[MR4D]

The money doesn’t matter.

The goals don’t matter.

The people don’t matter.

The only thing that matters is how much regulatory red tape is involved.

My guess is that the paperwork will kill this. Read the announcement. Too much discussion about regulatory framework. In the US or China, all you need is some money and smart people. That’s a very low barrier to getting moving forward.

[askonomm]

In other words, to be successful you need to be able to break the law and lobby the government? That is indeed the USA mindset, or should I say United Corporations of America? I'm happy EU is not USA.

[MR4D]

That’s absolutely asinine and not at all what I said.

The EU over regulates things like tech and that why they won’t be successful at have an AI tech scene. Over time, anyone good will migrate to the US or China where they can work faster and not have as many rules to deal with.

A simple example is hiring and firing people - it’s much easier to make personnel changes in the US than Europe. As a result, US companies can take more risks.

[askonomm]

Yes, US has at-will firing, and healthcare tied to the employer, and so forth. Basically the US has made sure that the corporations have all the power, and the people have none of it. Does this make it easier to make companies? Well of course it does, just like slave trade made it easier to collect crops.

Unlike the US however, we in EU really like having basic human rights - such as mandatory minimum vacation time, healthcare that won't immediately disappear if you lose your job, or depend on the job, as well as not getting fired without cause, and without multiple warnings beforehand.

If the result of this means that we won't be successful in the AI tech scene, or that all the Musk-like slave owners migrate to US or China where they can abuse people however much they like, I'm pretty sure Europeans are not going to shed a tear over that.

I realize more and more that the main difference between Americans and Europeans is that Americans think from the perspective of a corporation, whereas Europeans think from the perspective of themselves, as human beings. We're not compatible, clearly, so there's no need to force us to be the same.

[MR4D]

I disagree with "basic human rights". They aren't. And the reason they aren't is because one person's mandatory minimum vacation time is another person's liability.

Yeah, it's great for the employee - I totally agree. But if you run a startup, that's a huge cost.

So yes, we disagree on approaches, and that's fine. Not everyone needs to be like us, and if you reread my original comment, I never said they did. [0]

[0] - "My guess is that the paperwork will kill this."

------ side note:

I'm American. I spent 2 weeks in Europe last summer for vacation. I loved it. Food was great, Formula 1 was great. Overall a fantastic time.

But if I'm going to run a startup, I would never do it in Europe. An organic foods company - sure - that would be a great place to do it.

[dgroshev]

From experience, regulation as an explanation for EU startup competitiveness is overused so much it's almost meaningless. Can you point out specific laws that you consider existential for startups?

What I find matters way, way more is two factors:

- Concentration of capital. The US has an ecosystem of wealthy people that want to put their money somewhere. This is good for startups, but can also backfire as we can see in the news.

- Unified market. EU is not a single market, it's several dozen markets with different regulations, different languages, and different cultures. You can't sell the same B2C product with the same marketing in Germany, Spain, and Sweden as easily as you can in California, Ohio, and Texas.

[MR4D]

Adding another point from Paul Graham [0] & [1]

[0] - https://x.com/paulg/status/1887186094120137042?s=46&t=mXA1Wm...

[1] - https://x.com/paulg/status/1887249759557009903?s=46&t=mXA1Wm...

[MR4D]

First, your last point answers your first question: a non-unified market is an implicit result of too many regulations. Harmonizing them would create a more unified market. The US is efficient because it is more homogenous. That efficiency is one of the things that leads to capital formation.

So, I think you have causation backwards. Capital formation doesn't really happen because it's too difficult to build and grow things in Europe.

Look at tech in Silicon Valley - all that capital formation is years worth of growth and reinvestment.

Look at oil & gas Texas - again, all that capital comes from years of growth and reinvestment.

And what you learn in silicon valley you can generally apply to starting a company in Austin Texas. What would happen if Mercedes wanted to move it's company (HQ and all) to Spain? How much would it have to relearn from a regulatory perspective?

[jpdus]

I agree that the announcement should´ve talked more about goals and performance than regulatory stuff ;-).

But I think there is a new understanding among the bureaucracy that regulation (alone, without innovation) will kill Europe´s competitiveness and that some acceleration and cutting of red tape is necessary.

Can't say with certainty that this will be successful. But that we, as a very young startup that is barely known outside of our AI Open Source niche, are part of this, is already a sign in itself - a year ago I´d have never believed that this might be an option (and also probably would've declined if someone asked us to join a EU-funded project).

We will have engineers without a degree (but hundreds of thousands of HF downloads) working side-by-side with some of the top researchers + HPC centers.

[MR4D]

I wish the effort well. Any change is welcome.

[permanent]

> China, all you need is some money and smart people

No way