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We do tech. There are more startups on my city (which is small) than what the article is mentioning as average. The article assumes that "doing tech" needs to

We do tech. There are more startups on my city (which is small) than what the article is mentioning as average. The article assumes that "doing tech" needs to be something like a facebook or google and sell customer data like there is no tomorrow. It's a bit different around here, we like it that way.

johnnyfaehell 8y ago
The thing is, from my experience, there are start ups and lots of them. But the quality of the work would not be considered good and in many case their stuff is nothing but an unstable crud. Their banners may be taking about data and machine learning but all they have is a simple website that struggles with 10 requests per second.
- jlangenauer 8y ago
  Not sure where you've been looking, but this is not my experience at all here in Berlin. You can't generalise from a few crap startups (which exist everywhere, btw) to the entire ecosystem.
close04 8y ago
The title is clickbaity, as is the norm these days. The reason it's so blunt and "polarizing" is that Bloomberg is a US publication. You think they'd ever dare publish an article asking "Why can't the US do civil rights?", an arguably more important topic than tech? Europe can do tech but they don't really make it an important target. Also many of the good people in tech choose to go Silicon Valley (which is now ~60% foreigners) so this depletes the pool of EU talent. The bigger SV gets, the harder it is for person in tech to resist the temptation to go, and for local EU startups to find the proper resources. And the EU doesn't yet act like a single body with a unified strategy when it comes to developing the tech sector, unlike the US or China. It's hard to mount an offence against an already established leader when everybody is pulling in another direction.
- blattimwind 8y ago
  > an article asking "Why can't the US do civil rights?", an arguably more important topic than tech? But the US has the correct kind of free speech which is the only civil right any good American requires.
- repolfx 8y ago
  The US is a single body with a unified strategy to developing the tech sector? What are you thinking of here exactly?
- candiodari 8y ago
  Mind if I inquire, what civil rights does a European have that an American doesn't ?
  - Beldin 8y ago
    Privacy. In the EU, there's the GDPR with such rights as the right to be forgotten, the right to access and correct any data a company has in you, etc. In the US, the FCC recently made it possible for ISPs to sell data on browsing behaviour from their clients to anyone that pays. Neither is perfect, but they are worlds apart in this respect.
    - candiodari 8y ago
      Ok let's split up this argument: 1) Privacy from government snooping a) targeted/with court order (sort of, as in many cases in the EU this does not actually require a court order. Quite a few states just give police the authority to do this by themselves with little to no oversight). Perhaps this should be called "lawful intercept" or perhaps non-mass surveillance. US: privacy held up: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fifth_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fifth_Amendment_to_the_United_... EU: no privacy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Key_disclosure_law#Legislation_by_nation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Key_disclosure_law#Legislation... b) without US: no privacy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_surveillance_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_surveillance_in_the_Unite... EU: no privacy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_surveillance#Germany https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_surveillance#Germany https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_surveillance#United_Kingdom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_surveillance#United_Kingd... etc ... 2) privacy in the sense of forcing companies to drop personal data US: complex, and varies from state to state, in most cases you should be able to get it deleted https://uk.practicallaw.thomsonreuters.com/6-502-0467?transitionType=Default&contextData=(sc.Default)&firstPage=true&comp=pluk&bhcp=1 https://uk.practicallaw.thomsonreuters.com/6-502-0467?transi... EU: also complex, but generalized: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Data_Protection_Regulation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Data_Protection_Regula... Relating to debts: US: standardized, and regulated EU: complete and total chaos So, I would say that the situation is not quite so clear cut. In terms of your rights to prevent state spying on you, clearly the US provides superior tools to it's citizens. In fact the EU is worryingly bad. In the private sector it would be fair to say the EU is superior, except when it comes to information about debts, where again the US is superior. Doesn't seem to me to be such a clear-cut situation. But perhaps I'm wrong. Why do you think one is superior to the other ? If you're falsely accused of something, I assure you the US is far superior. If you want your mcDo to stop sending you email, you're going to find the EU is superior. Of course, spam was mostly illegal before the GPDR, and I suspect that nothing will change in practice.
andromedavision 8y ago
> "doing tech" needs to be something like a facebook or google Yes, this is what is implied. Why would you think otherwise? Funny that building big corporations is frowned upon or even outright vilified by so many. May be this is what is wrong with Europe; no more ambition to do big things. Big tech companies can do so much more than tiny businesses. Granted, there are some things that small companies can do better especially when it requires huge risk taking, but overall, why would any small company not want to get bigger(as big as it can get)? Isn't that the point of being in business?!

johnnyfaehell 8y ago

The thing is, from my experience, there are start ups and lots of them. But the quality of the work would not be considered good and in many case their stuff is nothing but an unstable crud. Their banners may be taking about data and machine learning but all they have is a simple website that struggles with 10 requests per second.

jlangenauer 8y ago
Not sure where you've been looking, but this is not my experience at all here in Berlin. You can't generalise from a few crap startups (which exist everywhere, btw) to the entire ecosystem.

close04 8y ago

The title is clickbaity, as is the norm these days. The reason it's so blunt and "polarizing" is that Bloomberg is a US publication. You think they'd ever dare publish an article asking "Why can't the US do civil rights?", an arguably more important topic than tech? Europe can do tech but they don't really make it an important target. Also many of the good people in tech choose to go Silicon Valley (which is now ~60% foreigners) so this depletes the pool of EU talent. The bigger SV gets, the harder it is for person in tech to resist the temptation to go, and for local EU startups to find the proper resources. And the EU doesn't yet act like a single body with a unified strategy when it comes to developing the tech sector, unlike the US or China. It's hard to mount an offence against an already established leader when everybody is pulling in another direction.

blattimwind 8y ago
> an article asking "Why can't the US do civil rights?", an arguably more important topic than tech? But the US has the correct kind of free speech which is the only civil right any good American requires.
repolfx 8y ago
The US is a single body with a unified strategy to developing the tech sector? What are you thinking of here exactly?
candiodari 8y ago
Mind if I inquire, what civil rights does a European have that an American doesn't ?
- Beldin 8y ago
  Privacy. In the EU, there's the GDPR with such rights as the right to be forgotten, the right to access and correct any data a company has in you, etc. In the US, the FCC recently made it possible for ISPs to sell data on browsing behaviour from their clients to anyone that pays. Neither is perfect, but they are worlds apart in this respect.
  - candiodari 8y ago
    Ok let's split up this argument: 1) Privacy from government snooping a) targeted/with court order (sort of, as in many cases in the EU this does not actually require a court order. Quite a few states just give police the authority to do this by themselves with little to no oversight). Perhaps this should be called "lawful intercept" or perhaps non-mass surveillance. US: privacy held up: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fifth_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fifth_Amendment_to_the_United_... EU: no privacy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Key_disclosure_law#Legislation_by_nation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Key_disclosure_law#Legislation... b) without US: no privacy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_surveillance_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_surveillance_in_the_Unite... EU: no privacy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_surveillance#Germany https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_surveillance#Germany https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_surveillance#United_Kingdom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_surveillance#United_Kingd... etc ... 2) privacy in the sense of forcing companies to drop personal data US: complex, and varies from state to state, in most cases you should be able to get it deleted https://uk.practicallaw.thomsonreuters.com/6-502-0467?transitionType=Default&contextData=(sc.Default)&firstPage=true&comp=pluk&bhcp=1 https://uk.practicallaw.thomsonreuters.com/6-502-0467?transi... EU: also complex, but generalized: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Data_Protection_Regulation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Data_Protection_Regula... Relating to debts: US: standardized, and regulated EU: complete and total chaos So, I would say that the situation is not quite so clear cut. In terms of your rights to prevent state spying on you, clearly the US provides superior tools to it's citizens. In fact the EU is worryingly bad. In the private sector it would be fair to say the EU is superior, except when it comes to information about debts, where again the US is superior. Doesn't seem to me to be such a clear-cut situation. But perhaps I'm wrong. Why do you think one is superior to the other ? If you're falsely accused of something, I assure you the US is far superior. If you want your mcDo to stop sending you email, you're going to find the EU is superior. Of course, spam was mostly illegal before the GPDR, and I suspect that nothing will change in practice.

andromedavision 8y ago

> "doing tech" needs to be something like a facebook or google Yes, this is what is implied. Why would you think otherwise? Funny that building big corporations is frowned upon or even outright vilified by so many. May be this is what is wrong with Europe; no more ambition to do big things. Big tech companies can do so much more than tiny businesses. Granted, there are some things that small companies can do better especially when it requires huge risk taking, but overall, why would any small company not want to get bigger(as big as it can get)? Isn't that the point of being in business?!