Lobbyists rewrote Washington state’s privacy law • Hacker News Board

Re: Lobbyists rewrote Washington state’s privacy law

#11

Post by mac01021 » Sat, Apr 27, 2019, 12:16 PM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #3

blub wrote: post #2

"In the final draft circulated among local lawmakers last week, which was obtained by POLITICO, Ryan Harkins, a senior public policy director at Microsoft, also wrote notes in the margins, often chiding lawmakers for their legislative approach and deleting sections of the bill that he viewed as unsatisfactory." Lobbying is pure corruption. No individual citizens or even organizations have such power to strike paragra…

That’s a perverted view of the “public interest” as being diametrically opposed to corporate interests. Microsoft is a major employer in Washington. Not to mention, it’s one of the nation’s major innovators, making products everyone uses. It’s views on proposed legislation are extremely relevant and helpful and it’s in the “public interest” for legislators to consider them. Note that some of the provisions in questio…

I don't know anything about the pros and cons of this bill. The fact remains that a corporation's interests are frequently not aligned with other people's and in the long run, the ability for corporation's to have this kind of relationship with legislators may do great harm to the Democratic process.

Re: Lobbyists rewrote Washington state’s privacy law

#12

Post by rayiner » Sat, Apr 27, 2019, 12:45 PM UTC

robert_foss wrote: post #8

rayiner wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Draft legislation in Washington is publicly available. Anyone (including privacy groups) could submit a redline markup. To the extent that the legislature might prioritize the views of Microsoft isn’t corruption, it’s common sense. The EU created a heavy handed data privacy law because it would be American companies that would feel most of the compliance burden. When you are Washington state and one those companies i…

A draft being publicly available does not in any way mean it has the influence of a highly paid, well connected lobbyist. The point being that lobbying is highly effective, and the public has little chance of having it's voice heard. I hear you say: 'the voice of the people is heard at election time'. This would be the case if the very same lobbyist didn't fund the campaigns of politicians. If money can buy influence…

Lobbying isn’t “fund[ing] the campaigns of politicians.” It’s about making PowerPoint presentations to politicians’ staff.

Re: Lobbyists rewrote Washington state’s privacy law

#13

Post by sleighboy » Sat, Apr 27, 2019, 12:54 PM UTC

saagarjha wrote: post #9

rayiner wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Draft legislation in Washington is publicly available. Anyone (including privacy groups) could submit a redline markup. To the extent that the legislature might prioritize the views of Microsoft isn’t corruption, it’s common sense. The EU created a heavy handed data privacy law because it would be American companies that would feel most of the compliance burden. When you are Washington state and one those companies i…

> Draft legislation in Washington is publicly available. Anyone (including privacy groups) could submit a redline markup. Yes, but that requires that people know about the legislation and care enough to be involved, and it is unlikely that they'll be more willing than Microsoft will because it will affect them significantly less. > The EU created a heavy handed data privacy law because it would be American companies…

Re: "Think of the children". If you consider the two questions after what you quoted to reply to, I think what was intended was to allude to a regulatory capture situation. The article specifically states certain carve-outs being suggested.

Re: Lobbyists rewrote Washington state’s privacy law

#14

Post by rayiner » Sat, Apr 27, 2019, 1:06 PM UTC

saagarjha wrote: post #9

rayiner wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Draft legislation in Washington is publicly available. Anyone (including privacy groups) could submit a redline markup. To the extent that the legislature might prioritize the views of Microsoft isn’t corruption, it’s common sense. The EU created a heavy handed data privacy law because it would be American companies that would feel most of the compliance burden. When you are Washington state and one those companies i…

> Draft legislation in Washington is publicly available. Anyone (including privacy groups) could submit a redline markup. Yes, but that requires that people know about the legislation and care enough to be involved, and it is unlikely that they'll be more willing than Microsoft will because it will affect them significantly less. > The EU created a heavy handed data privacy law because it would be American companies…

> Yes, but that requires that people know about the legislation and care enough to be involved, and it is unlikely that they'll be more willing than Microsoft will because it will affect them significantly less.

Aren’t those reasons to weigh the company’s views more heavily?

> It turns out that American companies are disproportionally affected because there are more large American companies, which means the law will target them more. That's like saying the U.S. should drop out of environmental agreements because they'll hurt our local industry more–it's not taking into account the fact that it's our own companies disproportionately causing the problem the legislation is trying to solve.

It certainly would be prudent for legislators to be more cautious about environmental legislation that could affect major domestic employers. The cost benefit (the potential gain from a cleaner environment versus the potential loss from reduced economic activity) is different for the US than for other countries.

> "Think of the children" tends to lead to mass surveillance and a degradation of liberties, while calls for "privacy" lead to…Facebook earning less money? Where are you trying to take this argument?

For both things, the benefits are widely appreciated while the costs necessarily are not. It’s entirely appropriate for companies to come in and say “hey, this law sounds great but is going to put additional burdens on companies that are out of proportion to the benefits.” Legislators must of course balance the resulting input, but the process of providing that input is not corruption.

As to Facebook making less money, that is a cost that must be considered. A huge fraction of the fancy coffee and avocado toast industry is bankrolled by Facebook money. If the benefits from increased privacy don’t outweigh the losses to companies like Facebook, the law is a bad one.

Re: Lobbyists rewrote Washington state’s privacy law

#15

Post by rayiner » Sat, Apr 27, 2019, 1:12 PM UTC

deogeo wrote: post #10

rayiner wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s a perverted view of the “public interest” as being diametrically opposed to corporate interests. Microsoft is a major employer in Washington. Not to mention, it’s one of the nation’s major innovators, making products everyone uses. It’s views on proposed legislation are extremely relevant and helpful and it’s in the “public interest” for legislators to consider them. Note that some of the provisions in questio…

> That’s a perverted view of the “public interest” as being diametrically opposed to corporate interests. The goal of corporations is to extract as much money as possible from the public. So in a very real sense, they are opponents, even if sometimes their interests align.

Corporations give people goods and services in exchange. (And almost everyone gets the money in the first place by working for a corporation.) Their interests are highly aligned.

Re: Lobbyists rewrote Washington state’s privacy law

#16

Post by saagarjha » Sat, Apr 27, 2019, 1:41 PM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #14

saagarjha wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Draft legislation in Washington is publicly available. Anyone (including privacy groups) could submit a redline markup. Yes, but that requires that people know about the legislation and care enough to be involved, and it is unlikely that they'll be more willing than Microsoft will because it will affect them significantly less. > The EU created a heavy handed data privacy law because it would be American companies…

> Yes, but that requires that people know about the legislation and care enough to be involved, and it is unlikely that they'll be more willing than Microsoft will because it will affect them significantly less. Aren’t those reasons to weigh the company’s views more heavily? > It turns out that American companies are disproportionally affected because there are more large American companies, which means the law will…

> Aren’t those reasons to weigh the company’s views more heavily?

No. Coming back to the environmental (which is decent metaphor, I think), a company which dumps into the local river is going to fight tooth and nail against any regulation that stops them from doing this because it might have a significant effect on their bottom line, while for most people this will not be enough for them to care to get involved because the harm is difficult to measure individually and hard to conceptualize (but, over the entire population, has significant detrimental effects). This shouldn’t mean that the government should weigh corporate concerns more heavily.

> The cost benefit (the potential gain from a cleaner environment versus the potential loss from reduced economic activity) is different for the US than for other countries.

Well, of course it is: it depends on which countries have business that rely on their negative externalities not catching up to them.

> Legislators must of course balance the resulting input

The problem is that the input legislators get is from a source that is strongly biased towards viewpoints that have a lot riding on the laws being put in place, which is generally not the people you want to be listening to for a fair, balanced opinion.

> If the benefits from increased privacy don’t outweigh the losses to companies like Facebook, the law is a bad one.

This is highly dependent on which group you are looking at. From Facebook’s perspective, most privacy laws are bad for them, while from their user’s perspective most privacy laws are probably good. The issue is that the latter group is being left out when this consideration is made, or at least is not well represented.

Re: Lobbyists rewrote Washington state’s privacy law

#17

Post by JohnFen » Sat, Apr 27, 2019, 2:12 PM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #3

blub wrote: post #2

"In the final draft circulated among local lawmakers last week, which was obtained by POLITICO, Ryan Harkins, a senior public policy director at Microsoft, also wrote notes in the margins, often chiding lawmakers for their legislative approach and deleting sections of the bill that he viewed as unsatisfactory." Lobbying is pure corruption. No individual citizens or even organizations have such power to strike paragra…

That’s a perverted view of the “public interest” as being diametrically opposed to corporate interests. Microsoft is a major employer in Washington. Not to mention, it’s one of the nation’s major innovators, making products everyone uses. It’s views on proposed legislation are extremely relevant and helpful and it’s in the “public interest” for legislators to consider them. Note that some of the provisions in questio…

> That’s a perverted view of the “public interest” as being diametrically opposed to corporate interests.

It's hard to see that as perverted when it is so often true.

Re: Lobbyists rewrote Washington state’s privacy law

#18

Post by JohnFen » Sat, Apr 27, 2019, 2:14 PM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #12

robert_foss wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A draft being publicly available does not in any way mean it has the influence of a highly paid, well connected lobbyist. The point being that lobbying is highly effective, and the public has little chance of having it's voice heard. I hear you say: 'the voice of the people is heard at election time'. This would be the case if the very same lobbyist didn't fund the campaigns of politicians. If money can buy influence…

Lobbying isn’t “fund[ing] the campaigns of politicians.” It’s about making PowerPoint presentations to politicians’ staff.

And making large donations to reelection campaigns.

Re: Lobbyists rewrote Washington state’s privacy law

#19

Post by JohnFen » Sat, Apr 27, 2019, 2:17 PM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #15

deogeo wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That’s a perverted view of the “public interest” as being diametrically opposed to corporate interests. The goal of corporations is to extract as much money as possible from the public. So in a very real sense, they are opponents, even if sometimes their interests align.

Corporations give people goods and services in exchange. (And almost everyone gets the money in the first place by working for a corporation.) Their interests are highly aligned.

> Their interests are highly aligned.

It sure doesn't seem like it to me. Corporations are about maximizing profits, which in part means soaking people to greatest degree possible.

It would be easier to support the notion that their interests are "highly aligned" if corporations had an incentive to make a reasonable profit rather than the most profit they can get away with.

Re: Lobbyists rewrote Washington state’s privacy law

#20

Post by SaltyBackendGuy » Sat, Apr 27, 2019, 3:22 PM UTC

blub wrote: post #2

"In the final draft circulated among local lawmakers last week, which was obtained by POLITICO, Ryan Harkins, a senior public policy director at Microsoft, also wrote notes in the margins, often chiding lawmakers for their legislative approach and deleting sections of the bill that he viewed as unsatisfactory." Lobbying is pure corruption. No individual citizens or even organizations have such power to strike paragra…

> Lobbying is pure corruption

I never understood why more people don't see it this way. You literally pay money to get X bill passed. If that's not corruption I don't know what is.