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The European Union versus the Internet

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Re: The European Union versus the Internet

#21

Post by zzzcpan »

kodablah wrote: post #3

> This brings me to a piece of legislation I have been very critical of for quite some time: GDPR. The intent of the legislation is certainly admirable — protect consumer privacy —although (and this may be the American in me speaking) I am perhaps a bit skeptical about just how much most consumers care relative to elites in the media. Amen. The way Google and FB are using data just doesn't bother the masses the way i…

I believe it bothers most people once they become aware of what is stored, how it's used and can be used against them. They are not aware of that though and when you tell them about it they have a hard time believing. And I don't think media cares that much, I don't know why it seems to you that it does. Media is often complicit with all that spying too.

Re: The European Union versus the Internet

#22

Post by Semaphor »

kodablah wrote: post #3

> This brings me to a piece of legislation I have been very critical of for quite some time: GDPR. The intent of the legislation is certainly admirable — protect consumer privacy —although (and this may be the American in me speaking) I am perhaps a bit skeptical about just how much most consumers care relative to elites in the media. Amen. The way Google and FB are using data just doesn't bother the masses the way i…

> although (and this may be the American in me speaking) I am perhaps a bit skeptical about just how much most consumers care relative to elites in the media.

The difference in general between EU and USA: in the EU it's seen as a good thing to protect people even when they don't understand why. In the USA, excluding weird outliers like "careful, fresh coffee is hot" it's not.

Re: The European Union versus the Internet

#23

Post by kodablah »

tw1010 wrote: post #16

It's super interesting to watch the reaction of the US blogosphere to EU laws. I feel like I'm learning a lot about US culture just by observing the general attitude that seems to be coalescing against things like GDPR. I used to think that I'd been pretty well indoctrinated into the US value system, despite being born in the EU, just by virtue of having most of my influences (movies, the internet) having come from t…

I also find it interesting from the inverse perspective. I am of course naive, but I think most of the viewpoint differences boil down to how one views business owners and government. Not necessarily one versus the other, though that does come in to play, but more about whether the former deserves rights/consideration and whether the latter is equipped to reasonably restrict them. This is especially true for big business and big laws.

Re: The European Union versus the Internet

#24

Post by kodablah »

Semaphor wrote: post #22
kodablah wrote: post #3

> This brings me to a piece of legislation I have been very critical of for quite some time: GDPR. The intent of the legislation is certainly admirable — protect consumer privacy —although (and this may be the American in me speaking) I am perhaps a bit skeptical about just how much most consumers care relative to elites in the media. Amen. The way Google and FB are using data just doesn't bother the masses the way i…

> although (and this may be the American in me speaking) I am perhaps a bit skeptical about just how much most consumers care relative to elites in the media. The difference in general between EU and USA: in the EU it's seen as a good thing to protect people even when they don't understand why. In the USA, excluding weird outliers like "careful, fresh coffee is hot" it's not.

> in the EU it's seen as a good thing to protect people even when they don't understand why

Use of the word "elite" by the author encapsulates this mentality. What if they do understand why and still don't care? Or at least, to speak from my perspective, what if they do understand why but also understand that the approach used makes things worse? It is so disappointing watching so many praise the intent of the law instead of the practicalities that I wonder where real understanding is lost. Recognition of a problem, and even recognition of what might work in some idealistic situation, is not enough to be construed as understanding the situation.

Re: The European Union versus the Internet

#25

Post by digikata »

So there's a lot of coverage about the EU parliament process, but where did the drive for this copyright directive come from? There seems to very little coverage on how this directive came about. Whose interests are being represented by these changes?

Re: The European Union versus the Internet

#26

Post by Latteland »

kodablah wrote: post #3

> This brings me to a piece of legislation I have been very critical of for quite some time: GDPR. The intent of the legislation is certainly admirable — protect consumer privacy —although (and this may be the American in me speaking) I am perhaps a bit skeptical about just how much most consumers care relative to elites in the media. Amen. The way Google and FB are using data just doesn't bother the masses the way i…

I think we have to separate the ability to control our own information, demand privacy if we want it, and things like the right to be forgotten, which I find far more objectionable than gdpr. I should be able to tell companies they can't use my info and activities any way they want. We have large companies that are effectively general utilities that a modern educated person almost needs to use (email, linked in, to a lesser degree facebook) to be successful, and I even pay google for my email and domain but they still have complex privacy tracking descriptions that always looks like they can basically do anything inside their system with my activities that they track. I don't care that it makes their life harder, they are making plenty of money. I'm actually paying them and I can't really compel them to change their behavior.

Re: The European Union versus the Internet

#27

Post by throwaway122378 »

mrmekon wrote: post #18

In my network of friends, which is within the EU and comprised entirely of EU citizens and spans multiple EU tech companies from dinky startups to Giant Unicorn, GDPR has been almost universally approved. We had to implement it, and generally feel better for having done so. The Giant Unicorn employees were dismayed by how little time they were given for such a giant task, but were in support of the law. Everybody is…

Can you elaborate on the specifics of the copyright law?

Re: The European Union versus the Internet

#28

Post by kodablah »

Latteland wrote: post #26
kodablah wrote: post #3

> This brings me to a piece of legislation I have been very critical of for quite some time: GDPR. The intent of the legislation is certainly admirable — protect consumer privacy —although (and this may be the American in me speaking) I am perhaps a bit skeptical about just how much most consumers care relative to elites in the media. Amen. The way Google and FB are using data just doesn't bother the masses the way i…

I think we have to separate the ability to control our own information, demand privacy if we want it, and things like the right to be forgotten, which I find far more objectionable than gdpr. I should be able to tell companies they can't use my info and activities any way they want. We have large companies that are effectively general utilities that a modern educated person almost needs to use (email, linked in, to a…

I think we all want that, or some form of it. But how do we get there?

> We have large companies that are effectively general utilities that a modern educated person almost needs to use (email, linked in, to a lesser degree facebook) to be successful

I personally don't feel like we're there yet.

> I can't really compel them to change their behavior.

You and I have reached the same epiphany. Let's work around them. Let's even fight it with legislation if we must, but let's make positive strides in that direction, not negative ones. We should foster an open environment for others to build these workarounds, not scare them inadvertently while trying to solve the original problem.

Re: The European Union versus the Internet

#29

Post by NeedMoreTea »

tw1010 wrote: post #16

It's super interesting to watch the reaction of the US blogosphere to EU laws. I feel like I'm learning a lot about US culture just by observing the general attitude that seems to be coalescing against things like GDPR. I used to think that I'd been pretty well indoctrinated into the US value system, despite being born in the EU, just by virtue of having most of my influences (movies, the internet) having come from t…

I also found the reaction interesting because even techies here were overwhelmingly in favour of GDPR. Mainly because it is so similar to data protection that's been in place for 20 years and they have been used to implementing without problem. That included founders and executives within companies. Thanks to the profile of people I know that's been mainly in smaller companies. Most of the negative opinion I heard was that the regulations wouldn't be enforced strongly enough to achieve enough change.

Yet a common US reaction was to view GDPR as something draconian and anti small business, and to deliberately misunderstand that a maximum penalty wasn't going to be the always penalty. Much like this blog post does.

On the copyright proposals those same people here in the EU are unanimously against.

Re: The European Union versus the Internet

#30

Post by plandis »

tw1010 wrote: post #16

It's super interesting to watch the reaction of the US blogosphere to EU laws. I feel like I'm learning a lot about US culture just by observing the general attitude that seems to be coalescing against things like GDPR. I used to think that I'd been pretty well indoctrinated into the US value system, despite being born in the EU, just by virtue of having most of my influences (movies, the internet) having come from t…

In my mind the difference is that:

* In the US: Don’t use social media if you don’t want to be tracked, it’s your choice.

* In the EU: We cannot compete against big US companies so we will pass laws that are popular with entitled people to weaken them in the name of social benefits. Win-win for politicians.

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