[btilly]

Without the people who start business type X, we won't have competition in business type X. Therefore a law that makes it hard to start businesses of type X will affect you whether or not you ever intend to start such businesses.

This applies for any X that you care to name, including "internet".

If you believe that you can both pass regulations that make businesses of type X harder to form, and enjoy the benefits of having new businesses of type X around, then there is probably a big flaw in your thinking.

[TeMPOraL]

In case of GDPR, X is "businesses abusing people's data", which essentially boils down to "adtech". We don't need more competition in adtech. We need adtech to die.

[btilly]

No, X is "businesses that handle people's data". For whatever reason.

The goal is to regulate adtech. But the effect is to impose regulatory costs on every company that wants to have a discussion forum on their website. (And the upcoming copyright bill is even worse.)

[kelnos]

In the case where X is what you describe, then fine. If they can't start their company and simultaneously treat my private data with respect and care, then I don't care for them to exist.

The cost of business going up isn't necessarily a bad thing, if we're getting something valuable in return (IMO we are). The question is whether or not the increased cost is prohibitive, and you have not provided any evidence to suggest that's the case.

[UncleEntity]

> The question is whether or not the increased cost is prohibitive, and you have not provided any evidence to suggest that's the case.

The thousands of companies that just block EU citizens rather than comply seems to suggest that they feel the cost is prohibitive.

As for more direct hard evidence I believe this would fall into the "unseen" category in Bastiat's That Which is Seen, and That Which is Not Seen and is, in effect, calling on someone to prove a negative.

[TeMPOraL]

> The thousands of companies that just block EU citizens rather than comply seems to suggest that they feel the cost is prohibitive.

They block EU because they deem compliance not worth the effort (now), usually because they get more than enough from their US markets. This doesn't mean the costs are prohibitive. Thousands more companies didn't block EU citizens. Some companies (notably news sites) even started to offer a superior product to EU citizens (e.g. plaintext news).

Also, even with those blocking EU or shutting down, nothing of importance is lost. These companies have competitors that are less abusive, who do fine.

[jdietrich]

Handling other people's personal data is a serious responsibility. GDPR imposes regulatory costs, in the same way that health and safety or environmental protection legislation imposes regulatory costs. It's not creating any new costs, it's just properly pricing an externality.

https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2016/03/data_is_a_tox...

[Mirioron]

Including all the businesses that run on adtech then? I guess so much for Google, YouTube, Facebook, Android etc.

I would much rather have adtech and those businesses. I think most people feel the same way, because they continue to use those businesses.

[piaste]

Adtech ought to die. Ideally, I would want to pay for Google and Facebook the same way I pay for Netflix and Spotify. In exchange, I would want them to treat the data about what I do online with the same respect with which my doctor treats my medical history.

The model where Google provides a service and users pay for it is more efficient and more societally healthy than the model where Google provides a free service, a million companies pay to place ads on it, and pass the cost of their AdWords budget onto users who get a 'free' service.

It is a model where consumers get better products, and where millions of creative minds aren't wasted making web pages uglier (or ruining cities with billboards, for that matter). It is a model where competition is also a little easier, because an alternative search engine can undercut Google's prices and carve itself a starting market niche, even if their service is not quite as good as the established competitor; instead of the current model where first you need to be better than Google in every way, and then you have to fight the network effect.

I have no clue how to get to world to switch to this model. It will require that elusive white whale, an online payment mechanic that is truly as frictionless as cash. And it will almost certainly require legislation rather than mere market pressure, because people can see their monthly Google bill but cannot see the vast costs of the marketing industry which they pay for every day.

[Mirioron]

>The model where Google provides a service and users pay for it is more efficient and more societally healthy than the model where Google provides a free service, a million companies pay to place ads on it, and pass the cost of their AdWords budget onto users who get a 'free' service.

That's cool and all, but people can't pay for it. These fees would add up quickly and you'd basically never go beyond your few webpages that you're paying for, because everything else costs money.

I probably would never have cared about the internet or anything related to computers, if websites had required people to pay. That would not have been an option for me or most people I knew growing up.

[sidibe]

Everyone who cares strongly about this issue (not nearly as big a cohort as hn thinks) is against targeted ads. If they ever get their way and laws really end Google/Facebook's business model as GDPR intends, the much larger cohort of people who care more about not paying for services will start caring.

[maximus1983]

Adtech will die once people start paying for things on the internet. When that will be who knows.