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EU Digital Markets Act, aimed at Google, Apple, Amazon, approved

consilium.europa.eu

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Re: EU Digital Markets Act, aimed at Google, Apple, Amazon, approved

#181

Post by nathanyz »

dane-pgp wrote: post #133
MichaelCollins wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The apparent desire for paternalism unnerves me. Any time people are free to choose who they associate with, they run the risk of coming across bad actors who would scam them or worse. In most domains of life, we have special protections for the senile elderly and children but everybody else is given freedom and subsequently expected to develop and exercise a sense of good judgement, because freedom is more important…

I absolutely agree with you, but here's a hypothesis worth considering: What if we're building a society that is so complicated that it just isn't feasible for individuals to make informed decisions about important matters any more? Societies have long accepted that things like medical treatments have to be prescribed by an expert, and some societies have even decided that healthy people can be forced to have medical…

And on top of this increase in complexity, is a decrease in legal consequences for bad actors taking advantage of this complexity. That is what is going on currently due to how the Internet crosses international borders which makes policing much more difficult for society.

It is a difficult conundrum as freedom is definitely something I value, but I think freedom may not be the best solution in a world without legal consequences for those abusing that freedom to take advantage of others.

Freedom with no guidelines to prevent use of that freedom to abuse others is not real freedom

Re: EU Digital Markets Act, aimed at Google, Apple, Amazon, approved

#182

Post by simondotau »

impalallama wrote: post #129

I'm very interested to see how this will affect closed gaming platforms like Nintendo, Sony, etc. Personally I'd love to be able to install an itch.io app on my switch and play some silly indies.

If this law doesn’t force the consoles to open up, it will prove that it was not grounded in real principles. Consoles are computers, just as surely as an iPhone is.

Re: EU Digital Markets Act, aimed at Google, Apple, Amazon, approved

#183

Post by parasense »

Gareth321 wrote: post #2

This is easily one of the most expansive Acts regarding computing devices passed in my lifetime. The summary is in the link. As an iPhone user, this will enable me to: * Install any software * Install any App Store and choose to make it default * Use third party payment providers and choose to make them default * Use any voice assistant and choose to make it default * User any browser and browser engine and choose to…

> Fines are up to 10% of global revenue for the first offense, and 20% for repeat offenses.

For Alphabet (Google) the revenue distribution from 2015 to 2021 was approximately 33% for all of Europe, Middle-east, and Africa. It's unclear to me the actual European numbers since they are combined EMEA.

For Apple in 2021 the revenue was approximately 23% for Europe (no middle-east or Africa).

For Facebook in 2021 the revenue was also approximately 23% for Europe (no middle-east or Africa).

So it's safe to say that a first offense would potential halve the revenue for the region, and a second offense would remove the financial rationale of doing business in the region.

Re: EU Digital Markets Act, aimed at Google, Apple, Amazon, approved

#184

Post by kmeisthax »

losvedir wrote: post #143

I'm sort of surprised at the positive tone here. Sure, it's nice for non-technical people to enumerate a lot of nice to haves, but just asserting something doesn't make it true or possible. As one example, making "core messaging functionality interoperable". How exactly does that work with end-to-end encryption? I suppose we'd need some sort of open system and protocol for all the tricky key sharing stuff? That would…

There's no particular reason preventing us from having interoperable E2E; we could already have interoperable E2E e-mail today if we wanted. Securely bootstrapping key exchange could be done through having one phone take a picture of a QR code on the other phone. Though, to be fair, I have no idea if any existing E2E services actually let you do this. "In-band"/electronic key introduction does require the message server operator to act as a trusted bootstrapper, but nobody seems to be worrying about that as-is.

The real concern with interoperable messaging is antispam. E-mail was an absolute disaster because there was no barrier to entry for someone who just wants to send unsolicited garbage to everyone. Google killed federated messaging for Google Chat back in the day because for every one person running their own XMPP server there were hundreds who realized Google was just giving away valuable real estate on everyone's Gmail inbox to this chat service. The EU appears to be trying to mandate federation to fix the competition problems involved with iMessage[0] and I genuinely hope there's a user opt-out for this when it inevitably gets abused for spam.

[0] Which, ironically, is more of an American problem than a European one

Re: EU Digital Markets Act, aimed at Google, Apple, Amazon, approved

#185

Post by brtkdotse »

yoavm wrote: post #100
Gareth321 wrote: post #2

This is easily one of the most expansive Acts regarding computing devices passed in my lifetime. The summary is in the link. As an iPhone user, this will enable me to: * Install any software * Install any App Store and choose to make it default * Use third party payment providers and choose to make them default * Use any voice assistant and choose to make it default * User any browser and browser engine and choose to…

Interestingly enough, an iPhone that complies with these demands is actually the first iPhone I'd ever consider paying for. I wonder if this might actually increase adoption.

It’s not a popular opinion around here, but the reason I like my iPhone is _because_ it’s a walled garden. It just works, reliably, without surprises, for years on end.

Re: EU Digital Markets Act, aimed at Google, Apple, Amazon, approved

#186

Post by closewith »

hef19898 wrote: post #161
DCKing wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed. I switched from an iPhone to a Pixel because the iPhone experience is claustrophobic (admittedly I switched from Android to iPhone before that for the much better and lengthy software Apple gives). If this means the iPhone is getting things similar to F-Droid and NewPipe I'd be happy to switch back. The new iPads have an M1 chip with virtualization capabilities, but you wouldn't know it with the stuff Apple a…

Ha, a iPad running Linux would be something I'd look at. It is a surprise so, that the EU is actually moving, at scale, in that direction. Maybe privacy, processed food and some other things next!

What?

The EU has enacted GDPR, 178/2002/EC (food safety), 44/1999/EC (consumer protection), any number of consumer protection Regulations and Directives.

Re: EU Digital Markets Act, aimed at Google, Apple, Amazon, approved

#187

Post by perceptronas »

alex7734 wrote: post #140

Very good. Even politicians can do a good thing every once in a while. Now, can we get rid of hardware remote attestation and impossible-to-unlock bootloaders please?

I am not sure that's a good idea. Now phones are rarely stolen. I would not like to come back to time when you get mugged for your phone. (1st hand experience)

Re: EU Digital Markets Act, aimed at Google, Apple, Amazon, approved

#188

Post by skc »

Gareth321 wrote: post #2

This is easily one of the most expansive Acts regarding computing devices passed in my lifetime. The summary is in the link. As an iPhone user, this will enable me to: * Install any software * Install any App Store and choose to make it default * Use third party payment providers and choose to make them default * Use any voice assistant and choose to make it default * User any browser and browser engine and choose to…

If the will (and financial muscle) was there, this might have actually been the spark needed for a tenacious 3rd player in the mobile OS space.

Re: EU Digital Markets Act, aimed at Google, Apple, Amazon, approved

#189

Post by pieter_mj »

bloppe wrote: post #81

It blows my mind how many people have bought into Apple's position on this. No, Apple restricting your freedom does not afford you greater security. You, as an adult, can choose not to install shady software. If you're not confident in your ability to tell shady from legit, just stick to the App Store. Don't demand that Apple treat the rest of us like children just because that's how you would like to be treated.

All true. At the same time it will undeniably increase opportunities for criminal actors. For a technical user, usually not a problem (like it is currently the case on Android). For an ordinary user caught in the hype of the day, not so much.
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