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> it is a totally unnecessary political statement which fragments their userbase and introduces a political dimension to any procurement decision involving Cloudflare.

My take was, If you need help from the current State Department, or the current administration, (and I assume they do) it absolutely is a necessary statement. And then, this is them trying very hard to suck up, as is required, without pissing off everyone.

Perhaps I'm wrong, and this is actually a form of honesty, instead of performative theater. In which case I would probably agree with you. It's unfortunate. But I default to the assumption that people aren't children by choice.

Then why bring up Musk, who is perhaps more reviled than even Vance?

I agree, he seems to be ranting and escalating unnecessarily.

The are fining his company 213% of yearly Italian revenue. He is not the one escalating.

He took a risk in ignoring a law instead of exiting the market. They did not escalate, they applied the law.

What we need is an international legal framework for the Internet. And that includes compromises on all sides. China, EU, Russia, US and others have very different understanding on what is right. But hey, I think US politics is America first and cancel all international treaties. Sounds like more problems like this are incoming.

Sure, next we should implement global communism and live in peace and harmony forever! That is most definitely feasible

I think it would be more effective if US establishes deterrence against punitive fines of its companies.

> Europe is too important for USA. I don't think the US administration will like the relationship to go sour at this very point in time just because of this Cloudflare doofus barking around.

When you say "for USA", what do you mean by "USA"?

Are you talking about the general US population? US corporations? Or the person who decides foreign policy direction (i.e., Trump)?

Because Trump recently ordered the snatching of a foreign head of state because he didn't like how the guy danced and allegedly didn't take him seriously.

I was trying to say that even though the US administration is actively escalating with Europe, I don't think the point in time has been reached where they want to go full berserk and cut Europe off from services by US tech companies. Cloudflare CEO tries to trigger such an escalation right now, but I'm not sure the US administration wants this kind of escalation right now, because it would also accelerate migration away from Microsoft and other US tech companies, hurting their revenue. For FAANG $7M is peanuts, and they won't leave billions on the table just because Cloudflare CEO has a big ego.

Musk and JD Vance are not "extremely unpopular in the EU", they are primarily unpopular with progressives, regardless of the location.

It sounds like you're just upset the Cloudflare CEO sides with conservatives on this particular issue.

Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but they are, in fact, extremely unpopular in EU

You believe Musk is unpopular with conservatives in the EU?

Overall he is very unpopular. There are a few far right parties that love him but they are outnumbered.