actually okay with user data. We may be reasonable with user data, but either disagree with a portion of GDPR (like IP addresses) or do not have the time or money to very we comply.
- dalore 8y ago
  Still don't understand the issue. IP addresses are being kept private like with all the other user details right? You still can have web logs with ip addresses without needing consent. And also (as stated in numerous places) that you won't get hit with fines. If you aren't compliant (and it would take a big violation to get their notice) you are given ample time to comply. Or you could in your case if you really are violating it flagrantly then you could just block access to EU. But you would have to a big violater. So if you look at a prisoners dilemma outline you've got: - you are violating / you block EU: outcome is no market access to EU - you are violating / you don't block EU: you have access to the market and if you are caught violating you got ample time to change or you can just block EU and you're in the same boat as before - you aren't violating / you block EU: you just blocked access for no reason and losing out on a market - you aren't violating / you don't block EU: You have access to the market So if you don't know you're violating or you wonder about the IP address and weblogs issue which is minor, then the prisoners dilemma show that best go with continue as normal. There is no case were you would be hit with big fines.

Animats 8y ago

In most industries, US consumers spend far more than consumers anywhere else in the world. Not any more. China's citizens spend twice as much on international tourism as US citizens do. The EU has 508 million people. The US has 325 million.

AmericanChopper 8y ago
The GDP, the consumer spending market and the consumer spending per household is all higher in the US than the EU. You can cherry pick out a few industries where other countries spend more than the US, but it's still the most valuable market by far in most industries.