Buy European: EU Commissions New Apply AI Strategy Launched
euractiv.com
euractiv.com
Ironically there are no current exit strategies for our public sector mobile apps which rely solely on Google play or the Apple store. I've written a plan for how we can move our resources from Azure to Hetzner, luckily I'm not involved with how we would move any 365 products so it was not too bad. Only the plan involves me using our digital national ID app on my phone, which would not work if I wasn't running android with Google Play (or apple). I mean, in the extreme it wouldn't be impossible to use my passport in person, but still.
Its not just consumers. A lot of the private sector also relies on mobile apps. Even more of it relies on American desktop OSes. There are lots of other online services - email, storage. Lots of non-IT services such as payments (SWIFT, Visa, Mastercard).
How much good will you moving from Azure to Hertzner do if lots of other businesses are down, lots of payments are not working, and a lot of government stiff is not working. Maybe you can keep a few things going because they have energy (and it is important to keep supplies going if everything else fails), but that is about it.
Whenever I think about these things I just don’t see us Europeans being able to tackle suddenly having to decouple from the US if Trump or a successor suddenly turns the screws to 11.
Basically energy production would have few isses with a disconnect from the US, regardless of where we'd have to go. But the business would struggle.
Just take the issue of a european chip industry. Or literally anything China is doing now. The EU just isn't really a driver - it is a maintainer at best. And that also means it will successfully lose out to e. g. China or the USA.
Isn't that an example of driving towards intrinsic perfection?
All the engineering part of that technology is in European hands, the royalties to EUV LLC are based on mutually beneficial arrangements, if it's weaponised all gloves are off.
Today's restrictions are mainly export control licenses, not ongoing IP licenses.
ASML builds the whole scanner and owns the integration IP that makes the parts actually produce yield at scale. The light source matters but without ASML's stages, metrology, optics integration, contamination control, control software etc etc you've got a science project instead of a tool a fab can run. ASML won because the integration problem beat almost everyone else.
It's similar to TSMC, anyone can buy an ASML machine, but there is only one TSMC, because it's not just about the machine and not just about the light source.
There is literally a term for when EU mandates result in global change, "the Brussels effect".
Also, it's a bit weird to claim the EU never tries to push for perfection and just copies - this is the organisation that brought us USB C as the one and only standard for everything, the right to be forgotten and the right to digital privacy, competition on railway networks EU-wide, the OpenSkies, and is actively trying to prevent excessive concentration of market forces (unlike pretty much any other regulator).
Not the same as inventing USB, and I am far from sure its a good thing.
> he right to be forgotten and the right to digital privacy
Right to privacy in various forms far predates the EU.
> competition on railway networks EU-wide
A copy of a policy of a country that has left the EU, and is far from popular there, and looks like being reversed there.
> actively trying to prevent excessive concentration of market forces (unlike pretty much any other regulator).
The US was very good at that historically, and there are plenty of regulators around the world with the same concerns.
Why? It's good for consumers (more practical) and the planet (less ewaste).
> Right to privacy in various forms far predates the EU.
Online? As a concept yes, but as a legal framework, not really.
> A copy of a policy of a country that has left the EU, and is far from popular there, and looks like being reversed there.
The UK system isn't actual competition though. There are concession that get local monopolies. So for the vast majority of trips, there is one private company that operates these trains on that route. It's the worst of all worlds. In the EU, anyone can start operating on any route.
> The US was very good at that historically, and there are plenty of regulators around the world with the same concerns.
And which one has done anything? The only recent one I recall is the UK's blocking Faceboo's acquisition of Giphy.
You might not be aware of the many USB standards: A, B, C, 1.1, 2, 3, 3.1, 3.2 - each with own devices and sometimes cables
They don't make a framework for XYZ to emerge based on market forces. It's always committee driven 'we will support this initiative so XYZ happens' top-down initiatives.
Those are necessary in some sectors, but it is applied everywhere. With multinational participation in committee and a lot of back and forth dance.
It's better than blind trendchasing or completely unregulated market forces doing their job, but the delay overhead is gigantic.
> All of this AI acceleration will be monitored by an “AI Observatory” and discussed in an “Apply AI Alliance” – a refashioning of the existing AI Alliance, a stakeholder talking shop.
It reminds me of how here in Spain the Government already created the Agencia Española de Supervisión de la Inteligencia Artificial (Spanish AI Supervision Agency) when we barely have an AI industry to supervise. It creates some more cushy jobs for them to hand out though.
The problem is that you cannot pivot easily, you cannot change a lot of things in it - and even things like your potential hire bailing last minute can be devastating, paperwork wise.
Over 50% of those "living off the government" are pensioners, so mostly coming from a pool of people who already worked (and most of them in the private sector), and paid their share in taxes. In spain, the private sector makes 70% of the active workforce, while the public sector around 13%, self employed 13%, and unemployed 10%.
I know Spain (and Europe) have quite a lot of structural problems, but I fail to see how having so many pensioners has anything to do with AI regulations.
Its even worse in the UK where we have a special additional income tax (NI) on earned income (things like investment income are exempt), that is higher on people with low to moderate incomes, that is primarily used to pay (current) pensions (a little bit is set aside for future pensions, but there is only enough set aside for less an an year of payments).
The important part is how large fraction of the population work, not where the money for the remaining fraction comes from. Money is only a representation of value, value created by the working fraction.
Setting aside money, and where you put it, makes a big difference. It might be in a sovereign wealth fund, or used to finance govt debt (as in the small fund that exists in the UK) or invested in shares by a private pension fund, or be a liability of a past employer. In some of those cases value might be generated in another country.
You are right in principle but there are big practical differences too.
I suspect many of them are just ignoring their obligations with respect to data transfers (they also fail to understand the meaning of "Freely Given Consent" or "Legitimate Interest"), and utterly pathetic and useless institutions like the Irish Data Protection Commission (https://www.dataprotection.ie/en) just... let them.
I recall bunch of those also having a FOMO for NFTs and having NFT events in the commission premises.
Probably its O.K. as long as they don't spend consequential money on this stuff. They should just watch the US more closely, keep announcing 600B Euros investment every few weeks and do nothing about it. Make VW invest 5B Euros for AI self driving in Mistral then Mistral buying shares from VW with that money, do some questionable self driving demos etc.
Eurocrats are clueless, they are trying to have something that very small number of people show interest in. What they should really do, IMHO, is to reduce friction induced by bureaucracy and that's it. Contrary to the popular narrative EU is a force for reducing bureaucracy, as the Brits found out when left EU. The idea is that EU coordinates the 27 states to create ruleset that are more or less aligned so there's not too much paperwork when trading between those 27 countries. Unfortunately this is still not good enough and they are working to create the 28th regime which is supposed to be something like streamlined ruleset that bypasses the local ones so that companies can grow in a market of 27 countries without dealing with 27 set of laws. That's when EU can have an actual AI thing because the current state of AI is just bunch of capitalists juggling money and credit among themselves to keep alive this interesting technology that looks promising but doesn't actually accomplish something yet. If EU will have anything of this sort they need a place to hold these capital gymnastics.
This particular "Apply AI" strategy seems to stem from the idea that AI does some great things and EU industry should adopt it to increase productivity and not fall behind. Pure FOMO, considering that studies show very limited gains through use of AI so far.
Stop hurting yourself by thinking like this. They are extremely smart and capable, only not working in your favour.
Computers: China, Taiwan Food: splitted between EU 60% China 30% and US 10% (personal experience, YMMV). Clothes: 95% S-E Asia, including China Tools: Eastern EU Energy: US, Russia
/s
Europe is like some rich kid who thinks he somehow has merit of his own, instead of just being well-off because his parents were well-off. Basically Europe is the Greta Thunberg of continents.
If nothing else, Airbus says hello and laughs in your face. Throw in Spotify and IKEA, the majority of the world's luxury sector, a decent portion of the world's biggest car manufacturers, ASML, and you're just being silly.
But I guess if I were a rich person who mostly bought luxury goods, they would come from France. I guess I'm the problem. If only my tax money stayed with me instead of being funnelled to useless aristocrats, then maybe I could afford more luxury goods from France.
At the same time there are plenty of everyday items still made in the EU, and not necessarily luxury goods. My pets' leashes are made in Germany, my kitchen knives are made in Germany, my pots and pans are made in Sweden, Denmark, and Germany. My drinking glasses are made in France, and Italy, my glass storage containers are made in France; lots of my clothing are made in Portugal, my music gear is made in Germany, Spain, Estonia, and Poland.
It's up to you to choose items made in the EU and not China though.
Even with consumer items the keyboard I am typing this on says "made in the Czech Republic" on the bottom. I definitely have lots of things made in Germany, Taiwan, France, the US, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Vietnam etc.
People in the UK keep saying "we do not make anything anymore" but in fact lots of things, cars (often foreign brands, but still made here) and car parts, medicines, chemical, medical equipment, jet engines, satellites..... those are just off the top of my head.
For non-consumer items there's a whole laundry list of high-tech stuff where Europe has a big presence: high-end chemical reactors, high-precision machinery, chip manufacturing machines (not only ASML but also probe cards, vacuum valves/pumps), off-shore wind turbines (including HV submarine lines for transmission), aseptic packaging for food (Tetra Pak, SIG), and lots more.
People only look at the brands they recognise without understanding there's a whole lots of standing-on-the-shoulders-of-giants going on in the supply chain so Apple can manufacture an iPhone in China using technology from all across the globe, a lot of it from Europe. That laser cutter doing precision metalwork on phones, or cars? Probably German or Swiss...
It's not flashy but there's actually very important technology that is developed, and made in Europe.
It's almost like people taking these jabs don't understand comparative advantages, and are also blind to the economical output of Europe in general...
Almost every conversation i have about international trade with anyone without some sort of economics background illustrates this.
We have high tariffs with China as well though. I wish we didn't, then I might actually be able to afford an electric car.
The EU demands that goods made in Poland conforms to some standards, but also that the manufacturers in Poland conform to some standards. For goods from China they in theory demand the same standards, but in practice these standards are not strictly enforced for goods from China (see AliExpress, Temu, Shein, etc), and there are no regulation on the manufacturers. Chinese manufacturers use slave labour, they pollute, they don't give their employees similar rights and benefits.
It's also way easier and cheaper for most Europeans to buy something from China than it is to buy something from within Europe, even though the actual selling price out of the factory is not that much higher for things manufactured in Europe. I pay the same "tariffs" if I buy from Sweden or AliExpress.
But you can't buy an electric car on Temu.
Even more so when you take build quality and support quality in the equation.