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Any lawmaker with an ounce of foresight would have recognized the pervasive cookie banners as the logical consequence of the law. If you give companies an easy

Any lawmaker with an ounce of foresight would have recognized the pervasive cookie banners as the logical consequence of the law. If you give companies an easy copy-and-paste way to get around a single regional law then they will do the quickest dumbest thing possible to get what they want no matter who the visitor is and where they're located. The EU laws are poorly conceived, poorly written, and now we all have to live with them. They can make privacy laws, but they need to make them better. I truly believe that the EU ruined the web for everyone with their haphazard legislation. And now they're trying to do it again with AI but thankfully they're just getting blocked now instead of everyone trying to comply.

troupo 3y ago
Since you seem to know so much about EU law, can you show me where exactly GDPR requires cookie banners. Or talks about cookies, banners, or even browsers?
- dageshi 3y ago
  I don't know, I can say the EU uses them itself... https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_24_1161 https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_24_... If that site needs a cookie banner I'm guessing nearly all sites do.
  - troupo 3y ago
    > I don't know Exactly. And this doesn't surprise me. The law states: if you collect more data than is strictly required for your site[1] to function and/or send user data to third parties, you have to: - tell the users about it - let the users to opt out, where opt out must be as easy as opt in - if the users opt out, the site[1] must continue working So yes, that site does send some extra data to third-parties, and informs the user about it. And lets the user know about it. IMO it shouldn't use third-party services, but oh well. These days it's a source of my constant amazement that 8 years after its publication the people who complain about GDPR the most have not had even the tiniest attempt to read anything about it or understand anything about it. [1] I simplified this to sites. GDPR is General Data Protection Regulation. All this equally applies to sites, apps, offline businesses, governments etc. To cookies, local storage, offline paper documents, tape records, cloud storage etc. 8 years. The law has been around for 8 years. It has been enforced for 6. It takes about half an hour to read the most relevant parts of it (chapters 1—5). An hour if you're not too familiar with legalese. And yet... "I don't know".
    - VWWHFSfQ 3y ago
      > And yet... "I don't know". What is there to know? Nearly every website on the western internet has these cookie banners including the EU's own government sites. The practical consequences of the laws are now apparent. So what did we all miss that was hidden in the legalese?
      - troupo 3y ago
        > What is there to know? Rarely do you see people flaunt their willful ignorance. > Nearly every website on the western internet has these cookie banners Well, since you approach is "I don't know and what is there to know", it's no surprise that the industry so easily sold you the lie of "the EU's laws are at fault" > including the EU's own government sites. Compare the banner on the site linked above and the usual dark patterns employed by the industry.
        VWWHFSfQ 3y ago
        Just to be sure that we're talking about the same thing, are you saying that the explosion of opt-in cookie banners on the web is not the result of the EU's privacy laws?
kerkeslager 3y ago
[flagged]
- hef19898 3y ago
  One good example for a good website without tracking: news.ycombinator.com
  - actionfromafar 3y ago
    Was it always like that?
    - hef19898 3y ago
      HN? As as das as I remember, yes. Why?
- throw10920 3y ago
  > Let's be real, the GDPR banners are far less annoying than the ads that HNers love to defend. "Please don't sneer, including at the rest of the community." https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
  - kerkeslager 3y ago
    [flagged]
    - throw10920 3y ago
      > There's a large (possibly majority) segment of HN's population which is so pro-corporate as to be anti-human Do you have any evidence for that claim? Unless you have access to raw HN data, I suspect not. > Treating such toxic ideology as acceptable in the name of politeness doesn't make HN or the world a better place. Well, if you don't, then you're breaking the site guidelines, and you'll be flagged.
Ma8ee 3y ago
Those cookie warnings make me immediately close every website that doesn't make it very easy to opt out from tracking. I don't think I miss much, since the correlation between websites that tries to make as much as possible from every visit and those that puke out shallow, easily produced, content is very strong.
Yujf 3y ago
I agree that EU laws are far from perfect, but I 100% would rather have the GDPR than not have it. With AI what I saw in the news mostly made sense and did not hinder development too much. But again I would rather they regulate the use because it will have real negative consequences for many people if they don't
- graemep 3y ago
  The GDPR and DMA are mostly good. GDPR should have exemptions for organisations with smaller amounts of data who do not trade in it. A lot of EU laws have also been bad. VATMOSS (especially with the very low initial limit to register) was initially a disaster. It actually deterred people from trading within the EU! The commission's attempt at chat surveillance was thrown out by the parliament, but they will try again. The new AI regulations look problematic. The draft I saw of the AI one was far too broad (included old tech like expert systems) - not checked recently whether it has changed. There are also issues with a lack of FOSS exemptions in the other current law (forgotten what it is called) imposing greater liability for faults in some categories of software.
  - Yujf 3y ago
    I don't know the details about VATMOSS but will look into it. I agree that chat control and the initial thing about software security not having a FOSS exemption were problematic. As far as I know, an exemption for FOSS authors was added. I think it is important to acknowledge that many regulations are not perfect and I would push for more revisions on the details (although changes in the law also have a real cost associated) that don't hit their target.
    - graemep 3y ago
      > As far as I know, an exemption for FOSS authors was added. last time I caught up on it, it was a very narrow exemption that was only of use to pure hobby projects.
graemep 3y ago
> Any lawmaker with an ounce of foresight Where would you find a lawmaker with an ounce of foresight?

troupo 3y ago

Since you seem to know so much about EU law, can you show me where exactly GDPR requires cookie banners. Or talks about cookies, banners, or even browsers?

dageshi 3y ago
I don't know, I can say the EU uses them itself... https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_24_1161 https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_24_... If that site needs a cookie banner I'm guessing nearly all sites do.
- troupo 3y ago
  > I don't know Exactly. And this doesn't surprise me. The law states: if you collect more data than is strictly required for your site[1] to function and/or send user data to third parties, you have to: - tell the users about it - let the users to opt out, where opt out must be as easy as opt in - if the users opt out, the site[1] must continue working So yes, that site does send some extra data to third-parties, and informs the user about it. And lets the user know about it. IMO it shouldn't use third-party services, but oh well. These days it's a source of my constant amazement that 8 years after its publication the people who complain about GDPR the most have not had even the tiniest attempt to read anything about it or understand anything about it. [1] I simplified this to sites. GDPR is General Data Protection Regulation. All this equally applies to sites, apps, offline businesses, governments etc. To cookies, local storage, offline paper documents, tape records, cloud storage etc. 8 years. The law has been around for 8 years. It has been enforced for 6. It takes about half an hour to read the most relevant parts of it (chapters 1—5). An hour if you're not too familiar with legalese. And yet... "I don't know".
  - VWWHFSfQ 3y ago
    > And yet... "I don't know". What is there to know? Nearly every website on the western internet has these cookie banners including the EU's own government sites. The practical consequences of the laws are now apparent. So what did we all miss that was hidden in the legalese?
    - troupo 3y ago
      > What is there to know? Rarely do you see people flaunt their willful ignorance. > Nearly every website on the western internet has these cookie banners Well, since you approach is "I don't know and what is there to know", it's no surprise that the industry so easily sold you the lie of "the EU's laws are at fault" > including the EU's own government sites. Compare the banner on the site linked above and the usual dark patterns employed by the industry.
      - VWWHFSfQ 3y ago
        Just to be sure that we're talking about the same thing, are you saying that the explosion of opt-in cookie banners on the web is not the result of the EU's privacy laws?

kerkeslager 3y ago

[flagged]

hef19898 3y ago
One good example for a good website without tracking: news.ycombinator.com
- actionfromafar 3y ago
  Was it always like that?
  - hef19898 3y ago
    HN? As as das as I remember, yes. Why?
throw10920 3y ago
> Let's be real, the GDPR banners are far less annoying than the ads that HNers love to defend. "Please don't sneer, including at the rest of the community." https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- kerkeslager 3y ago
  [flagged]
  - throw10920 3y ago
    > There's a large (possibly majority) segment of HN's population which is so pro-corporate as to be anti-human Do you have any evidence for that claim? Unless you have access to raw HN data, I suspect not. > Treating such toxic ideology as acceptable in the name of politeness doesn't make HN or the world a better place. Well, if you don't, then you're breaking the site guidelines, and you'll be flagged.

Ma8ee 3y ago

Those cookie warnings make me immediately close every website that doesn't make it very easy to opt out from tracking. I don't think I miss much, since the correlation between websites that tries to make as much as possible from every visit and those that puke out shallow, easily produced, content is very strong.

Yujf 3y ago

I agree that EU laws are far from perfect, but I 100% would rather have the GDPR than not have it. With AI what I saw in the news mostly made sense and did not hinder development too much. But again I would rather they regulate the use because it will have real negative consequences for many people if they don't

graemep 3y ago
The GDPR and DMA are mostly good. GDPR should have exemptions for organisations with smaller amounts of data who do not trade in it. A lot of EU laws have also been bad. VATMOSS (especially with the very low initial limit to register) was initially a disaster. It actually deterred people from trading within the EU! The commission's attempt at chat surveillance was thrown out by the parliament, but they will try again. The new AI regulations look problematic. The draft I saw of the AI one was far too broad (included old tech like expert systems) - not checked recently whether it has changed. There are also issues with a lack of FOSS exemptions in the other current law (forgotten what it is called) imposing greater liability for faults in some categories of software.
- Yujf 3y ago
  I don't know the details about VATMOSS but will look into it. I agree that chat control and the initial thing about software security not having a FOSS exemption were problematic. As far as I know, an exemption for FOSS authors was added. I think it is important to acknowledge that many regulations are not perfect and I would push for more revisions on the details (although changes in the law also have a real cost associated) that don't hit their target.
  - graemep 3y ago
    > As far as I know, an exemption for FOSS authors was added. last time I caught up on it, it was a very narrow exemption that was only of use to pure hobby projects.

graemep 3y ago

> Any lawmaker with an ounce of foresight Where would you find a lawmaker with an ounce of foresight?