Comment by draw_down
5 years ago
Jeez, what a mess. To extend the McDonald’s analogy, when McDonald’s is serving its American customers, it doesn’t heed European laws about beef and potatoes. Because those laws are irrelevant to them, they have no bearing on McDonald’s making money (again in the context of serving their American customers). McDonald’s is never going to check what Brussels says about dairy before they make a milkshake in Spokane. Sorry.
My friend, that couple of sentences you’re so wound up about means more or less exactly what you’ve said at the end. Businesses aren’t in the business of giving a shit about things that don’t affect their business. You’re upset that they don’t word it more bluntly? Really?
Actions have consequences is my response. Sorry you all didn’t get the consequences you wanted. But it’s very frustrating the childish way people on HN approach these issues. Zero material analysis or thinking, always pointedly naive idealism of this type: “well you SAID you care about Europeans”- come on.
I’m begging you all to take the next step and think through the actual forces at play, instead of banging on with the churlishness.
The way this works is very simple- law is introduced, business figures out the easiest way to deal with it and get back to what they were doing, rinse and repeat.
Maybe the European search engines do a better job at this. You could give them a try.
You missed the McDonald's analogy. A burger in every shop in the U.S. will taste the same as any other. It follows the rules of the franchise, just as every site I linked is a cookie cutter website for local news. Each "local" site has nearly the same functionality, look, backend... because they are from the same supplier. It's news franchises serving your local paper and TV station, and it has been for a while.
Certainly, this media conglomerate does not need to care about European visitors, but to claim they do on the "Access Denied" page is quite hypocritical.
I hadn't even mentioned the detail, "while we work to ensure..." This would imply they've been doing anything at all for the past three years.
Also, I'm 15 miles away from a Google office, so I guess I've been using a European search engine all along!
This:
> McDonald’s is never going to check what Brussels says about dairy before they make a milkshake in Spokane. Sorry.
conflicts with this:
> law is introduced, business figures out the easiest way to deal with it and get back to what they were doing, rinse and repeat.
So which is it? If they care about Brussels, then they are willing to go the extra mile. If they don't care, why put up the block anyways?
Amen. If a court in the EU fines the Bozeman Daily Chronicle, what is stopping the Chronicle from replying, "lol ok." and continuing to not care?
I think this works if you are small. If you are large, you might have a branch or subsidiary in EEA which may get fined or whose assets might get frozen.
Most companies (and most individuals, I'd say) want to do what's necessary to not be bothered. It's doubtful these organizations have any great fear of EU regulatory bodies, but if showing a warning (that the user can subsequently bypass) shows they made an effort and staves off 90% of complaints, it'll be worth it.
These companies are blocking EU (and presumably UK) viewers completely. An example: https://imgur.com/a/RSYXA0V
> Our European visitors are important to us.
> This site is currently unavailable to visitors from the European Economic Area while we work to ensure your data is protected in accordance with applicable EU laws.
But US meat is not allowed in Europe because of hormones.
So they have to adjust their EU meat supplier for servings in Europe though.
Someone located in Brussels does not buy a cheeseburger from a McDonalds in Spokane.
Someone located in Brussels might easily end up on the website of a Spokane newspaper.
A newspaper in Spokane is also not going to be covered by GDPR unless that actively target people in the EU. If a few people in the EU happen to wander over to your website, that's not enough to make you subject to GDPR.
I don't understand completely why you're being downvoted. I'm european, in favour of GDPR, and I think this is a valid way of doing it. These reactions confuse me the same as using incognito or adblockers to pass paywalls and such - if that's their business model and their choice, I'm going to say no, and won't even be interested.
> I don't understand completely why you're being downvoted.
Because it's irrelevant, wrong and passive-aggressive belligerent: "Sorry you all didn’t get the consequences you wanted... childish ... Zero thinking ... churlishness".