[teekert]

This annoys me. Rather than robbing Moxie of his vision and forcing Meta to break their business model, why do governments not just lead by example?

Start using Matrix, we all know that the signup process could be easier (among many other things), throw some money and devs at the project with that specific goal. Start offering services over Matrix. Public money, public code. The whole world benefits.

[lhopki01]

I'm pretty sure Signal wouldn't be subject to this. I think it's only for companies over 75 billion euro[1] market capitalization.

[1] https://www.theverge.com/2022/3/24/22994234/eu-antitrust-leg...

[pabs3]

They are already using Matrix somewhat, for example the French:

https://matrix.org/blog/2018/04/26/matrix-and-riot-confirmed...

[V1ndaar]

While I agree leading by example and using Matrix would be great, it is orthogonal to the proposed law.

More importantly, who cares about Moxie's (imo crappy) vision? If this were to force him to rethink his stance, that's a plus in my book.

[teekert]

Do you realize what you are saying? Would you feel the same when someone with the opinion that your vision is crappy, was to force you to rethink your stance on anything? Let alone on something your put insane amounts of time into?

I realize now that Signal will not be affected, only very large companies will. Nevertheless I find your attitude very concerning.

[stingraycharles]

Why would requiring interoperability rob Moxie of his vision?

[teekert]

He indicated multiple times that he does not want other (third party) clients, does not want the server to be open and federated. Let him have it, it works for many people.

Imagine you were him and you are getting issues filed from people using services the government forced you to build, or were even build by others but forced on your once clean solution. I'd say "screw you guys, I'm going home" (Build your own solution). And I'd agree with him. Where would it end?

[stingraycharles]

The same can be said about WhatsApp et al. I’m going to bet that Meta also indicated they don’t want other third party clients.

From my point of view, the advantages of opening up these platforms outweigh the disadvantages for those who don’t like that.

The whole idea of this type of regulation is that it tries to do what’s best for the consumer, and the market as a whole, not not necessarily for the businesses behind it.

[teekert]

And then we keep Moxie as a slave forcing him to get motivated to implement all this? Or will the government cease control of the code? Stop Moxie from Forking, then tell people to stay on the government branch?

And the arguments hold for Meta too if you ask me. WhatsApp is not a public service. It was not build (or in this case bought later on) with our interests at the top of the priority list. If we want public services with the public's interest at heart, we have to build those services, or sponsor those. Not take them from companies. In this case we already have a nice solution in the from of Matrix.

What are you suggesting?

[vhanda]

No one is forcing anyone to do anything.

Countries (and citizens by proxy) have a right to decide how they want services to function in their respective countries. Any company can choose to follow those regulations or voluntarily stop services within that country.

The great part about the EU is that it's a big enough market for companies to want to target it. One doesn't object about food health standards or what standards electronics parts are required to follow, it's the same for internet services.

[stale2002]

They don't have to be forced to do anything.

If these companies do not want to follow these laws, then they are within their right to not operate in the EU.

[teekert]

This proposes a very strict link between what is good for a society and the law. We should continue to debate decisions like this because what is good for society is very difficult to prove but the law has real repercussions, right now.

[Someone]

these rules will only apply to platforms with a market cap of over €75 billion or European Economic Area turnover of over €7.5 billion (https://www.politico.eu/article/eus-digital-markets-act-adop...)

I don’t think he has he ambition to even get half-way there, and if he ever gets there, I expect he’ll be able to pay others to worry about that.

[bluedays]

More importantly who is Moxie?

[teekert]

Yeah, that could have used a citation indeed. I use Moxie [0] because he is a face to a popular messaging app (Signal [1]), and I think it is important to realize he is the brain behind this wonderful creation.

Try putting yourself in his shoes as the government contemplates publicly about how they are going to force some changes to the project you build based on your very private vision of privacy and subsequently made available for free to millions, based on your hard work.

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moxie_Marlinspike

[1]: https://www.signal.org/

[Strom]

Moxie Marlinspike is the creator of Signal, a popular secure messaging app.

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