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EU negotiators agree new rules to rein in tech giants

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Re: EU negotiators agree new rules to rein in tech giants

#2
> Parliament also succeeded in convincing the Council of interoperability requirements for messaging services, meaning outfits such as WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger or iMessage will have to open up and interoperate with smaller messaging platforms. For group chats, this requirement will be rolled out over a period of four years.

This would be great. I remember using pidgin back in the day and it was really convenient to have every messaging app in one interface.

Re: EU negotiators agree new rules to rein in tech giants

#3
post #2

> Parliament also succeeded in convincing the Council of interoperability requirements for messaging services, meaning outfits such as WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger or iMessage will have to open up and interoperate with smaller messaging platforms. For group chats, this requirement will be rolled out over a period of four years. This would be great. I remember using pidgin back in the day and it was really convenient…

Yeah, saw this and immediately thought of Pidgin. This is also great for smaller platforms -- If I could use something like Pidgin again then I'd probably log into ICQ again for the first time in... a very long time.

Re: EU negotiators agree new rules to rein in tech giants

#4
> EU officials have agreed on landmark rules

I'm not sure what this means in terms of the timeline. Will it be voted for in European Parliament and if yes, when? To what extent this may be changed in the final edition? And if it's adopted as a law, how much of a grace period will the companies have?

Re: EU negotiators agree new rules to rein in tech giants

#5

> EU officials have agreed on landmark rules I'm not sure what this means in terms of the timeline. Will it be voted for in European Parliament and if yes, when? To what extent this may be changed in the final edition? And if it's adopted as a law, how much of a grace period will the companies have?

If you start doing the right thing now not only can you beat the competition, you don't need a grace period.

Re: EU negotiators agree new rules to rein in tech giants

#6

> EU officials have agreed on landmark rules I'm not sure what this means in terms of the timeline. Will it be voted for in European Parliament and if yes, when? To what extent this may be changed in the final edition? And if it's adopted as a law, how much of a grace period will the companies have?

The trilog between the parliament and the member states decided upon a text.

Next each chamber will vote on it but this is usually just a formality since they gave the negotiators a mandate beforehand.

If it passes, the text will become a EU directive which needs to be incorporated into national law by the member states.

After that it becomes enforceable.

Re: EU negotiators agree new rules to rein in tech giants

#7

> EU officials have agreed on landmark rules I'm not sure what this means in terms of the timeline. Will it be voted for in European Parliament and if yes, when? To what extent this may be changed in the final edition? And if it's adopted as a law, how much of a grace period will the companies have?

Yes, somewhat reminded that some things move slow. Of note I remember the whole Microsoft monoply for web browser fiasco by the EU with the time they got around to a rulling/actioning, Google had come out of no were and usurped Microsoft as the dominante browser.

Re: EU negotiators agree new rules to rein in tech giants

#8
One reason the EU missed out on the internet is our unlimited willingness to be regulated. And we keep piling more and more bureaucracy on top of it.

This only cements the power of US big tech like Google and Facebook.

And it sets the stage for the next big applications of the web all being build outside the EU as well.

Here in Germany, everyone is afraid to start a web startup. And if they do, they spend endless amounts of energy on agonizing over the GDPR and how to build useful international services without using international tools. We sanctioned ourselves by making the use of foreign SAAS illegal.

If you are in the EU, try out surfing the web via a non EU IP once. It is an eye-opening experience. No cookie banners! Only Europeans have to deal with those.

But it gets worse: Look at European websites from a US IP. You do get cookie banners. European companies deal with degraded user experience, slower build time and worse monetization. On a worldwide basis. While the rest of the world only applies these downsides to the European part of their business.

Re: EU negotiators agree new rules to rein in tech giants

#9
> The new rules for so-called gatekeeper platforms, derived from years of antitrust enforcement in the digital economy, include restrictions on combining personal data from different sources, mandates to allow users to install apps from third-party platforms, prohibitions on bundling services, and a prohibition on self-preferencing practices.

The first one sounds very damaging to adtech, but might not be enforced.

Re: EU negotiators agree new rules to rein in tech giants

#10
post #2

> Parliament also succeeded in convincing the Council of interoperability requirements for messaging services, meaning outfits such as WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger or iMessage will have to open up and interoperate with smaller messaging platforms. For group chats, this requirement will be rolled out over a period of four years. This would be great. I remember using pidgin back in the day and it was really convenient…

I wish so much for that to happen. I still remember jabber being popular in Poland 15 years ago. One of the reasons I switched to gtalk at the time was the fact that it allowed me to keep my jabber contacts. Little did I know they would kill it in a couple of years.
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