Hacker News Reader

Comment by bilekas | Hacker News Reader

It so nice to see megacorps not being allowed to whatever they like as in the US. The EU has regulations and standards. If you don't follow them you can't just try to sue the body. Just follow the rules like you're supposed to. It's quite simply really.

View on HN

They already did this with Canada.

Meta decided to stop showing news links in Canada. [1]

Presumably, it would choose the same thing here.

[1] https://www.facebook.com/sureshsingaratnam/posts/so-meta-is-...

Yes, that was a great move. I wish Meta would do the same in all countries. I don't go to Facebook to read news.

> Yes, that was a great move. I wish Meta would do the same in all countries. I don't go to Facebook to read news.

Lots of news organization saw their traffic drop though, and this reduced revenues. (Not judging either way, just noting some effects.)

I am not a facebook user, but going by that post they seem to go a step further and outright block any links pointing to news sites. The article mentions some provisions in the Italian law that prohibit restricting visiblity of the news sites, at least during negotiations, so that kind of salted earth move could backfire .

Yes, meta took the salt-the-earth approach. Rather then allow users to post links and meta not summarize the content, meta is now destroying its own value for Canadians.

These hypercorps and their CEOs act like giant fucking children, and rather than abide by a ruling being told to play fair, they just decide to take their ball and go home.

Good riddance. The sooner social media dies, the better off humanity will be.

You certainly can sue: "The ruling comes after Meta sued Italy’s national telecommunications regulatory agency (AGCOM) in Italian court in 2023"; that's the normal process for disputing regulatory rulings. Doesn't mean you'll win though.

I'm very much in two minds about this because "news" is not a morally neutral category in itself, such as with similar laws benefiting News Corp in Australia, but it's clear that Meta/FB is a much worse unrestrained actor.

I'm also not happy that news organizations get special exceptions. It is very easy to construct cynical motives:

- Politicians need the news so journalists are protected.

- If news organizations get paid, they have no incentive to be AI critical.

The article says that "news are vital". So is open source, films, images, art, and the authors do not get paid by the thieves.

> The article says that "news are vital". So is open source, films, images, art, and the authors do not get paid by the thieves.

"Vital" does not merely mean "important".

I view it as protecting a group of producers from a monopoly (or at least dominant) buyer.

But there is real, broad competition between news outlets.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com