This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
This isn't a 'painful day for tech titans.'
Corporations don't feel pain. C*Os insulate themselves from it. They're getting steadily richer, probably making more money than you'll ever see in your life.
This is a good day for tech consumers. That should have been the headline.
I get depressed whenever I read about those salaries. I get paid the bare minimum to pay the bills. I will never have the life those people have - not that I care about luxury, but simply not having to worry about basic necessities.
Good. Get rid of proprietary messaging apps and unfettered access to our data. Bring back standards.
Sad iMessage didn't get categorised as a gatekeeper, even though in here, the absolute ass of Europe called Czechia the iPhone market share is just above 1/3 of all phones active (which if I remember is way higher than it used to be) I completely expect for this number to rise, since people buy for the brand, and these brain-dead people are the ones to use the default messaging service, thus I can't wait to get shamed in 10 years for using my android phone and not being able to use iMessage
By default big business is narcissistic. They abuse the hell out of everything (see what you made me do to be profitable?) then play the victim when the government hits back.
I was around during the IE/ Netscape war. It occurred to me back then that given the same set of opportunities, any business would likely do the same. It sucks.
And not just businesses. I am always horrified by how many people are obsessed with protecting the precious intellectual property of their posts on the Fediverse from "scraping". It's exactly the kind of "Private Property! Keep out!" thinking that gives the tech monopolies the stranglehold over their users.
It's normal. In today's social media it just takes more time to ask the author whether you can use what they've created, especially relative to clicking that repost button.
In the 00s you'd just ask and most likely get permission and also the author would be flattered. If you wouldn't ask, though, that'd be very impolite and the author would be pissed.
Just like IRL among normal people.
I don't think you're quite following here.
EG have you ever heard about Power Ventures? That was a social media aggregator. You gave the website your credential for Facebook and others. It would fetch contact lists, messages, and so on, and present them in a single place. That gave you a kind of interoperability, or even a kind of federation. Obviously, Facebook didn't like that. This kind of thing just weakens their hold on users.
You'd think users here should like this sort of thing. But it's full here with people who passionately hate it, just as much as Facebook did. Facebook completely destroyed the company in court. The Fediverse is full of people who think that that's exactly right.
Aha, okay, I agree it's not.
Yes, which is why we have anticompetition laws. It's just for some reason, people can't always see competition problem when it's technology.
Tech looks like magic to the average person. It's even hard for tech people to definitively tell if something inappropriate is happening, unless they have access to the source. And even so, companies will hide behind the 'trade secrets' excuse. Most of the time we can only imagine the shenanigans happening behind the veneer of the corporate copy, because it's what we would do, given the vast amounts of data and lack of accountability/ transparency available for exploitation.
All true, but they are also failing at simple stuff. Requiring a closed company's format or services is a monopoly. Especially if "everyone else is doing it". That is when regulators need to step in as it's a market failure when there is a single vendor "everyone is using".
Correct. I feel the regulators lost the plot when they didn't keep up with market demands for next gen messaging, leading first to the proprietary protocols and then the proliferation of third party apps growing out of a person's social clout. It's sucks having to check which app someone is on before I can communicate with them. Some of us here in Asia have 10+ messaging apps on our phone, a combination of pre installed bloatware and apps installed because someone else didn't have my one, esoteric app. Each time we are handing over more and more of our personal data, network, metadata (so they say) etc.
It was a problem before IMs on phones. Or smart phone. (Maybe not IMs because of IRC). Microsoft have been conflating monopolies with standards since forever. Not only dominating desktop operating systems, but office software on it. Using monopoly of one to get a monopoly of the other. And lets not forget what they did with browers. The EU is only body in the world dealing with the problem at all.
Phones in Asia sound even more dystopian than here in the UK. Surely you can still go LineageOS, GrapheneOS, etc?
Thank you EU.
*cries in British
*cries in American
Title should be adjusted to "Tech giants no longer treated like coddled babies by EU"
yeah, interoperability should work to encourage development
I'm sorry to break it to you, but look at how much E-Mail, the biggest open Standard has developed.
Without a central Authority behind it, Developement doesn't work.
Heck, even with a central authority it's difficult. Just look how many Businesses still use Java 8.
XMPP actually started becoming better fast after those authorities (like Google) dropped it.
It sounds paradoxical, but that's exactly what i meant.
There were multiple authorities with different ideas which blocked developement. As soon as there was only one Authority left, developement sped up rapidly.
Sorry, but no, that's not how it happened.
There were multiple authorities with different ideas which blocked developement.
Google didn't block anything, just rolled out XEPs which its client supported and others sometimes did, sometimes didn't, and didn't really want to, because, first, around 2007 the expected requirements to an IM were different, so nobody felt pressed, second, they didn't discuss it with anyone.
So, for example, Jingle (VoIP) support was more like a toy - a few clients had it, but disabled by default and nobody cared to test it much.
As soon as there was only one Authority left, developement sped up rapidly.
Eh, and which would that be? What I see is exactly how useful XEPs were introduced by different people, and sometimes even replaced old XEPs for the same purpose, organically, with no authority involved.
By market forces, one could say.
Yeah, of course google didn't physically block anything, But you had multiple visions diverging and that harmed progress.
, and which would that be?
The enthusiasts faction running the servers.
And there were "multiple visions" long after than and now too.
Won't someone think of the poor shareholders /s
You are right, we should tax capital gains drastically so to disincentivise speculation, and force investor to rely on dividends. This would put a stop on the crazy run for growth we are experiencing as companies try to make their market valuation go up in this unsustainable eternal race to the top.
It’s been a painful few decades for consumers having the teeth of unregulated tech titans sunk into them.
It's not over with this bill, at least until pluralism returns in operating systems, hardware and internet protocols.
I just hope they don't stop the pressure with this.
It would be amazing if even a small portion of EU fines for big tech companies went to supporting open source alternatives.
In the Linux world, we are seeing right now how much things like Valve putting a bit of money into Linux, Germany's Sovereign Tech Fund giving €1m to the Gnome foundation, etc, is improving things massively. Funding helps. Developers/designers/etc like being paid.
Imagine if even 1% of these big tech fines went into a pot that an independent body chooses open projects to invest in. It'd be huge.
Open source has a sustainability problem in terms of funding, developers, and burnout. To me it seems we have a relatively easy and politically palatable solution.
Germany’s Sovereign Tech Fund giving €1m to the Gnome foundation
Why, in Germany of all countries they should have supported KDE. Granted, it's already doing fine, but then Gnome's problem is not with lack of money.
Probably because Gnome is used in more businesses and Gnome is pretty good at implementing accessibility features, which was one of the main conditions of the grant.
And it's not a big deal, KDE is already getting a lot of support, and the work Gnome is doing is going to be an open, cross-desktop framework. It benefits KDE too.
and Gnome is pretty good at implementing accessibility features, which was one of the main conditions of the grant.
At the same time yes and ... they are very unorthodox in their understanding of what makes things more accessible.
Not making their DE yet another Windows clone does not mean it's inaccessible.
I get it, you clearly have a personal issue with Gnome. Just don't use it then. There's no need to be upset about an amazing open source project getting support and improving the accessibility stack for the entire Linux desktop.
I use FVWM with 2-pixel solid borders and no window titlebars or buttons or panels, except for one FvwmButtons instance with digital clock, all keyboard-controlled. EDIT: ... so I obviously don't prefer Windows
The issues with Gnome are that it's resource-heavy and inconsistent in UX, and setting it up is PITA.
Cinnamon as its fork is much better.
I use FVWM with 2-pixel solid borders and no window titlebars or buttons or panels, except for one FvwmButtons instance with digital clock, all keyboard-controlled. EDIT: ... so I obviously don't prefer Windows
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The issues with Gnome are that it's resource-heavy
No it isn't. Stop making shit up.
inconsistent in UX
Gnome is easily the most consistent DE out there. By far. Honestly, by far and away the most consistent. Even MacOS is less consistent, and that's saying something.
and setting it up is PITA.
? Install it and it's done. I change a couple of keyboard shortcuts too but that's unnecessary.
Cinnamon as its fork is much better.
So a Windows UX clone. Not everything has to be yet another Windows clone. What happened to you not preferring Windows UX lol
No it isn’t. Stop making shit up.
I've even seen benchmarks. In my own experience it's slow where default KDE5 is fast. I didn't dig why, because I'm not going to use a full-fledged DE over my cozy FVWM setup anyway.
Also accusing better people than you of lying is impolite.
Gnome is easily the most consistent DE out there. By far. Honestly, by far and away the most consistent. Even MacOS is less consistent, and that’s saying something.
I already guessed that's your opinion, but OK. "Even"? It's the same horror as MacOS.
So a Windows UX clone. Not everything has to be yet another Windows clone. What happened to you not preferring Windows UX lol
It can look like Gnome 3 UX clone too, and that's how it looked when I used it. Just more consistent and usable.
Anyway, there's such a thing as ergonomics. It's not really subjective, it can be measured in clicks and keystrokes, with accounting for mistakes and searching for elements of UI. Gnome devs are clearly ignorant of it.
MacOS and Gnome are sometimes worse than even modern Windows in that regard.
BTW, about Windows - w2k and xp were very good in terms of ergonomics.
You're lying. That's why I called you a liar.
Gnome is the most consistent. That's an objective, factual statement.
No, you talked about a Windows UX clone. We get it, you want everything to be a Windows clone.
Just more consistent
Lmao
Anyway, there's such a thing as ergonomics.
Something gnome does very well and Windows and its clones don't.
Honestly, I don't know why only Gnome devs seems to care about consistency and ergonomics. It's maddening.
BTW, about Windows - w2k and xp were very good in terms of ergonomics.
HAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHA
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Lol
So you don't have any arguments and apparently think that repeating shit will make it true.
Any amount of "HAHAHA" is not an argument, and like I said, ergonomics is not a subjective thing.
This headline implies that EUs moves are agressive and brutal while they arent. Breaking up monopolies is an ordinary step of keeping the market competitive.
It should be ordinary. But it isn't. Which means the market stagnants as competition basically stops. Like how Microsoft basically closed IE development when IE "won" the browser market by achieving monopoly.
I wonder why it isn't titled from consumer's perspective.
