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0 pointsseemslegit5y ago0 comments

> If the EU's laws are so burdensome, why is there a thriving startup ecosystem in the EU? I have read about EU's stances on hate speech, defamation, and libel (though I wouldn't call that hobby reading research), and I am fine with their stances.

There is nothing particularly thriving about it. There are just a lot of them because it costs almost nothing to incorporate a company and 'startup' sounds cooler than a 'small consulting business' or a 'software house'.

Can you name many EU startups that IPOd or got acquired for an impressive amount during the last decade or were even considered "unicorns" at any point by anyone other than themselves ?

In any case, Section 230 isn't about startups per se but specifically about 3rd party content providers - know any such companies that are EU-based ?

> I think we could use more hate speech protection, when I see reports that as much as 60% of the tweets in the current U.S. political conversations are done by biased bots.

Have you considered the possibility of those reports being disseminated by biased bots ?

> And no, I am firmly against EARN IT and the other 230 attacks. We need internet legislation that is thoughtful, created by technical SME staffers and constitutional law SME staffers, not broad-brush legislation pandering to votes, FUD, or special interests.

You sound confused. How do you expect those hate speech protections to materialize if not by modifying or cancelling Section 230 ? I mean there's always the option of cancelling the 1st amendment - no one seems to like that pesky thing anyway today.

0 comments

Vespasian5y ago

> Can you name many EU startups that IPOd or got acquired for an impressive amount during the last decade or were even considered "unicorns" at any point by anyone other than themselves ?

In Addition to what sobani said:

HelloFresh, Transferwise, N26, Revolut, Telegram (if you stretch the meaning of Europe), Klarna, Auto1 Group to name a few

Of course not all of them operate globally but that isn't a requirement

sobani5y ago

> Can you name many EU startups that IPOd or got acquired for an impressive amount during the last decade or were even considered "unicorns" at any point by anyone other than themselves?

You mean besides companies like Spotify, Rovio (Angry Birds) or Mojang (Minecraft)?

seemslegitOP5y ago

That's really not that much to show for an economic superpower of almost half a billion people and none of these companies rely on the protections offered by Section 230. I mean maybe if you got creative enough in minecraft you could trigger some but it's owned by Microsoft now so you'll have to deal with their censorship first.

Communitivity5y ago

We have different ideas of success. My idea of a successful startup is not that it must reach unicorn status, but that it either has a successful exit where the founders and early employees comfortable enough that they can spend time on their next startup adventure; or that the company survives and continues to grow.

You place a lot of value in unicorns, but there are downsides to shooting to be a unicorn too. If you make it there you may be fabulously wealthy, but you'll have so much investment that most lose control of what they created and many succumb to bad investments that have so much dilution the cap table becomes upside down. Also most who aim for unicorn status ("I want to be rich!") fail. I'm ignoring bubbles, because if you have something that has no real contribution but rides/sparks a fad, then you can still get a lot of investment during a bubble - don't know if you could get to unicorn status though.

As for those companies not being capable of being platforms for hate speech: Minecraft obviously, Spotify is music so that should be a clear possibility, Telegram is messaging so that is also a possible. The ones that are financial apps are unlikely hate speech platforms, unless they allow comments or reviews.

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