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Comment by durnygbur | Hacker News Reader

The German anti-English sentiment is sometimes right. They're not afraid to point out omnipresent Anglosphere oligopolies - in payments (Visa, Mastercard), in social networks (Facebook, LinkedIn), in surveillance (Google, Facebook), in mobile (Google, Apple). While the rest of the Europe entirely submits to these oligopolies on a promise of receiving "investment". Funny though how Germans turn blind eye on their own oligopolies dominating and devastating European markets.

Part of the problem is that German economy is ruled by industrial and media moguls. For them internet is whether "stupid websites", a medium serving copyrights violations, or legal compliance issue (see "Impressum" hysteria). Either way an issue rather than opportunity. With their geriatric population the strategy is basically - increase public media fee, 50mbit copper internet in every household, internet for broadcasting public media content while throttling any alternatives.

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> Funny though how Germans turn blind eye on their own oligopolies dominating and devastating European markets.

Everybody wants sellers to compete when they're buying, nobody wants to compete when they're selling.

> For them internet is whether "stupid websites", a medium serving copyrights violations, or legal compliance issue (see "Impressum" hysteria).

The large corporations and media companies had issues with the laws around imprints? That wasn't my perception at all. Rather, it was average people who wrote blogs etc who didn't want to put their real name, home address and tax IDs onto their sites for various reasons, but the law was so vague that nobody was sure their site wasn't "similar to the press" or "with commercial interest". Larger companies didn't care at all -- they were generally compliant way before that law was introduced.

> Larger companies didn't care at all -- they were generally compliant way before that law was introduced.

If you write anything on the internet you're publishing content, ie. media might start consider you a competition, certainly after achieving certain visibility. Why not create an easy way to shot someone down or to suck someone into an expensive time consuming legal swamp?

Oh, I misunderstood your comment, I believe. I took it to mean that the companies got into a craze about new requirements, not that they were welcoming the new requirements as it gave them some/more control over online publishing (which is how I understand your comment now, please correct me if I'm wrong).

I generally agree in that case, they were probably happy for that moat.

I have the feeling that separation of powers tends to be stronger in the US. But maybe it's false..

I don't know if it's intentional separation of powers. The American culture is very individualistic, especially compared to the German. This just naturally means that American companies tend to "go it alone" in relation to the public sector for longer than they would in Germany.

Certainly when American companies get to the right size they seem to become much closer to the political bodies that matter to them and their interests, as is the case likely everywhere

>The American culture is very individualistic, especially compared to the German.

I wouldn't rush to this conclusion. US billionaires usually run many charity funds whereas German billionaires rarely do anything like that.

Also, German businesses owners don't seem to mind exploiting people's health and the environment (VW emissions scandal) or foreign workers [1] if it makes them money, so I think the same issues that plague capitalism in the US (greed) affect Germany too.

Otherwise, the wealth gap between rich and poor wouldn't be rising so steeply in Germany [2][3] if they wouldn't be so individualistic.

[1]https://m.dw.com/en/germany-meat-industry-conditions/a-54033...

[2]https://www.iamexpat.de/expat-info/german-expat-news/inherit...

[3]https://m.dw.com/en/study-shows-growing-wealth-inequality-in...

You can generalize that: German government doesn't mind exploiting people's health and the environment, and prioritizes industry interests. Two current examples: the ongoing ignorance about ground water pollution [1], and the Diesel air pollution affair, which is far from being over [2].

[1] https://www.dw.com/en/eu-sues-germany-over-water-tainted-by-... [2] https://www.rhein-zeitung.de/deutschland-und-welt/wirtschaft... (no English source)

> I think the same issues that plague capitalism in the US (greed) affect Germany too.

Definitely. It's a cultural thing, Germany (along with most Western countries) seems to follow the US in that regard.

The individualism <=> collectivism scale is well studied, and there's a significant gap between the US and Germany.

http://clearlycultural.com/geert-hofstede-cultural-dimension...

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