[tluyben2]

Just force monopolistic/abusive/anti-competitive companies to expose API's ; it's not a stretch; they did it for banks (psd2) and it's great for consumers and companies alike. Do it for everything; open systems make the world better. And they can still be monetized; it's not like forcing everyone to open source everything.

Edit: more subtle choice of words to indicate what I meant

[Diggsey]

As someone who works on a SaaS product, one of our biggest costs is our stable API surface. Internal APIs are essentially free, but for a public API we have to:

- Implement a conversion layer from our internal representation so we can keep it stable.

- Complicate all further feature work because we have to consider how it will affect existing customers of the API.

- Write and maintain documentation for the API.

- Keep the API working even after we no longer use it.

- Maintain multiple versions of the API in parallel.

- Make sure our error messages make sense to people not familiar with our internal systems.

- Be more careful with validation - for our internal APIs it's not the end of the world if a bad request results in a 500 rather than a 400, but it matters a lot for public APIs.

- Be more careful with rate limiting and other defenses against API misuse.

And this is to name just a few. A requirement that everyone expose a public API is pointless if it doesn't include a stability guarantee, and overly burdensome if it does.

[Someone]

> A requirement that everyone expose a public API is pointless if it doesn't include a stability guarantee, and overly burdensome if it does.

This isn’t a requirement that everyone expose a public API . https://www.theverge.com/2022/3/24/22994234/eu-antitrust-leg...:

“The DMA will force new obligations on companies deemed to be “gatekeepers” — a category defined by the legislation as firms with a market capitalization of at least €75 billion ($82 billion); at least 45 million monthly users; and a “platform” like an app or social network. Companies covered by this classification include well-known tech giants like Google, Microsoft, Meta, Amazon, and Apple, but also smaller entities like Booking.com.”

[qzx_pierri]

For smaller companies, I can see how that would be rough. However, for large tech companies, this law seems really necessary.

Also relevant: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rAlTOfl9F2w

[est31]

It should be easy to make exceptions for smaller companies/services, and put the rule into force for larger services. Also, the API doesn't need to be stabilized. If Whatsapp wouldn't send DCMA notices to developers of third party clients, and ban users of such, it would be a good start already.

[username190]

It’s worth noting that this (proposed) law already only applies to large companies, as I noted upthread. This is something that a lot of folks in this thread are missing, but which I think is pretty crucial.

> Included in the rules' scope will be platforms with a market capitalization of €75 billion or turnover in the European Economic Area equal to or above €7.5 billion. [0]

[0] https://www.politico.eu/article/eus-digital-markets-act-adop...

[grishka]

Most social media companies' businesses models rely on having complete control over the presentation of content. Forcing them to allow third-party client apps would ruin that, and it's going to be beautiful.

[parkingrift]

Complete control of the presentation of content, editorializing said content, and arbitrarily deciding what is and isn’t allowed. And they also still don’t want to be treated as publishers.

It’s hard for me to muster up even the smallest amount of sympathy for these vampires.

I expect this will take a decade to shake out as US tech firms work tirelessly to protect their spyware walled garden models.

[tinus_hn]

You’re severely overreacting. These features you so passionately hate are an important part of the reason why the general population is using the apps, and the business model of the large majority of chat apps is definitely not ‘spyware’.

What’s going to happen, if this ever goes through, is that the networks will open some kind of api so outsiders can send and be sent basic messages. And you will never be happy using it because you’ll always look like an outsider.

And there is no way to fix this because a big draw of these networks is that they keep adding new features and they are not in the old api so you can’t use them.

And of course it’s going to be a big source of spam so users will get the ability to block the outside from sending messages to them, which means you can’t reach half the people you want.

[parkingrift]

>These features you so passionately hate are an important part of the reason why the general population is using the apps, and the business model of the large majority of chat apps is definitely not ‘spyware’.

Disagree, and disagree. Access to friends and family is why people use these apps. Once these tech companies are forced to tear down those walls people will be free to use the app of their choosing to communicate with whomever they prefer. Spyware is harvesting data without the explicit consent of the user.

>What’s going to happen, if this ever goes through, is that the networks will open some kind of api so outsiders can send and be sent basic messages. And you will never be happy using it because you’ll always look like an outsider.

They'll be fined 10% of their global revenue for trying to play such an obvious and silly game.

[Jcowell]

Since we’re talking about the messaging component of services , what messaging service “[editorize] said content?

[arbitrarily deciding what is and isn’t allowed] Everything so arbitrary. Either allowing everything or nothing is not sustainable for anything on the internet so you need arbitrary rules to stop arbitrary things.

[parkingrift]

This proposal covers more than messaging. I don't know of any messaging services which editorializes content.

>Either allowing everything or nothing is not sustainable for anything on the internet so you need arbitrary rules to stop arbitrary things.

It doesn't need to be so complicated. Allow lawful content and maintain your neutral status, or only allow content you choose and become a publisher.

[drstewart]

Can you explain what TikTok does differently that makes it so open and free compared to evil US tech companies?

[parkingrift]

The only difference between TikTok and any other big tech company would be their (lack of) Congressional bribery.

[teekert]

Wow, "just force everyone". This is not freedom. I mean it doesn't feel that wrong because we ware talking about a big corporation, and sure I hate that WhatsApp replaced SMS here here claiming "privacy first, never any ads" but then gets bought by a big anti-privacy, ads-everywhere company. But still, imagine WhatsApp was written and maintained by an individual? Would we be so keen to use terms like "force"? This is all negative in the freedom dimension.

If you want a free, private, modern communication network, build it, don't steal it. In this case we are already very close to having a very nice solution in the form of Matrix. Throw some money and devs for things at Matrix/Element for issues we want to solve there. Push it as a government sanctioned solution. Offer services over Matrix, avoid WhatsApp.

[username190]

> imagine WhatsApp was written and maintained by an individual? Would we be so keen to use terms like "force"? This is all negative in the freedom dimension.

These rules only apply to platforms with a market cap of over €75 billion or European Economic Area turnover of over €7.5 billion.[0] No one is proposing that we require single developers work with Apple and Facebook to make their apps interoperable.

[0] https://www.politico.eu/article/eus-digital-markets-act-adop...

[wintermutestwin]

The more freedom monopolistic entities have the less freedom the rest of the world has because these overpowered companies have turned freedom into a zero sum game.

[tluyben2]

You are right, I fixed my words to say what I actually meant with 'everyone'; I meant (more or less - it could be a applied to a bit smaller imho; a few billion Euros seems enough to ask for some type of openness, but yeah it should not apply to small companies anyway) what the EU is planning, not actually 'everyone'.

[antris]

Limiting freedoms of megacorporations is a good thing.

[teekert]

They should be limited (blocked entirely) in their attempts to influence politics, I agree (sadly that is not the case). They should be limited in their attempts to create addictive products. Instead, we are now proposing to limit them in creating solutions according to viable business models that do no real harm.

There is no forcing necessary in other, imo preferred, scenarios. Like pushing Matrix. The solution, which uses the law to force a company will just block new attempts at creating similar but better products.

[drstewart]

Agree! But first, can you point me to e-lab.nl's open API?

[lovingCranberry]

I believe forcing to expose APIs would kill messengers which are built around a single feature (like snapchat). The idea behind snapchat is that it's hard for users to save images without notifying the opposite party. You wouldn't be able to enforce this with third party clients.

[spacexsucks]

Which is the dumbest excuse to keep walled gardens

[lovingCranberry]

John, don't call other people's opinions dumb, just because you disagree. Encourage dialogue, not hostility.

While I'm against walled gardens, I can see why these companies want to keep them closed. And if I'd work for e.g. snap, I would probably have this opinion as well.

Sawing off the branch you are sitting on is usually not a good idea.

[ubermonkey]

It seems like this is an attempt to destroy the whole idea of a curated platform, though.

iMessage's advantages are a feature of the Apple ecosystem. WANTING it to interoperate with Facebook or whatever is one thing, but legally REQUIRING it seems to me to be very, very dangerous.

[pabs3]

The banking API rule isn't that useful, you as a bank customer cannot get access to that bank's APIs, instead you have to go to another company who does have access.

[tluyben2]

Yes, like my company, who in turn make useful apps for consumers which was far harder (and more expensive) before. You had to jump through all kinds of hoops, you don't need to jump so many here in EU/UK. I did integrations in HK/AU/US and that was seriously painful without these in place. And far more expensive.

[pabs3]

No offense, but trusting third-party companies with financial data is unlikely for many people, they are probably more likely to write a scraper for their bank's horrible web interface or reverse engineer their bank's mobile app than do that.