this post was submitted on 17 Jul 2023
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[–] Gustephan 26 points 1 year ago (1 children)

100k/day (36.5 million anually) is ~0.03% of Meta's 2022 profits (121 billion). That's not a fine, it's barely even a tax. If you make 50k/year profit and the government gave you a similar fine, they'd be taking $15 from you. That sounds more like bribe money for Norwegian politicians than a good faith attempt to protect their citizens.

[–] mob 11 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I have a hard time believe they profited 121 billion dollars, when their 2022 gross revenue was 116 billion

I'm sure it's still a ridiculous amount of profit but that number seemed way to big at first glance so I had to check

[–] Gustephan 14 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I admittedly didn't look too hard for that 121bil figure, your source seems much better than the "Google it and grab the first number I see" approach I used. I see 91.36B gross profit for 2022 in your source. That makes the 36,500,000 fine ~0.04% of their profits instead or the 0.03% I got at first, equivalent to a $20 fine on 50k profit. I think the rest of what I said is still valid with the new numbers. Thanks for keeping me honest!

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

You confused revenue and profit. You must subtract expenses to calculate the profit. For example, if you buy something for $20 and sell it for $21, your revenue is $21, but your profit is only $1.

Facebook reported a profit of $39 billion in 2021 and $23 billion in 2022. This takes their expenses (salaries, offices, data centres, etc.) into account.