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Why the World Is Drawing Battle Lines Against American Tech Giants

nytimes.com

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Re: Why the World Is Drawing Battle Lines Against American Tech Giants

#151

Post by calibraxis »

barisser wrote: post #3

I found this article really frustrating. The US government forces American tech companies to spy on users, so US companies are to blame? These services are so useful and well-liked around the world that they should be considered a threat? The author is amazingly willing to accord French bureaucrats the right to regulate the cultural consumption of Frenchmen. How is this defensible? Should we knock Netflix because it…

Corporations and state are interlinked. For all intents and purposes, there's no clear boundary between them. (Especially since corporations are creations of the state, and heavily influence state policy.)

I agree the French government example seems weak. Maybe due to not being able to use truly cutting arguments in the US's agenda-setting newspaper.

Re: Why the World Is Drawing Battle Lines Against American Tech Giants

#152

Post by tacone »

barisser wrote: post #3

I found this article really frustrating. The US government forces American tech companies to spy on users, so US companies are to blame? These services are so useful and well-liked around the world that they should be considered a threat? The author is amazingly willing to accord French bureaucrats the right to regulate the cultural consumption of Frenchmen. How is this defensible? Should we knock Netflix because it…

> The US government forces American tech companies to spy on users, so US companies are to blame?

It's not the government, it's the establishment.

Re: Why the World Is Drawing Battle Lines Against American Tech Giants

#153

Post by sievebrain »

wfo wrote: post #107
sievebrain wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So to keep a diverse culture ( we all agreee diversity is great isn't it?) No, we don't all agree. Not when the "diversity" is someone looking at the market and saying "there are too many good movies. we need some shit ones". Nobody needs to diversify away from quality, which is essentially what the French laws do. Don't mistake the bizarre fetishes of a small number of French elite with some kind of natural law or e…

And so we are to take your definition of "good" and "shit" as gospel -- obviously, we want more movies that you think are good and less movies that you think are shit. Would you like to take the position of cultural czar and pre-review every piece of art to decide if it's worth publishing? Or perhaps you'd like us to just assume the market is the best judge of what is good art? That was a joke -- the notion is laugha…

Yes, your second interpretation is the right one.

Oh, I'm sorry, you think what people choose to spend their money on is a poor way to judge what's good entertainment?

I suppose you're right - we should let French bureaucrats decide instead. Their tastes are far more exquisite than anyone elses, after all. It goes with the job.

Re: Why the World Is Drawing Battle Lines Against American Tech Giants

#154

Post by sievebrain »

wfo wrote: post #105
sievebrain wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

None of the issues you cite are the fault of American media. They are at best due to lack of sufficient quantities of local production, and at worst due to local production just not being very interesting. Given that everyone learns English, material made in that language has a bigger market and can naturally be higher budget. But that's not anyone's fault per se and cannot be fixed with bureaucratic interventions. A…

I think 'fault' is wholly irrelevant here. If we try to understand the position of the French ministers, etc, we observe changes which are destroying their culture. They are fighting to preserve it. The fact that the destruction wasn't intentional or the fault of google, facebook, amazon, etc doesn't really come into the picture. And there are a number of reasons you can give for why people tend to prefer these behem…

I have put myself in their position and I do understand their arguments: despite that, I think their arguments suck. Because what do they boil down to, really? It's this:

Bureaucrat: You should watch what I like and not what you like, because my taste in entertainment are superior to yours

This is not an argument worthy of much attention, regardless of what fancy pseudo-intellectual babble is used to justify it (of which "shiny with no real valuable content" is a prime example).

Re: Why the World Is Drawing Battle Lines Against American Tech Giants

#155

Post by sievebrain »

nostrademons wrote: post #138
bduerst wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks - you're right. I was mixing PRISM with MUSCULAR. Wasn't PRISM still limited to data around high-interest individuals? (i.e. not a blank check to all data) Was BULLRUN what ATT room 641a was involved with?

Uncertain; that was my initial understanding as well, but the Wikipedia article on PRISM indicates that certain search terms are fair game as well. Also uncertain about the relationship between BULLRUN and AT&T room 641A. My understanding is that BULLRUN is different, focusing on influencing encryption standards so that the government could break them, but I'm not sure.

BULLRUN appears to be an umbrella term for all efforts to crack encryption directly, not just efforts to influence standards. For instance their VPN cracking systems probably fall under BULLRUN.

I think it was never entirely clear what PRISM is: the only slides that covered it were vague and were directly contradicted by the testimony of the relevant CEOs.

Re: Why the World Is Drawing Battle Lines Against American Tech Giants

#156

Post by dragonwriter »

hodwik2 wrote: post #150
dragonwriter wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That law limited religious freedom. Well, sure, in that it allowed powerful private entities to engage in religious discrimination adversely affecting the practical religious freedom of less powerful entities and individuals, but in terms of government power, it limited government action more than it was prior to the law (which is why the right pushed it). > It says that if you can prove a compelling interest, and…

It, in no unclear terms, says that you can limit free exercise, so long as you live up to two pretty low standards: -------- "b. Government may substantially burden a person's exercise of religion only if it demonstrates that application of the burden to the person— (1) is in furtherance of a compelling governmental interest; and (2) is the least restrictive means of furthering that compelling governmental interest."…

"only if" is restrictive, not permissive, "if" is permissive, and "if and only if" is both permissive and restrictive.

> This is much less binding than the first amendment:

I understand you view it that way, however, the author's of the bill did it because it was more restrictive on government than the first amendment had been applied by the courts, as it applies to neutral and generally applicable laws with incidental impacts on religious practice.

> The constitution provided no exceptions whatsoever.

OTOH, the constitution provides no qualifications whatsoever on various grants of power to government that it provides, either. The various scrutiny levels (strict, intermediate, and rational basis) serve, at least as regards federal action, to resolve conflicts between unqualified restrictions and unqualified grants of power (its true that other modes of legal interpretation are conceivable -- a strict "newest wins" rule, say, could be applied, in which case the first amendment grants would trump all powers in the "base" Constitution, but all powers granted by later amendments would completely ignore restrictions imposed by the First Amendment. So, say, commerce clause action would be completely prohibited from any impact on religious exercise, but income tax could be deliberately constructed to suppress a given religion with no Constitutional difficulty.)

Re: Why the World Is Drawing Battle Lines Against American Tech Giants

#157

Post by nostrademons »

sievebrain wrote: post #155
nostrademons wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Uncertain; that was my initial understanding as well, but the Wikipedia article on PRISM indicates that certain search terms are fair game as well. Also uncertain about the relationship between BULLRUN and AT&T room 641A. My understanding is that BULLRUN is different, focusing on influencing encryption standards so that the government could break them, but I'm not sure.

BULLRUN appears to be an umbrella term for all efforts to crack encryption directly, not just efforts to influence standards. For instance their VPN cracking systems probably fall under BULLRUN. I think it was never entirely clear what PRISM is: the only slides that covered it were vague and were directly contradicted by the testimony of the relevant CEOs.

It's pretty clear from a couple of the slides:

https://nsa.gov1.info/dni/prism-slides/PRISM-tasking%20proce...

https://nsa.gov1.info/dni/prism-slides/prism-conclusion.jpg

Note the presence of FAA Adjudicators and FISA Oversight & Processing in the collection pipeline in the first slide, and the direct reference to "FAA 702 collection = PRISM program providers" in the last.

The director of national intelligence also confirmed it in response to the leaks:

https://www.dni.gov/index.php/newsroom/press-releases/191-pr...

Re: Why the World Is Drawing Battle Lines Against American Tech Giants

#158

Post by DominikR »

scholia wrote: post #94
DominikR wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It doesn't look random to me when the biggest IT companies all originate from a small area in or near San Francisco. The US government spent a massive amount of money over decades in infrastructure and in government contracts which in combination with the right legal framework (and capitalism) created this dominance.

Right, because it's not a level playing field. I could start a company in a small European country for €X but tackling the US market would cost me 10 times that, which I haven't got and can't raise. However, the comparable US company can invade my market not by raising 10x more money but by raising 10% more. Even if you're successful, like Spotify, a big American company can start up years later with an inferior prod…

> However, the comparable US company can invade my market

Again talk about "invasion", I'd suggest you don't be so emotional so we can have a fruitful discussion.

Aside from that nobody owns the market.

You may feel it is an invasion because the barriers are low to do business as a foreigner, but this goes both ways.

I successfully sold products in the US as an EU citizen without having an office there, so it is possible.

And there are many tech companies from the EU that do the same on a much larger scale.

Our problem is really the legal framework, getting loans for starting businesses, getting investments from private investors (this is getting better though) and bureaucracy.

In the US you can fail and rebound from it, in most EU countries your life is destroyed because you'll be burdened with debts till the day you leave this earth. (or you lose all wealth you have accumulated to this point)

If we in the tech sector weren't so lucky to be able to start businesses with low capital investment I would have never started one because I don't have the rich parents/family that could help me if things go bad.

This is the problem from my perspective that we face here and no amount of protectionism will change that.

On the other hand I'm truly amazed what risks people take to start businesses in more capital intensive sectors in the EU. I wouldn't have the stomach to do this, to me these people seem almost insane.

Re: Why the World Is Drawing Battle Lines Against American Tech Giants

#159

Post by DominikR »

hellbanner wrote: post #98
DominikR wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your examples aside from chat apps are quite unrealistic. I don't even know when was the last time I invited someone to an event using any of the listed methods, it must have been years. But even if running into friends at the store was a thing, it doesn't mean that Facebook is not used by a billion people for organising social events and is therefore beneficial to them.

Human population of this planet is over 7 billion. I referred to non-facebook users Unrealistic for you and the other billion facebook users perhaps, yes. Different people use different methods of communicating.

Well even if 6 billion use emails, it is no proof that Facebook is not beneficial to the others. It is at least to me and to the parent.

Re: Why the World Is Drawing Battle Lines Against American Tech Giants

#160

Post by DominikR »

arcticfox wrote: post #85
DominikR wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your examples aside from chat apps are quite unrealistic. I don't even know when was the last time I invited someone to an event using any of the listed methods, it must have been years. But even if running into friends at the store was a thing, it doesn't mean that Facebook is not used by a billion people for organising social events and is therefore beneficial to them.

Wild, I just got invited to join a group for coffee over SMS. And before that, to meet with a technical group on MeetUp. And before that to meet up with my friends on GroupMe.

See my above comment to hellbanner. Aside from that MeetUp and GroupMe are social networks too.

Yes, they are different but I didn't say that Facebook is the end all perfect implementation of a social network.

I just refuse anyone telling me that Facebook isn't beneficial without very good proof, because it is to me and to my social circle.

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