EU regulatory apparatus is maybe only part of the EU which is operates without obsequiousness to the US; on the one hand, this is necessary assertion of sovereignty, on the other you fear for the wider collateral damage which will inevitably ensue. Trump gonna respond to this with an escalation for sure
'a billion here, a billion there, pretty soon you're talking real money'
...but this is a private(ish) business, it doesn't have a printer in the back yard, a billion is a lot no matter how you look at it, especially if they're now facing a tough choice between cannibalizing their results with AI summaries or having AI competitors eating their lunch.
This fine is more of a warning shot. The DMA allows for fines of up to 10% of global revenue or 20% in the case of repeat offenders.
These 890M are a first warning. Now Google has some time to react, but if they don't implement what is required of them, another, higher, fine will be issued.
20% of global revenue is not just cost of doing business, to any business.
EU just killed all hardware startups with Cyber Resilience Act. It killed all the SMEs <50 employees in hardware area too. The lost income from European companies will be replaced with fines for US companies. That’s a strategy! Visionaries at work.
Interesting to see how Google solves this in their UI because this isn’t a new problem: In 2017, they were fined for a similar problem with Shopping and the auction house concept to compete for placement was heavily scrutinized.
I looked it up, and it seems that one issue is that Google, as a DMA gatekeeper, is supposed to provide anonymous data to other search services, but in practice, important parts of the actual data have been removed. The other issue is that competing AI services (not just Gemini) should also be allowed to run integrated app search.
Could a mega-project like Linux have originated in the US instead of a Finnish bedroom? I have my doubts tbh, it takes an absolute madman to start such an obviously doomed project without any business potential ;)
Is that supposed to be a snark? Do better. I prefer that we didn't miss the boat on caring for each other, not shooting each other constantly, and generally not feeling we're better than anybody else, and the need to point it out on HN.
We are getting used to the news about our decadence and decay coming from the West as regular as they did from the East before. Not sure what it means for anyone involved
The lengthy legal battle against these fines is going to be extremely interesting, especially on the Shopping/Hotels/Flights side since it is an extremely competitive market. I wonder if the lower EU court will keep its overly proactive approach despite the CJEU's reversals.
Google knowingly and _intentionally_ breached the law.
A fundamental rule for capitalism to work well long term is that oligopoly and similar should not exist and must be rained in or outright split up if they exist. If that rule isn't followed capitalism turns from a tool which can support democracy to one which will sooner or later tear it apart. It's basically the economic version of the number one rule of democracy: "never concentrate too much power into two few people".
This also isn't just some theoretical thing, if you look through history having too much money/power in to few entities(1) always sooner or later lead to suffering of people, injustice and collapse.
Lastly it's worth noting that historically companies often do challenge such fines and managed to cut them down by quite a bit, that is iff they actually started being compliant by then. Sadly the end result is often still that, the economically benefit of huge companies systematic breaking the law, outweighs their penalties. I mean they often do calculate the most likely level of penalties into their cost-benefit analysis.
(1): Through it should be noted that this is about effective power, not theoretic power. It isn't rare through history to have people which theoretically are autocrats with absolute power, but practically the power is spread quite widely and in turn them having a brain fart, mental decline, megalomaniac, irrational hate against some groups of people etc. didn't lead directly to atrocities being committed.
Tariffs so far are on paper entirely, and in practice still overwhelmingly, paid for by the buyer.
So go ahead, make the stuff you buy from us 10x more expensive with you (not us) paying the difference to your government, then be surprised by how many of your factories can't run because they can't afford stuff they need that only we make.
Or, shock, substitute us with China.
But either way, you're hitting yourself and calling the pain a sign of victory.
The EU as a whole is walking a tightrope. Its largest economies still depend heavily on the US market. If the current US regime perceives that US companies are being targeted by EU "taxes", regardless of whether those laws are legitimate, there is a real danger of US retaliation.
Key sectors could take the hit, including automotive manufacturing, industrial equipment, chemicals, electronics, fashion, textiles, and luxury food and wine.
Given that these nations are already managing high debt loads while funding generous social welfare programs and expanding their defense budgets, trade sanctions could cause serious damage...
So yeah...EU is performing a delicate balancing act here.
35 comments
[ 1.9 ms ] story [ 92.5 ms ] threadThis is basically the equivalent of the weekly nuclear annihilation threat from the Moscow direction ;)
Also see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China%27s_final_warning
...but this is a private(ish) business, it doesn't have a printer in the back yard, a billion is a lot no matter how you look at it, especially if they're now facing a tough choice between cannibalizing their results with AI summaries or having AI competitors eating their lunch.
These 890M are a first warning. Now Google has some time to react, but if they don't implement what is required of them, another, higher, fine will be issued.
20% of global revenue is not just cost of doing business, to any business.
1 - restore interop with noscript/basic HTML browsers, stop favoring your 'whatwg cartel' web engine.
2 - gmail: restore interop with self-hosted SMTP servers without DNS (filtering on the IPv[46] literal from email address, this is stronger than SPF).
And there is probably more to add.
3 - stop writing comments only in english, stop favoring your 'anglosphere' linguistic bubble
There is Wikipedia article about this topic: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyber_Resilience_Act
Google Search decision: https://ec.europa.eu/competition/digital_markets_act/cases/2...
Android decision: https://ec.europa.eu/competition/digital_markets_act/cases/2...
It’s all sort of intertwined now.
Reading about it, both points seem valid to me.
A fundamental rule for capitalism to work well long term is that oligopoly and similar should not exist and must be rained in or outright split up if they exist. If that rule isn't followed capitalism turns from a tool which can support democracy to one which will sooner or later tear it apart. It's basically the economic version of the number one rule of democracy: "never concentrate too much power into two few people".
This also isn't just some theoretical thing, if you look through history having too much money/power in to few entities(1) always sooner or later lead to suffering of people, injustice and collapse.
Lastly it's worth noting that historically companies often do challenge such fines and managed to cut them down by quite a bit, that is iff they actually started being compliant by then. Sadly the end result is often still that, the economically benefit of huge companies systematic breaking the law, outweighs their penalties. I mean they often do calculate the most likely level of penalties into their cost-benefit analysis.
(1): Through it should be noted that this is about effective power, not theoretic power. It isn't rare through history to have people which theoretically are autocrats with absolute power, but practically the power is spread quite widely and in turn them having a brain fart, mental decline, megalomaniac, irrational hate against some groups of people etc. didn't lead directly to atrocities being committed.
So go ahead, make the stuff you buy from us 10x more expensive with you (not us) paying the difference to your government, then be surprised by how many of your factories can't run because they can't afford stuff they need that only we make.
Or, shock, substitute us with China.
But either way, you're hitting yourself and calling the pain a sign of victory.
Mandatory jailtime - otherwise they just shrug it off.
Key sectors could take the hit, including automotive manufacturing, industrial equipment, chemicals, electronics, fashion, textiles, and luxury food and wine.
Given that these nations are already managing high debt loads while funding generous social welfare programs and expanding their defense budgets, trade sanctions could cause serious damage...
So yeah...EU is performing a delicate balancing act here.