Major Tech Firms Face Hefty Fines Under New Digital Consumer Bill (theguardian.com) 52
Major tech firms face the threat of multibillion-pound fines for breaching consumer protection rules under new legislation that will tackle issues including fake online reviews and subscriptions that are difficult to cancel. From a report: The digital markets, competition and consumers bill will empower the UK's competition watchdog to tackle the "excessive dominance" that a small number of tech firms hold over consumers and businesses. Firms that are deemed to have "strategic market status" -- such as tech firms Google and Apple, and online retailer Amazon -- will be given strict rules on how to operate under the bill and face a fine representing up to 10% of global turnover if they breach the new regime.
Without naming these companies, the government said firms could be required to open up their data to rival search engines or increase the transparency of how their app stores and review systems work. Oversight of major tech firms will be carried out by an arm of the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), the Digital Markets Unit, which will also decide which firms receive strategic market status. The bill, which will be tabled in parliament on Tuesday, is expected to become law next year.
Without naming these companies, the government said firms could be required to open up their data to rival search engines or increase the transparency of how their app stores and review systems work. Oversight of major tech firms will be carried out by an arm of the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), the Digital Markets Unit, which will also decide which firms receive strategic market status. The bill, which will be tabled in parliament on Tuesday, is expected to become law next year.
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File RICO charges & force closed Yelp? Solves my only real concern...
Re:prices will go up (Score:5, Insightful)
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Probably because what you are proposing is insane.
It's only insane until some politician is up on stage saying it in front of a massive cheering crowd. Then it's time to actually worry.
And there's no "insane" mod, so they picked "flamebait" and "troll".
The moderation system here really is just a holdover from the site's heyday. It made sense to sink controversial posts along with the genuine detritus (spam, copypastas, shock links, ASCII art, off-topic posts, personal attack trolling, etc.) when stories would receive hundreds of comments. Nowadays, you might as well just browse at -1 because even most of the trolls have
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It's only insane until some politician is up on stage saying it in front of a massive cheering crowd. Then it's time to actually worry.
I guess I'm not following? Are you proposing anarchy, or not?
Nowadays, you might as well just browse at -1 because even most of the trolls have gone elsewhere, so most of what's at the bottom is just the result of moderation being used to lazily express disagreement. I blame Reddit.
Guess I can't disagree with you there. But to be fair, you can't really complain when you get downmodded for suggesting we should basically burn the government to the ground and go back to bartering with chickens and precious metals.
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I beg to differ: under-regulation in a capitalistic society often leads to monopolies, price-fixing collusion, and overall higher prices, as well as unsafe practices and products.
Over-regulation can also be bad, of course, leading to regulatory capture and again, monopolies.
What you want is the correct amount of regulation: not too much, not too little, and as fair to everyone as possible.
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There are no price fixing monopolies, even OPEC cannot do it and ends up being forced to behave by the markets. I am against all government regulations and interference in business and money.
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I once thought like you, then I grew up. The "invisible hand of the free market" is a malicious fantasy.
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In 2012, the Cardozo Law Review published a study finding such agreements raise prices by around 37%.
Source: John M. Connor & Robert H. Lande. "Cartels As Business Strategy," Page 485.
So yup, they exist, and have been studied.
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--CEOs
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Because it's a stupid idea that would leave us with awful services that no one would actually want to use.
Now, I didn't moderate you at all, but I'm just explaining why others would use negative moderation on your post. They only have the mod options handed them, and there's no way most people would want to mod a stupid idea in a positive way. I think a better option might be "bad idea", but we don't have that, so they reach for troll or flamebait (which makes sense, you did suggest a silly unworkable conce
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seriously, you are using airbnb as an example? Airbnb creates competition that the hotel lobby is trying to destroy, that is all that there is to it. People should be able to rent out their own property even by the hour, never mind day by day.
I am against all regulations, all government interference, including in medicine, schooling, etc. It is not a government concern, we make it so and thus we cause the disbalance, we create monopolies artificially, we cause rising prices by allowing government interfe
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Also it is quite curios that you believe that modern medicine requires government regulations. It does not, all medicine is invented privately in the first place, what government regulations do however, is prevent people from making their own choices as to what treatment to pick out of many and government regulations make medicine more expensive. Be ot copyrights and patents protected by government from competition or be it efficacy proofs, governments cause prices to rise and choices to be limited.
As to
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I am for anything that allows prices to drop.
How would reigning in scummy subscription cancellation tactics mean lower prices?
Getting rid of copyright and patent laws
Okay. If you don't mind, I'd like to run a hypothetical past you: A Garage Inventor comes up with a neat product. A major company with deep pockets creates a clone of that product and sells it at a loss until the Garage Inventor closes up shop. We've seen this with Apple, popular apps no longer sold because Apple rolled their own. Copyright and Patent laws are typically what level the playing field between small players
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Except they don't because only the big players can afford the patents and copyright, speaking as someone who had his company killed off by a patent troll.
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There is no reason for the prices to go up.
It's perfectly possible to run a good business without trampling on consumer rights.
I just moved into a new phone and Ebay wanted my phone number to be able to register the app on my new phone - despite being a happy and safe ebay user for about 20 years on 3 contintents - and it said 'by doing this you consent to us sending you any texts we like'
so I just deleted the app.
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The consumer right are a ruse. Here is the meat of the issue:
Without naming these companies, the government said firms could be required to open up their data to rival search engines or increase the transparency of how their app stores and review systems work. Oversight of major tech firms will be carried out by an arm of the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), the Digital Markets Unit, which will also decide which firms receive strategic market status.
- what exactly does this have to do with 'consumer rights'? Nothing. This is just control and it allows government agencies to threaten companies with whatever and to get payouts, that's all it is.
Re:prices will go up (Score:4, Informative)
Okay, opening their systems up to rival search engines* would be an "increase competition" move, which allows alternatives to flourish, and forces companies to keep on their toes and do things like keep search useful, rather than simply block as much of the internet as they can from their competition.
In order to enforce this legislation of course you need a body with the ability to investigate for violations and the power to punish them. Thus the CMA. Laws generally have to be somewhat generic, so giving the body doing the enforcing some power to clarify shit is also good.
Can also be abused, of course. But it's a mixed bag even in the USA.
*though I'm not sure what this means exactly. Does this mean that google has to allow Microsoft to index youtube?
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opening their systems up to rival search engines* would be an "increase competition" move
- it's a subsidy enforced by the government from one company to another, so it is a power of the government to pick winners and losers and it is a way to get payouts and bribes, that's all it is. It is an extra added expense to run a business, so it is another barrier to entry. It requires extra government regulations, so it is makeshift 'work' for the inept who tend gravitate towards government positions, so it is a form of welfare for the lazy and the corrupt. It most definitely will not bring any pric
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> roman_mir
I get the impression you might actually not be criticizing governments per se, but badly run governments. All the while disregarding the possibility of an unregulated corporation taking advantage of its position of power to distort the market and take advantage of the average consumer.
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They can threaten all they like. Companies data is by default commercial in confidence and only shared with other companies through a mutual contract. Requests / demands that they share with others are rightly responded to with a "Go fuck yourself" response to a blatant attempt of data harvesting by the state (because if you really think the state won't take a copy of the data as it goes from one private entity to another [gotta have proof you've done it, right?], I've got a bridge for sale).
And that's befo
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What do you suggest be done instead?
Company board members in prison.
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Without naming these companies, the government said firms could be required to open up their data to rival search engines or increase the transparency of how their app stores and review systems work. Oversight of major tech firms will be carried out by an arm of the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), the Digital Markets Unit, which will also decide which firms receive strategic market status.
- this is the actual reason for these regulations. Ability to regulate is ability to destroy, in case of large companies it is ability to extort bribes. So you are suggesting throwing people into jail? I am sure it will come up. If you do not comply with a certain number on a blank check guess where you may end up.
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Either that or their profits will decrease, hitting the investors.
Oh no, the horror!
In any case, the consumer will be suffering due to the government 'protecting' the consumer.
Stating opinion firmly as fact doesn't make it a fact.
The only thing that power over someone does is take away freedoms
The freedom to defraud.
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And yet they do not pay any "extra".
The USA is just 4% of the worlds population, the other 96% are entitled to have their say...its called democracy
And other countries are far more democratic, free, etc etc etc than the USA
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So you're in favor of giant global monopolies? I think you have teh dum.
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No, you are. You are in favor of the giant global monopolies on power - governments. I am for competition, thus I am against all government regulations, taxation, money printing.
The entire concept here is to give government power to get payouts, bribes from these companies to keep doing business given this:
Without naming these companies, the government said firms could be required to open up their data to rival search engines or increase the transparency of how their app stores and review systems work. Oversight of major tech firms will be carried out by an arm of the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), the Digital Markets Unit, which will also decide which firms receive strategic market status.
So you should really take a look in the mirror and realize where 'teh dum' is.
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Wow... Just wow.
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Wow. And here you are using a computing device and chatting on the internet. And calling other people stupid because they believe in things like taxes?
Um, how exactly are we supposed to build hospitals and roads? Pay for services like fire fighting and police?
You, my friend, are a totally delusional moron, and can safely be ignored as a whack-job.
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clearly all you can do is personal attacks. We can do everything privately, literally everything. Schools, hospitals, roads, including courts and policing. Then we would have actual competition, low prices, choices.
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Hey, you started the personal attacks when you insulted someone else for pointing out that you idea was clearly unworkable. I'm just firing back XD
As for "doing everything privately", I assume you are either a callus rich bastard who is lacking in empathy, or just stupid. There are very, VERY few instances where privatizing some service led to lower costs: aside for SpaceX, I'm having trouble finding an example. I know where I live whenever the politicians start talking about "privatizing" some service, we
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you started the personal attacks when you insulted someone else for pointing out that you idea was clearly unworkable
- Oh, so you have tenuous grasp of language in general and cannot differentiate an argument from a personal attack. Good to know.
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> The only thing that power over someone does is take away freedoms and increase expenses
If I replace someone with corporations, I'd agree it takes away freedoms, and maybe increases expenses, but both those can be good things too - so it can also be to the consumer's advantage.
Wait 5 days for Apple to say they are pulling out (Score:2)
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Apple can afford to fix these problems, is going to have to fix them for other markets eventually, and can stay in business if they fix the problems.
A company like Amazon, though, literally can't do business under those conditions.
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A company like Amazon, though, literally can't do business under those conditions.
Oh no! Whatever will we do without Amazon.
Had me at making cancelling subscriptions easy (Score:3)
I remember going to sign up for a car wash subscription. However, it had wording that it could ONLY be canceled in person, at the car wash you signed up at. They called it a "Security measure" so that a malicious person couldn't cancel your car wash subscription on you.
I declined at that point, even though the worker totally assured me that they'd totally cancel it over the phone for me.
Hint, I was military at the time, and subject to transfer or deployment on more or less a moment's notice. Didn't want the possible hassle.
Is the penalty too big? (Score:2)
Amazon's annual global retail sales is around $750 billion. The UK portion is around $30 billion. With a roughly 1.5% profit margin, retail profits are around $10 billion per year. So, a single 10% penalty will cost more than 160 times the annual UK profit and 7 times the entire global retail profit. That means that if the UK imposes such a penalty, they should expect Amazon to completely stop all retail operations in the UK. In fact, the penalty is so large that maybe Amazon would proactively pull out
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If US companies want to exist in other countries, then they have to obey local laws. US law ends at the US boarder.
The USA still has the death penalty for personal crimes in the US, as well as life imprisonment, why are companies who bring harm to millions of people need to be exempt from laws designed to curb their behaviour ?
The USA is 4% of the worlds population, it is NOT entitled to force themselves into/onto anyon