> This is a kind of strange take. Do you think conference topics are mutually exclusive?

To some extent they are, yes.

First, it's about what people spend their time and focus on. If you're focussing on regulating, there's less time you can spend on innovating.

Then, some of that regulation actually precludes innovation in certain areas. So, by establishing the premise that regulation is justified by organising a conference on it, you're delegitimising discussion on the kind of innovation that regulation attempts to prevent.

> You're not really providing any concrete examples of GDPR failing, so there's not much there to respond to.

GDPR was - allegedly - targeted at the likes of Facebook or TikTok, which to my knowledge do very little to implement GDPR in a way that's conducive to user privacy.

At the same time, everyone running a tiny website has to put in enormous effort to implement that regulation, because otherwise authorities might come for them through ruinous fines.

Yes, this does happen, particularly because in some EU countries (Germany being the worst offender) it's so easy to impose fines on small businesses at scale, this literally has become a business model for authorities and law firms.