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0 pointsTekMol4y ago0 comments

Sure. You can set up an address somewhere. Rent it. Set up some kind of mail forwarding or go there regularely to get it.

Sure. You can put in a day of work to self host or write your own analytics solution.

But this already puts you at a disadvantage. Because of the time you have to invest and the sub par solutions. Google Analytics is simply better than the alternatives.

And it does not end here. Every website I know uses a multitude of international tools. All of them connecting the visitor to some international servers which provide the service. Cutting European indie makers off from all these tools will put them at a huge disadvantage.

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5 comments · 3 top-level

jmnicolas4y ago· 2 in thread

The UE thinks it can reinvent the USSR better. I don't expect it to survive past 2030.

yarpen_z4y ago

How does it happen that in such discussions there is always at least one person who ends up equating everything they don't like to socialism? Are "socialism" and "communism" the only words they know? Clearly, they don't know very well the meaning of these words.

And regarding the "EU won't survive past 20XY". I've heard this argument almost non-stop from anti-EU politicians since 2007. Financial crisis, Greek debt crisis, Brexit, now coronavirus - every bad event is a good one to predict the collapse of the EU.

jmnicolas4y ago

I didn't mention communism nor socialism (except in the name USSR).

I compare the EU to the USSR because they're both top down bureaucracies that think they knows best and can erase nations under their rule. It works for a time but when it inevitably collapses, wars are almost a certainty.

You hear about the Euro and the UE collapse since 2007 because the process started back then.

Eastern countries don't share the liberal ideology of the west. They're in as long as money flows. Once it stops why would they let the west tell them how to think?

Then there are the southern countries (PIGS + France) that are bankrupt, the north don't want to pay. What do you think will happen when Covid can't be used to throw money at the problem any more?

Lastly look at the average European banks leverage. They won't survive another 2008.

FWIW I have skin in the game: I'm French, living in France.

piaste4y ago

> Sure. You can put in a day of work to self host or write your own analytics solution.

> But this already puts you at a disadvantage. Because of the time you have to invest and the sub par solutions. Google Analytics is simply better than the alternatives.

I am entirely in favour of requiring SaaS creators to put in a day of work if they want to analyze their users' information without violating their privacy, and forbidding them from saying "fuck it I can't be bothered, just send everything to Google, it's easier".

If being able to see our aggregate sexual orientations from Facebook Analytics is truly such a huge competitive advantage, by all means, explain in your sign-up page why it's in your customer's best interest to allow those tracking pixel and get their explicit consent.

Alright, I'll drop the sarcasm and state my claim outright: if you're creating an actually valuable and worthwhile product, using privacy-respectful tools and practices isn't going to kill your dreams. Not even close.

If you're creating another useless listicle page or shady dating app or would-be "viral" attention black hole, such that its business model fails if you can't track and profile hapless visitors or sell their data, then I'm glad you won't be able to start such a business in my country, and if you're abroad I hope you geoblock my country as well.

belorn4y ago

If an European indie want to access the European market they got to follow European law.

This argument of being at an disadvantage seems similar to that of app developer using the iphone market and paying a 30% tax to apple. That is a huge disadvantage compared to side loading the app on android which has 0% tax. The only problem of using side loading is that you have to leave the apple market space, or hope that places like EU put in laws that changes the regulations for the EU market space for phones. In that case it will be up to apple to decide how much access to the market space is worth.

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