When retaliating against Trump, I hope the EU targets digital services.
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@randahl
The best retaliation would be to *allow* competition from local companies, namely by scrapping the anti-circumvention provisions of our copyright law. It is an indiscriminate law forbidding infinite number of (otherwise) perfectly legal activities with one’s device that should have never been mandated in the first place. It allows many abuses like monopoly on app distribution, bricking of medical ventilators etc.:https://pluralistic.net/2026/01/01/39c3/#the-new-coalition #EndAnticircumvention #RepealArticle6 #BigTech
@om @randahl That's valid, too, but it's not an instant solution. (EU corps can't just throw a switch and offer a no-DRM-on-this-tractor-engine product: there are massive startup/R&D costs). Whereas tariffs on use of US big tech *is* a fast smackdown (although there's a secondary chilling effect on the EU companies paying for them).
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When retaliating against Trump, I hope the EU targets digital services.
Tariffs on Amazon and Facebook incentivises a digital decoupling from the the US, it shows Trump's oligarchs, that supporting Trump is the road to ruin, while NOT preventing the poor from putting food on the table.
Hit those Zuckerbergs.
Also: A really good time to enact the Tobin-Tax.
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@pluralistic has a bunch of suggestions about removing all of the laws protecting devices from being jail broken that the US has bullied pretty much every country into adding to their books as a start
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When retaliating against Trump, I hope the EU targets digital services.
Tariffs on Amazon and Facebook incentivises a digital decoupling from the the US, it shows Trump's oligarchs, that supporting Trump is the road to ruin, while NOT preventing the poor from putting food on the table.
Hit those Zuckerbergs.
@randahl massive financial and visibility support to free and open source European alternatives would be just enough
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Also: A really good time to enact the Tobin-Tax.
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When retaliating against Trump, I hope the EU targets digital services.
Tariffs on Amazon and Facebook incentivises a digital decoupling from the the US, it shows Trump's oligarchs, that supporting Trump is the road to ruin, while NOT preventing the poor from putting food on the table.
Hit those Zuckerbergs.
@randahl They made a pilot, but neither could someone make an Excel sheet on the effects, nor could someone present the results with Powerpoint. So nobody knows what they found.
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When retaliating against Trump, I hope the EU targets digital services.
Tariffs on Amazon and Facebook incentivises a digital decoupling from the the US, it shows Trump's oligarchs, that supporting Trump is the road to ruin, while NOT preventing the poor from putting food on the table.
Hit those Zuckerbergs.
Europe should look to our niece (the USA) for the solution and treat American digital services in the same way that America treated TikTok.
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When retaliating against Trump, I hope the EU targets digital services.
Tariffs on Amazon and Facebook incentivises a digital decoupling from the the US, it shows Trump's oligarchs, that supporting Trump is the road to ruin, while NOT preventing the poor from putting food on the table.
Hit those Zuckerbergs.
@randahl
Also, I recommend Cory Doctorow's suggestion to revoke anti-circumvention laws and encourage reverse engineering of digital products. Hits the tech titans in the monopoly, where it will hurt most, and offers economic benefits. -
When retaliating against Trump, I hope the EU targets digital services.
Tariffs on Amazon and Facebook incentivises a digital decoupling from the the US, it shows Trump's oligarchs, that supporting Trump is the road to ruin, while NOT preventing the poor from putting food on the table.
Hit those Zuckerbergs.
REPEAL ANTI-CIRCUMVENTION LAWS
". . . if someone threatens to burn your house down unless you follow orders, and then they burn it down anyway, you really don't have to keep following their orders."
( Cory Doctorow )
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Europe should look to our niece (the USA) for the solution and treat American digital services in the same way that America treated TikTok.
@ReggieHere @randahl what happened with tiktok in the USA was that Trump started to criticize it, then Biden started legislation against it because he did whatever Trump wanted. Trump used this as an example of how Biden was out of touch and aping him, and then by the time the legislation passed, Trump was in power again and used “bringing back Tiktok” as some propaganda victory. I don’t know why you would want to emulate anything about this but go for it.
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@ReggieHere @randahl what happened with tiktok in the USA was that Trump started to criticize it, then Biden started legislation against it because he did whatever Trump wanted. Trump used this as an example of how Biden was out of touch and aping him, and then by the time the legislation passed, Trump was in power again and used “bringing back Tiktok” as some propaganda victory. I don’t know why you would want to emulate anything about this but go for it.
The ban on TikTok is still ongoing and due to be completed by Jan 23rd 2026.
TikTok is still operational in the United States because it is due to be divested from ByteDance into U.S. control under the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act (2024).
Since all US social media companies are tools for foreign influence and propaganda, the exact same security concerns apply in Europe.
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When retaliating against Trump, I hope the EU targets digital services.
Tariffs on Amazon and Facebook incentivises a digital decoupling from the the US, it shows Trump's oligarchs, that supporting Trump is the road to ruin, while NOT preventing the poor from putting food on the table.
Hit those Zuckerbergs.
@randahl @masek absolutely, but right now we're just totally fucked in terms of reliance on AWS and Azure, essentially nothing in Europe will work if cloud access is disrupted. So digital services has an escalation ladder that is especially dangerous to Europe. I hope that changes soon, but it won't change soon enough
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When retaliating against Trump, I hope the EU targets digital services.
Tariffs on Amazon and Facebook incentivises a digital decoupling from the the US, it shows Trump's oligarchs, that supporting Trump is the road to ruin, while NOT preventing the poor from putting food on the table.
Hit those Zuckerbergs.
@randahl
Also ESPECIALLY Franchises and physical services such as fastfood, coffee, delivery, rentals, ride hail, Hilton etc. These are parasites. They underpay, use fake royalties and other schemes to export profits without or little tax. They often require a local to rent the premises and put up capital.Actually BAN the stupid parasites.
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The ban on TikTok is still ongoing and due to be completed by Jan 23rd 2026.
TikTok is still operational in the United States because it is due to be divested from ByteDance into U.S. control under the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act (2024).
Since all US social media companies are tools for foreign influence and propaganda, the exact same security concerns apply in Europe.
For context, Facebook and Cambridge Analytica have already been accused of micro-targeting UK Facebook users ahead of the 2016 Brexit referendum, and more recently Xitter has been accused of amplifying far-right posts in Europe.
Little Tommeh fascist-Christian is just one of the far-right figures who are getting very agitated about the possibility of a crackdown on US social media.
https://www.aljazeera.com/video/pinch-point/2025/12/17/aje-onl-pp-the-great-replacement-v2-161225
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When retaliating against Trump, I hope the EU targets digital services.
Tariffs on Amazon and Facebook incentivises a digital decoupling from the the US, it shows Trump's oligarchs, that supporting Trump is the road to ruin, while NOT preventing the poor from putting food on the table.
Hit those Zuckerbergs.
@randahl The only retaliation that would hurt is to tax profit and dividends transfered abroad. Tax on revenue or imports are forwarded to consumers that need the services.
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When retaliating against Trump, I hope the EU targets digital services.
Tariffs on Amazon and Facebook incentivises a digital decoupling from the the US, it shows Trump's oligarchs, that supporting Trump is the road to ruin, while NOT preventing the poor from putting food on the table.
Hit those Zuckerbergs.
@randahl Before you think about that, think about DNS.
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When retaliating against Trump, I hope the EU targets digital services.
Tariffs on Amazon and Facebook incentivises a digital decoupling from the the US, it shows Trump's oligarchs, that supporting Trump is the road to ruin, while NOT preventing the poor from putting food on the table.
Hit those Zuckerbergs.
@randahl Hit those Zuckerbergs... i love it!
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@om @randahl That's valid, too, but it's not an instant solution. (EU corps can't just throw a switch and offer a no-DRM-on-this-tractor-engine product: there are massive startup/R&D costs). Whereas tariffs on use of US big tech *is* a fast smackdown (although there's a secondary chilling effect on the EU companies paying for them).
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@randahl and clouds! Besos' dream is to have no more personal computers in households but instead everything in his clouds.
Imagine this horror & terror coming true.
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When retaliating against Trump, I hope the EU targets digital services.
Tariffs on Amazon and Facebook incentivises a digital decoupling from the the US, it shows Trump's oligarchs, that supporting Trump is the road to ruin, while NOT preventing the poor from putting food on the table.
Hit those Zuckerbergs.
@randahl Absolutely! Target the income and the monopolies of the American oligarchs (FB, Amazon, Google, Microsoft, Apple etc).
If they stop handing billions of $ to the corrupt trump regime, then there is a chance the regime will fall, and democracy may return.
