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Not this again. These fines are barely a blip on the radar compared to the yearly EU budget and the budgets of Western European countries. Also, the EU has hand

Not this again. These fines are barely a blip on the radar compared to the yearly EU budget and the budgets of Western European countries. Also, the EU has handed out fines to anti-competitive companies for a long time. E.g. 855 million Euro in 2001 for vitamin cartels: https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/IP_01_1625 https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/IP_01_... Intel for 1B in 2009 for abusing its dominant position in x86 CPUs: https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/IP_09_745 https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/IP_09_... Also various car companies, like Daimler in 2016 for 1B. The EU is really different than the US, in that most citizens and countries believe in market regulation. And all these regulations like GDPR, DMA, DSA, etc. are all expressions of that. It just takes years for these regulations, to land, first because writing such regulations is complex, especially because companies try to find loopholes. Secondly, we are 27 nations, and that just makes things go slower. After they are accepted they are usually effective, e.g. takeout functionality of various large services were mostly a side-effect or EU legislation requiring that users can get their stored data and get it removed. It just takes many years to finetune, because companies unintentionally or intentionally misinterpret them (like the many websites that have a GDPR popup, where opt-in is a single click and opt-out is multiple clicks, which is illegal under the GDPR).

withinboredom 3y ago
> because companies unintentionally or intentionally misinterpret them The GDPR basically boils down to 1) don't be an asshole. 2) explain how you are using personal data and who you are sharing it with. 3) let people delete their personal data (within reason). 4) if you get hacked, let your customers know within a reasonable time frame. It's pretty hard to fuck that up and the number of companies that fuck it up is sad.
lucianbr 3y ago
I am european, I live in Europe and I much prefer the EU approach to the US approach. I still feel that the EU drags its feet on enforcing rules on large european companies, like the automakers, while moving slightly better on US companies. Yeah, they did eventually fine Volkswagen. After the US got the ball rolling, and it became impossible to sweep the whole thing under the rug. Of course, the US does the same thing. The 737 MAX was grounded in Europe, while the US FAA dragged their feet until it really became obvious that it must be done. The GDPR DMA DSA are really great. I'm not at all sure we would have them if the internet giants were european. How many laws requiring interoperability between car parts or industrial machine parts do we have? Thank bog there are still competing governments.

withinboredom 3y ago

> because companies unintentionally or intentionally misinterpret them The GDPR basically boils down to 1) don't be an asshole. 2) explain how you are using personal data and who you are sharing it with. 3) let people delete their personal data (within reason). 4) if you get hacked, let your customers know within a reasonable time frame. It's pretty hard to fuck that up and the number of companies that fuck it up is sad.

lucianbr 3y ago

I am european, I live in Europe and I much prefer the EU approach to the US approach. I still feel that the EU drags its feet on enforcing rules on large european companies, like the automakers, while moving slightly better on US companies. Yeah, they did eventually fine Volkswagen. After the US got the ball rolling, and it became impossible to sweep the whole thing under the rug. Of course, the US does the same thing. The 737 MAX was grounded in Europe, while the US FAA dragged their feet until it really became obvious that it must be done. The GDPR DMA DSA are really great. I'm not at all sure we would have them if the internet giants were european. How many laws requiring interoperability between car parts or industrial machine parts do we have? Thank bog there are still competing governments.