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Comment by dmitrygr | Hacker News Reader

that before long, everyone will be declared a gatekeeper, just so EU can control everything as they please.

You need at least 7.5B euro turnover and 45M MAU in the EU to have a chance to qualify. It's not going to be everyone.

Why shouldn't our sovereign government control things as they please? That's the whole point of sovereignty - people elect government, government makes rules.

That's not how that's supposed to work!

Democratically elected governments should have no say as to how many billions of dollars of market activity tech oligarchs are entitled to capture and redirect towards their very noble goal of winning the competition to see who can build the biggest yacht.

And, of course, building bunkers for when enough of the general population eventually catches onto and gets tired of the grift...

Some baseline needs to be a established, because small palyers can't play with the same rules of larger ones.

And it is absolutely the role of the government to regulate the market.

I believe you missed the dripping sarcasm

Eh, too many people say very similar shit in HN with a straight face. Quite a few here is quite happy to bow to their corporate masters.

I can't tell if parent was being sarcastic.

I agree, and originally that was my take, until I got to

"very noble goal of winning the competition to see who can build the biggest yacht."

The simps tend not to say the quiet part out loud

Fair enough, I concede the point. That section was too on the nose.

You can control what ENTERS your borders, not what happens outside of them. You are free to cut the cables, but not to dictate to those outside your house how to live on the other end of those cables. Else we'll all be living under the union of the rules of everyone. You sure you want that? Iran bans a lot of things you might like, as does china, and russia, and usa.

As soon as you send that data into my country, it is happening inside my borders.

You can buy magic mushrooms semi legally in the Netherlands. Doesn't mean you won't get in trouble if you send them from the Netherlands to another country.

So you DO want iran controlling what your LLC does if it is internet connected in any way (which everything is now).

Or they could just not serve Iran? But yeah, if you operate in a country you should probably follow their laws. I don't see how that's controversial

In the days of the internet "operate in a country" == "exist". Eg: [1] UK has tried to enforce its laws even onto organizations who literally exist in USA only. Their argument: you exist, internet exists, so you are still subject to us. So tell me, how can one exist today and not "operate" in every country where internet exists. And once you see that there is no way, how do you propose your logic for regulation to work, other than by everyone being subject to everyone's rules?

[1] https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c624330lg1ko

I couldn't find anything about VPNs in the link you shared.

If that is the case, I disagree with it. But if you serve the UK market, you gotta follow UK law. That doesn't seem unreasonable, does it?

I see you removed the VPN reference in your edit and it made your argument quite a bit weaker imo.

Just because 4Chan is in the US, doesn't mean they don't send their data to the UK.

As soon as they do, they are subject to UK law. Quite simple. If they don't want to be, they can stop sending their data there. See also the magic mushroom parallel from earlier.

> So tell me, how can one exist today and not "operate" in every country where internet exists

You could IP block by geo for example? Seems pretty straightforward.

So I have to actively work and expend energy to not be subject to some random whim? curious view.

It's not "some random whim", it is the law. And yes, one has to work and expend energy to follow the law frequently. I did my taxes not too long ago. Also got my drivers license before getting on the road.

Or in another, more close parallel: You do in fact have to put a fence around your construction site so you're not liable if somebody walks there and hurts themselves.

I've never worried about North Korean law because I've never been to North Korea, and I don't do business with North Korea

I do work about following Thai law because I've been to Thailand, and hope to go again

I do work about following US law because the US has a history of pursuing US law breakers - people who have never even been to the US - beyond its borders

America doesn’t just fine businesses doing businesses in American and breaking the law. It tries to extradite people who have never been to America to torture them

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gary_McKinnon

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kim_Dotcom

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khalid_El-Masri

Don't do business with Iran, then you don't have a problem

If you do do business with Iran, you have to follow Iranian law

Ok, and what would you say is the problem, there?

https://digital-markets-act.ec.europa.eu/about-dma_en

All I see is more interoperability, fairer competition, more consumer rights, etc. If you are against this sort of regulation and a rational being, I envy you because you must either be oligarch-level rich, or in a happy bubble disconnected from world-affecting current events.

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