Google’s $6B Miscalculation on the EU • Hacker News Board

Re: Google’s $6B Miscalculation on the EU

#181

Post by biokoda » Sat, Aug 08, 2015, 12:52 PM UTC

MarcusVorenus wrote: post #90

biokoda wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Short term expense of the citizens. Nurturing local business is a long term benefit strategy. Protectionism is how every nation on the planet developed. Why are Americans driving South Korean/Japanese cars and not the other way around? Because the south koreans and the japanese imposed large tariffs on car imports and the US did not. Their car companies had free range on their own turf. Which gave them time and money…

>Protectionism is how every nation on the planet developed You must be joking. Countries with open markets develop way faster than protectionist countries. If mercantilism is so good then why are the Asian Tigers doing so well and communist countries doing so bad?

What does communism have to do with anything? Protectionism is exactly how the Asian Tigers developed their economies. You don't have to take it from me, read it from a prominent South Korean economist: http://www.amazon.com/Things-They-Dont-About-Capitalism/dp/1...

Re: Google’s $6B Miscalculation on the EU

#182

Post by tiatia » Sat, Aug 08, 2015, 9:36 PM UTC

allendoerfer wrote: post #160

tiatia wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, sure. You mean besides the extreme bureaucracy, poor funding opportunities, poor exit opportunities. Germany is probably one of the WORST places for a start-up.

>extreme bureaucracy As someone doing business in Germany since the age of 17, I would actually like to know, what you mean by that. Of course employment works different here (like generally in Europe), and I also give you that it is much harder for non-Germans, but if you know the language you can generally just call the folks at our IRS and they are happy to help you. Starting to freelance is literally just filling…

Dude, I have run companies in the US and DE. So please don't tell me the difference. Your problem: You can't even imagine the difference in the VC scene between the two countries.

Re: Google’s $6B Miscalculation on the EU

#183

Post by slgeorge » Sat, Aug 08, 2015, 10:14 PM UTC

mrweasel wrote: post #53

richmarr wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this view is one-sided Despite having many different languages, in some ways Europe is a more homogenous market than the US. For example, an insurance business can operate freely across Europe with only one small piece of additional paperwork. I think it's actually an A4 piece of paper. In the US they'd have to be regulated separately by nearly every state.

We need to register a company in each EU country we want to ship stuff to, otherwise we would quickly hit the sales tax limits in each country. From our perspective the EU common marked is pretty much just a pipe dream. Being able to start a business in one EU country and just automatically have access to all of the 500million EU citizens would be awesome, but right now that not how it works.

It can be confusing operating in the EU. Whatever jurisdiction you're operating in, when it's not your own, it feels confusing! In my experience the EU is at the better end of the scale - but you have to bear in mind that it's separate states with ajoining regulations for the "market".

If you think you'll scale the business then it's best to start with a single company registered in a EU country of your choice. Generally, easiest to pick the one you will find easier to deal with, or you think you'll have the most sales in.

The local tax regulations will specify when you have to pay taxes in other EU jurisdictions. There are limited exceptions when you're just getting started. This only means registering for taxes - it's similar to the idea of US company registering to pay local state taxes.

Employing people is different and will require registering for employment taxes in each country.

Any competent business accountancy firm should be able to provide assistance: generally best to work with one which has relationships or offices in the other EU countries you're interested in operating in. If you can't afford that then your local government business department will be more than happy to help (as you are generating tax!): in the UK that's the Department for Business Innovation & Skills [1].

[1] https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/department-for-b...

Re: Google’s $6B Miscalculation on the EU

#184

Post by eru » Sun, Aug 09, 2015, 1:41 PM UTC

confluence wrote: post #60

eru wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry, I don't follow. How did Google rip anyone off here?

Scrapped the data most likely

Google respects robots.txt.

Re: Google’s $6B Miscalculation on the EU

#185

Post by confluence » Sun, Aug 09, 2015, 1:51 PM UTC

eru wrote: post #184

confluence wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Scrapped the data most likely

Google respects robots.txt.

I'm sure you say you do.

Re: Google’s $6B Miscalculation on the EU

#186

Post by roymurdock » Sun, Aug 09, 2015, 4:54 PM UTC

M2Ys4U wrote: post #174

roymurdock wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So Vestager is a straightforward politician that is actually doing her job and has no other agenda than supporting local businesses and protecting the interests of the consumer? This is fantastic. I wish we had some more people of her caliber in US politics. Reflects well on the EU that she was elected.

>Reflects well on the EU that she was elected. It would, if hers was an elected position :P The European Commission is a bit of a strange beast. As is the rest of the EU, to be honest. The Commission consists of the President of the European Commission, the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy (effectively its foreign minister), and 26 other commissioners. The President of the Euro…

Thank you for the intense clarification! The EU certainly is a strange and complicated alliance.

Re: Google’s $6B Miscalculation on the EU

#187

Post by Kankuro » Tue, Aug 11, 2015, 12:14 PM UTC

gefh wrote: post #154

Kankuro wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the EU, it is illegal to copy a database of another entity even if it contains factual information (you can copy individual facts, but not a DB). Source: I realized that when I wondered if it was possible to copy names from Wikipedia into OpenStreetmap. The Wikimedia foundation ("owner" of the DB) is unlikely to sue OSM.

Wikipedia data is available under a choice of open licenses: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Reusing_Wikipedia_co... They're unlikely to sue because 1. They don't want to, making information freely available is kinda their thing, and 2. They'd lose.

The ODbL license is not compatible with the Creative Commons license. (1) I know about their goal, and I also know that they are eager to collaborate with OpenStreeMap. So they would the sue. (2) I think it is the Database Directive of the EU which protects the databases, even if it is made of factual information.

To be more specific about my case, I wanted to import into OpenStreetMap the latin names ("romaji") of places from Wikipédia. But I had to check if it was allowed around the world. I read that in Australia it is not a problem, but it is hard to know about the rest of the world.