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That sounds very theoretical. I witness the journey of several German startups for a while now and get a very different picture. Many of the most powerful web

That sounds very theoretical. I witness the journey of several German startups for a while now and get a very different picture. Many of the most powerful web tools are not compatible with the GDPR. Google Analytics. Ad marketplaces. Free CDNs. And its all a moving target. I see small companies struggling for years now with these problems. And they will keep struggling for the forseeable future.

gcthomas 5y ago
It is the most powerful tools that I want restricted. the milli-second bidding auctions for ad placements and the tracking that goes on to enable that is unethical and illegal. There are perfectly good alternatives that don't abuse my personal data — companies should use those.
- zaroth 5y ago
  That’s great, but the question is about the second order effects. Have you taken them fully into account when you declare that these regulations are what you want? Or do you want the first order effects only (who wouldn’t?!) and just stop your analysis there? Declaring that there are “perfectly good alternatives” sounds like dismissal of the second order effects, which certainly makes supporting the regulations much easier to sit with.
  - gcthomas 5y ago
    It seems that I get hit with the negative first order effects, and VCs benefit from the putative positive second order ones. No, I'm happy to have the legal eagles stop this without-consent data sharing, and if the corporations lose a bit of money, then that's fine by me.
matthewmacleod 5y ago
My experience says that this is pretty far from the truth, and nobody is really struggling with any of this stuff. It's all been "yeah I guess we have to pay attention to privacy, that's a bit annoying" and then getting on with it. What you're saying basically boils down to "if we stop worrying about user data then we can make more money!" which… yeah, I guess. In the same way that companies could make more money if we let them pump effluent directly into rivers – but we don't do that.

gcthomas 5y ago

It is the most powerful tools that I want restricted. the milli-second bidding auctions for ad placements and the tracking that goes on to enable that is unethical and illegal. There are perfectly good alternatives that don't abuse my personal data — companies should use those.

zaroth 5y ago
That’s great, but the question is about the second order effects. Have you taken them fully into account when you declare that these regulations are what you want? Or do you want the first order effects only (who wouldn’t?!) and just stop your analysis there? Declaring that there are “perfectly good alternatives” sounds like dismissal of the second order effects, which certainly makes supporting the regulations much easier to sit with.
- gcthomas 5y ago
  It seems that I get hit with the negative first order effects, and VCs benefit from the putative positive second order ones. No, I'm happy to have the legal eagles stop this without-consent data sharing, and if the corporations lose a bit of money, then that's fine by me.

matthewmacleod 5y ago

My experience says that this is pretty far from the truth, and nobody is really struggling with any of this stuff. It's all been "yeah I guess we have to pay attention to privacy, that's a bit annoying" and then getting on with it. What you're saying basically boils down to "if we stop worrying about user data then we can make more money!" which… yeah, I guess. In the same way that companies could make more money if we let them pump effluent directly into rivers – but we don't do that.