Is Europe becoming uninvestable?

[Dalal.Holdings]

42 minutes ago, formthirteen said:

 

I hope his letter to Elon Musk and the response from Jim Jordan got him fired: https://judiciary.house.gov/media/press-releases/chairman-jordan-presses-european-union-attempts-censor-elon-musk-and-political

 

 

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"First, your claim that 'the DSA does not regulate content' is contradicted by the text of the DSA and by your own actions. The DSA, as you admit in your letter, requires 'Very Large Online Platforms' (VLOPs), such as X, Facebook, and YouTube, to take 'mitigation measures' against alleged 'disinformation.' The DSA defines 'disinformation' as a type of 'content,' and because the DSA regulates disinformation, the DSA—contrary to your claims otherwise—regulates content.

 

It's amazing how these EU regulatoooors use word salad to confuse and distract from what they are doing. He claimed the "DSA does not regulate content" but then of course we must have "mitigation measures" against "disinformation". 

 

It's all smoke and mirrors that allows these unelected bureaucrats to exercise their power. The EU is much worse off for it.

[John Hjorth]

ico.org.uk : A guide to the data protection principles.

 

Easier there to get an overview of what it is about in stead of 80 pages.

 

I speculate it all started with the ads revenue streams at Google and Meta, rising such considerations based on these companies accumulation of all kinds of userdata, however I'm not sure about that.

Edited September 16 by John Hjorth

[Dalal.Holdings]

5 minutes ago, John Hjorth said:

ico.org.uk : A guide to the data protection principles.

 

Easier there to get an overview of what it is about instead 80 pages.

 

I speculate it all started with the ads revenue streams at Google and Meta, rising such considerations based on these companies accumulation of all kinds of userdata, however I'm not sure about that.

 

I'm sure there were large teams of professionals wearing ties that spent long hours formulating all these regulations and reports spanning hundreds of pages. Now please explain to me whether someone in the EU is better off than someone elsewhere who uses AI/technology thanks to all this regulatory apparatus. 

 

It all sounds great in theory, but it fails in practice and merely hinders innovation (unborn companies). But I get it, these guys in Brussels are on the payroll and need something to do to fill their time.

[UK]

https://stratechery.com/2024/the-e-u-goes-too-far/

[Dalal.Holdings]

To those who argue that Elon Musk is a free speech hypocrite, here are the top trending items on X right now for me:

 

 

[Dalal.Holdings]

12 minutes ago, UK said:

https://stratechery.com/2024/the-e-u-goes-too-far/

 

Yes this is perfect and goes into most of my points. I enjoyed it in video form:

 

 

[Cod Liver Oil]

Yes, the EU is a mess. Luxury is also a mess. But I have a soft spot in my heart for dynastic French families so I am adding to Dior at 16 times today. I like what Arnault is doing in real estate with Catterton.  National and familial DNA seem to be merging. L’etat, c’est moi kind of thing. 

[frommi]

4 hours ago, Dalal.Holdings said:

To those who argue that Elon Musk is a free speech hypocrite, here are the top trending items on X right now for me:

 

 

I started blocking everyone with a political post, now its a lot cleaner, but theres still a lot of nonsense in my feed.

[Dalal.Holdings]

1 minute ago, frommi said:

I started blocking everyone with a political post, now its a lot cleaner, but theres still a lot of nonsense in my feed.

 

The point is that the platform is owned by the guy with top trending item calling for his deportation. That looks like a platform that has free speech to me.

[frommi]

8 minutes ago, Dalal.Holdings said:

 

The point is that the platform is owned by the guy with top trending item calling for his deportation. That looks like a platform that has free speech to me.

I don't care, for me its just spoiled with untrue statements. Of course its free, but whats the value when 80% of the "free" posts are just bullshit? But i think this discussion derails the threat, so lets do it somewhere else or not at all

[Dalal.Holdings]

17 minutes ago, frommi said:

I don't care, for me its just spoiled with untrue statements. Of course its free, but whats the value when 80% of the "free" posts are just bullshit? But i think this discussion derails the threat, so lets do it somewhere else or not at all

 

What exactly is the solution? We create a committee of certified fact checkers who can roam the internet for misinformation to stomp out? That's how people who work in Brussels think and that's my point.

 

With free speech, you have to accept the noise and the crazies. It has been a hallmark of open societies.

[Spekulatius]

12 hours ago, John Hjorth said:

ico.org.uk : A guide to the data protection principles.

 

Easier there to get an overview of what it is about in stead of 80 pages.

 

I speculate it all started with the ads revenue streams at Google and Meta, rising such considerations based on these companies accumulation of all kinds of userdata, however I'm not sure about that.

I wish the US had data protection principles. The US is one of the few countries without data protection laws for individuals. It’s free for all here and that’s why business like Equifax and the other credit agencies exist

Edited September 17 by Spekulatius

[Spekulatius]

12 hours ago, Dalal.Holdings said:

To those who argue that Elon Musk is a free speech hypocrite, here are the top trending items on X right now for me:

 

 

You do realize, that the top feed is customized on X and has to do with your own history. Below is mine. I have two accounts, one of them I rarely use and of course that one is showing me a different “What is happening feed” than the other. That tells me that “What is happening” has more to do with your own click history  on X than what is actually happens in other words, it’s clickbait. I leave it up to others to draw conclusions from your own posted link.

 

[UK]

15 hours ago, Cod Liver Oil said:

Yes, the EU is a mess. Luxury is also a mess. But I have a soft spot in my heart for dynastic French families so I am adding to Dior at 16 times today. I like what Arnault is doing in real estate with Catterton.  National and familial DNA seem to be merging. L’etat, c’est moi kind of thing. 

 

+1

Edited September 17 by UK

[Sweet]

7 hours ago, Spekulatius said:

You do realize, that the top feed is customized on X and has to do with your own history. Below is mine. I have two accounts, one of them I rarely use and of course that one is showing me a different “What is happening feed” than the other. That tells me that “What is happening” has more to do with your own click history  on X than what is actually happens in other words, it’s clickbait. I leave it up to others to draw conclusions from your own posted link.

 

 

 

"Hawk Tuah" 

[Dalal.Holdings]

11 hours ago, Spekulatius said:

You do realize, that the top feed is customized on X and has to do with your own history. Below is mine. I have two accounts, one of them I rarely use and of course that one is showing me a different “What is happening feed” than the other. That tells me that “What is happening” has more to do with your own click history  on X than what is actually happens in other words, it’s clickbait. I leave it up to others to draw conclusions from your own posted link.

 

That’s why I said here’s what’s trending “for me”…

 

The fact is that there were tens of thousands of posts yesterday on X calling for the owner of X to be deported and this was the top trending item for at least some users. So that to me is a piece of evidence that counters your assertion that Elon is a free speech hypocrite. I have yet to see evidence that Elon systematically censors content he does not like ideologically on X.

[Dalal.Holdings]

15 hours ago, Spekulatius said:

I wish the US had data protection principles. The US is one of the few countries without data protection laws for individuals. It’s free for all here and that’s why business like Equifax and the other credit agencies exist

That’s why GDPR was created. So you can customize your cookies on every website you visit. The problem is that no one actually does it and now it’s just an annoyance that gets in the way of experiencing the internet.

 

Like I said—these things sounds great in theory (and they may have good intentions), but don’t work well in practice and you end up with layers of useless regulation.

 

Edited September 17 by Dalal.Holdings

[james22]

 

[John Hjorth]

Ref. the posts above about data protection principles by @Dalal.Holdings , @Spekulatius and @Dinar - in principle versus in practice, including all the hazzle and annoyance in practice, is really EU for that to blame if you as an american citizen accesses an American website, actually?

 

Here is a good example - the Washington Post website, accessed from Denmark, an EU member country :

 

 

 

I suppose it must be evident that the website is 'tasting' on my user agent [IP adress?] to get a reply to 'Who there?' before sending me a reply and eventually letting me in, or am I reading it in a wrong way here, my assumption just mentioned thereby wrong?

 

There actually exists an news website, that I can't access here from Europe. Right now, I don't remember which it is.

[John Hjorth]

28 minutes ago, james22 said:

 

 

Good you're bringing us back on topic and track again, James [ @james22 ],

 

My knowledge about German macro economics is insufficient, but I suppose this development is a for a good part releated to the the three large German automakers and their underlying supply chains, which actually constitutes a huge German spiders web? [ @Spekulatius has called the situation for one them a 'shitshow', I am not even sure if it's funny, nor an exaggeration, or even worse, the opposite?]

 

I hope to read something of value about it here from a knowledgeable CoBF member on the issue at hand.

[Dalal.Holdings]

1 hour ago, John Hjorth said:

Ref. the posts above about data protection principles by @Dalal.Holdings , @Spekulatius and @Dinar - in principle versus in practice, including all the hazzle and annoyance in practice, is really EU for that to blame if you as an american citizen accesses an American website, actually?

 

Here is a good example - the Washington Post website, accessed from Denmark, an EU member country :

 

 

 

I suppose it must be evident that the website is 'tasting' on my user agent [IP adress?] to get a reply to 'Who there?' before sending me a reply and eventually letting me in, or am I reading it in a wrong way here, my assumption just mentioned thereby wrong?

 

There actually exists an news website, that I can't access here from Europe. Right now, I don't remember which it is.

 

https://stratechery.com/2024/the-e-u-goes-too-far/

 

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During the recent Stratechery break I was in Europe, and, as usual, was pretty annoyed by the terrible Internet experience endemic to the continent: every website has a bunch of regulatory-required pop-ups asking for permission to simply operate as normal websites, which means collecting the data necessary to provide whatever experience you are trying to access. This obviously isn’t a new complaint — I feel the same annoyance every time I visit.

 

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I certainly agree with the sentiment — if I lived in Europe and were assaulted with data requests from random entities with such frequency, I would feel similarly motivated — but obviously the implementation is completely broken: hardly anyone, no matter how disciplined about their data, has the time and motivation to read through every privacy policy or data declaration and jump through the hoops necessary to buy a ticket or reserve a table while figuring out the precise set of options necessary to do so without losing control of said data; you just hit “Accept” and buy the damn ticket.

 

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Europeans sure are obsessed with data generally. On another trip, I was in a forum about AI and was struck by the extent to which European business-people themselves were focused on data to the point where it seemed likely some number of their companies would miss out on potential productivity gains for fear of losing control of what they viewed as some sort of gold mine; the reality is that data is not the new oil: yes, it is valuable at scale and when processed in a data factory, but the entities capable of building such factories are on the scale of a Meta or a Google, not a museum or a restaurant or even a regional bank. I don’t think that AI has changed this equation: the goal of a business ought to be to leverage its data to deliver better business outcomes — which AI should make easier — not obsessively collect and hoard data as if it were a differentiator in its own right.

 

[John Hjorth]

I'll let it go from here, @Dalal.Holdings,

 

A part from this comment : I think you aren't relating to my point, namely it's not the EU bothering and annoying you in your your daily digital life, for the most part, it's likely websites, where the web developers haven't done their basic work of not annoying you with presenting for you the cookies options pop-up, because you are accessing the site from within USA, not from the EU, thus no cookie requests required for you [, but for a person like me [European citzen].

 

Washington Post mentioned here as an example of how to solve the issue the correct way for citizens outside EU member contries, here including UK and Switzerland.

[John Hjorth]

With regard to Mario Draghi, his statements, and his report, here is the links to his report for those CoBF members interested:

 

European Commision [September 9^th 2024] : EU competitiveness: Looking ahead.

 

I have looked it up just today, and have not read anything in it yet. So I can't express any personal opinion about it. But I will certainly read it over the next few weeks to come.

[Dalal.Holdings]

34 minutes ago, John Hjorth said:

I'll let it go from here, @Dalal.Holdings,

 

A part from this comment : I think you aren't relating to my point, namely it's not the EU bothering and annoying you in your your daily digital life, for the most part, it's likely websites, where the web developers haven't done their basic work of not annoying you with presenting for you the cookies options pop-up, because you are accessing the site from within USA, not from the EU, thus no cookie requests required for you [, but for a person like me [European citzen].

 

Washington Post mentioned here as an example of how to solve the issue the correct way for citizens outside EU member contries, here including UK and Switzerland.

 

The forum topic is whether the EU is uninvestable, so my annoyances to EU policy as an American is of minimal concern. The main concern is whether the EU is harming itself by allowing Brussels to smother the continent in regulation.

 

It seems to be the case. Apple has forked iOS for the EU now. Everyone in EU gets a different (I will say inferior) version of iOS from rest of the world.

 

https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2024/01/apple-announces-changes-to-ios-safari-and-the-app-store-in-the-european-union/

 

Apple Intelligence (their AI version) is not available in EU

 

https://www.axios.com/2024/06/21/apple-ai-features-europe

 

https://www.forbes.com/sites/ewanspence/2024/09/16/apple-iphone-16-pro-apple-intelligence-european-union-dma-new-iphone/

 

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Of course, European iPhone users will see none of these upgrades, whether they are existing iPhone 15 Pro owners or those who buy any one of the four new iPhone 16 family.

This caught regulators by surprise, but by being so possessive over user data, it makes implementing AI for users impossible to execute for Apple.

 

Quote

European Commission Vice-President Margrethe Vestager was not happy (about Apple Intelligence not being available), saying at Forum Europa:

 

I find that very interesting that they say we will now deploy AI where we’re not obliged to enable competition. I think that is that is the most sort of stunning open declaration that they know 100% that this is another way of disabling competition where they have a stronghold already.

 

I'm afraid that EU regulator Ms. Vestager has no idea how AI or competition in technology works. She is clueless just like Thierry was. If EU thinks that all these rules have helped competitiveness in Europe, I look forward to seeing a bunch of vibrant startups sprouting up on the continent (any day now...)

 

Have fun with your precious data, Europe.

 

 

So is Europe Uninvestable? I would argue that within 21st century industries, it would take a large burden of proof to convince me to invest in Europe.

 

Edited September 17 by Dalal.Holdings

[John Hjorth]

Thank you, @Dalal.Holdings,

 

To me personally, this last post of yours above is the first post in this topic that creates a link / causation [call it what you want], by logic and examples, between the investability of Europe and by EU imposed innovation constraints.

 

I'm certainly a slow catcher, who needs things bent in neon, before it sinks in. Again, thank you.