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I do not understand this approach. A market solution works and is popular, so the government should step in and try to develop something better with "contracts"?

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It's just a form of standardization by the government in terms of the technical protocol. Just like EU has some with OOXML and ODF. This ensures that other players can come in and build alternative clients. Without regulations, it's going to be a nation relying on a company. I don't think that is good.

The EU has been trying to enforce open formats for their own use; it doesn't try to force private individuals or companies to use them among themselves.

(It also failed; as of 2014, .doc was still used more than .odt by orders of magnitude in the major institutions - Commission, Council and Parliament)

Many people in fact rely on WhatsApp. But that's not like they own the only road available.

If for some reason WhatsApp suddenly vanished, people would switch to the competitors, like Telegram, Messenger, Viber, etc.

There would be chaos during the change, but that's just because the change happens suddenly. If it happens slowly (if the government continues to block WhatsApp, people will rely on an alternative), then I see no harm.

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