I desperately desperately desperately want to read a headline that says "Ukraine signs rare mineral agreement with the European Union. Ukraine becomes a member of the EU and the EU gets large resources of rare minerals to supercharge their own homegrown tech industry and divest it from the United States of Trump"
this post was submitted on 24 Feb 2025
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Switch to open source everywhere, especially in government systems
Drop Microsoft, block meta, Google, and just get rid of Amazon
It would probably take decades to unplug older systems but with a gradual approach we could probably get rid of most of it quite fast.
I wonder how much public money is wasted in Microsoft crapware, but if any of it would be redirected to open source fundings (which is actual common good) it may be a huge deal.
Much of the software, especially stuff that the likes of Microsoft provide, already exists, and is already in use. In fact plenty of local administrations have been railing against the EU commission and their insistence on .docx and stuff.
OTOH it's not trivial to implement, not in the software sense but the institutional one: It doesn't matter that software that can map complex administrative workflows already exists, you still have to take that stuff and build whatever workflow some agency uses into it.
You also don't need your own servers, there's public law hosting providers around. E.g. northern German states founded dataport, if you're a municipality there it's a no-brainer to get your software and your cloud, consulting, everything, from them. It's going to be better than anything you could come up with because you're not the first municipality to contract with them.
I'm in Australia and I would like to say something about that. Come at us you stupid fascist cunt.
As an American, I support this statement.
American here.
They're like any other bully.
Break their nose.
I think the world would be a better place if we collectively perma-banned all American digital services (while helping NGOs/open source projects relocate their infrastructure and legal organisations out of the US).
There would be a lot more competition, a wider variety of product offerings, more regional customisation, a bigger focus on long tail services.
It would be messy at first, but that's the nature of a transition from an oligarch model to a competitive model.
While what I am saying may sound like a pipe dream or pettyness, but from my perspective everything starts from a small step.
And if you don't live in the US (but are unfortunately impacted by their internal politics), you do have to take a more sober attitude towards their claimed commitment to democracy, free markets and rule of law.
Yes, in the new "might is right" world Trump is pushing for, it's better to start pushing back or get pushed over. In his "make a deal" world view, better to say to ban everything outright in two weeks. In his typical fashion, some compromises might appears the next day. Losing a few hundred million customers and large amounts of influence will sting him and his supporters.
I would argue the goal should be actually permanently getting rid of American technology services as opposed to getting a deal.
By this point American business leaders (not only in tech) have decisively proven that they are not any better than say russian oligarchs; a group of corrupt criminals who will happily support authoritarianism as long as they get to keep their businesses interests.
Plus allowing another countries tech to be embedded into government and services, military, and any other critical operations is an omnipresent national security risk. Doesn't matter if they're an ally.
Democracies should be run on 100% open source. The developed world could collectively employ less engineers than big tech and I am certain they could produce a better ecosystem of services, both through contributions to existing projects as well as greenfield, that would also provide wide reaching benefits to every other economy... and they could do it cheaper than big tech. It's easy to beat private companies that must enshittify to achieve constant profit growth.
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Thanks Mr Trump - this really helps us sell our non-US technology to the Europeans. Keep on making stuff great again 🤘
Part of the reason why I’ve recommended US based services to my Canadian clients was because of its speed due to proximity. Now that net neutrality has been gutted and ISPs are free to artificially slow down their services a la carte, the speed advantage is questionable. Now I recommend services in Canada where I find them and European alternatives when no closer ones are available.
I don't pick based on country of origin, I pick based on privacy and other features. Unfortunately, that seems to knock out most US based services, which is sad because I'm American.
It's almost like Trump when to a seminar on the incredible healing power of tariffs, and believed every word he heard.
The seminar name Tariff-ic.
“It’s time to be tough on Big Tech! And by tough, I mean I’m going to give Bezos, Musk, Zuckerberg and all the rest the most vigorous blowjobs they have ever felt!” -Dumpy Trumpy
Strange, Big Tech has no inherit right to operate in foreign markets. If they want to be in those markets, they need to pay their fair share. I would be glad to see them pull out of those markets, but that won’t easily happen.
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I am so sick of all this shit. It’s only been like a month.
That’s exactly how I felt when Bolsonaro was in power in Brazil. He at least became ineligible for being responsible for our equivalent of the capitol invasion in Brasília, and is possibly going to jail.
It still baffles me that the US is supposed to be a country where laws work more strictly, and yet everything Trump did in his previous term—from obstruction of justice to inciting the January 6th Capitol riot—seems to have been met with limited accountability. How can a nation uphold its democratic principles if the mechanisms designed to check power are perceived as being selectively applied?
where laws work more strictly
That's never been the case. If anything we've been a major source of corruption on the world and particularly for South America for the last 150-200 years. Shit you could easily frame the Cuban revolution and the reaction to American corrupt interests and draw a straight line from drug cartels and bribing coups as well.
Answer: it can’t!
The main difference is that the Brazilian Supreme Court judges have a spine, while American SC judges have an RV.
I mean, technically, we have a federal republic.
While there is supposed to be a division of powers, because it was combined with the first past the post system, it becomes a split political mess, because the combinatorics virtually guaranteed this outcome at some point.
Additionally, instead of a parliamentary republic, just like Brazil, we have the presidential system, which leads to the same problems you guys got with Bolsanaro. Quite literally everything you hear in the media and by our government regarding democracy is and has been propaganda. States have some democratic processes, but for the large part that's not even true.
The founding fathers were of course aware of all this. They just figured it was useful while separating from Britain and establishing the country, and over time it would better itself because enlightened individuals would remain in power dedicated towards "the more perfect Republic."
Obviously that didn't happen and here we are.
Dude I'm with you. I want off this fucking ride.
Let's just start accepting the tarrifs and keep doing what we have been doing
The sooner you isolate us economically, the sooner it will better for all of us.
One problem is stuff we don't have. Like computer, phone, networking devices. All this is made elsewhere.
Didn’t Trump just told everyone where to retaliate against his tariff for maximum pain in the US and on his priorities?
Those digital service taxes need to grow way higher!
you mean musk
Lol, Trump is a clown. If netflix or other big tech is charging me for using their service in my country, and they have legal presence and activity in my country, they should be charged taxes in my country because they are generating econimic activity.
He's like that over confident political blowhard on the internet who picked up on one term used in policy at some point and tried to wedge it in as the appropriate answer to everything.
Sort of except the fact that he wants to be a dictator. Tariffs require no approval from Congress and it's the only peaceful offensive weapon he has at his disposal.
He knows better (at least let's hope he does) than to send troops anywhere for 90 days.
"failed foreign economies"
Lol. Lmao, even.
Absolute clown.
Us Europe trade war in 5...
The EU established an ACI (Anti-cooersion instrument) in 2023 that would be devastating to US interests.
Included in their response would be the suspension of all US intellectual property rights in Europe.
I'm not sure what the goal is here, but it doesn't sound well thought out
Well has anything trump has said sounded well thought out. He's like the villain from Meet the Robinsons
Wonder what the correct answer is... should everybody in the world put even higher taxes on big tech now, or better taxes + tariffs?
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Trump doesn't get Taxes doesn't he
Why would he? He doesn’t pay them.
Who knew that Trump was so into Hawaiian solidarity. Gonna make the whole nation into an expensive island.
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Hahahahahahahahaha.
No wait, sorry.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
He didn’t say anything about regulating them.
Tax revenue is small fry compared to the harm they can (and do?) cause.
Trump can tariff his asshole while he goes and fucks himself!
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