[msdrigg]

I don't see a lot of discussion of the Meta "pay or consent" investigation. Why wouldn't giving users the option to pay for tracking-free, ad-free service meet the requirement? Is the concern that the $10/month price too high? Would this kind of model be acceptable at a more reasonable price point?

[gpm]

My understanding, and the understanding of the EU commissioner [0], is that any amount is too high.

Consent must be freely given under EU law, not given in exchange for not having to pay money. You can't give a discount on the services for consenting.

[0] https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2024/03/apple-google-and...

[toyg]

If that's the case, several European newspapers are also in breach. The latest iteration of paywalls typically state something like "we need money to survive, so you either buy a subscription or you agree to being tracked for advertising purposes".

On a certain level I agree with you: it goes against the spirit of the law and it's downright rude (effectively blackmailing readers).

This said, the alternative is that they go full-paywall (and risk death, when less than 1% of readers will actually bother to sign up).

[pashadee]

I wrote about it months ago when they did it. Why wouldn't it? Because... it's illegal (under EU law)

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38192620

But the answer is: pay or consent "does not achieve the objective of preventing the accumulation of personal data by gatekeepers". See https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_24_... (also linked via the tweet elsewhere in this discussion)

[bluesign]

I think tracking-free and ad-free are different concerns here. Basically you can offer ad-free for $X/month, but tracking consent should be separate ( basically anyone would be able to deny tracking )

Same issue on the Apple side will play out probably similar; either they can charge every developer some technology fee, or they cannot charge to anyone.

[burnerthrow008]

> I think tracking-free and ad-free are different concerns here

Maybe in theory, but in practice they are one and the same. The CPM on ads where you don't know the audience is so low that you might as well skip the ads entirely.

> Same issue on the Apple side will play out probably similar; either they can charge every developer some technology fee, or they cannot charge to anyone.

Yes, and the result for both will be that there is no free tier in the EU anymore. All EU developers will pay the CTF and all EU users will pay $10/month for for ad-free FB.

[acedTrex]

Ya I am also not following what the problem is with this approach. Is that not the entire point of options? Do people feel entitled to have all free services with no obligations of their own?

[idle_zealot]

If the policy is "you can't sell you privacy" that would be pretty cool. It would require tech companies to come up with a business model that doesn't profit from pervasive surveillance. It is well within our rights as a society to deem such a model unacceptable.

[msdrigg]

So from the articles I can find about the complaints filed against Meta [1] I can't find any explanation of what would be an acceptable price for non-consent besides free.

I mean like it's their right as a government to say 'you can't charge for consent. either charge everyone or no-one', but I wonder how it'll all pan out.

[1](https://techcrunch.com/2024/02/28/meta-consent-or-pay-consum...)

[nickpsecurity]

I’ve long promoted this. Many others did, too. I went as far as suggesting they charge above the per-user profit of the surveillance business just to increase odds it would be profitable. I wanted that for Google apps on alternative Android’s and Facebook.

That they won’t release such products despite the demand shows they’re just evil. They believe they can squeeze more money and power out of ever-increasing surveillance.

[tacocataco]

Perhaps there is another incentive/coercion to encourage this behavior that we are not aware of.

[verisimi]

If you pay, you have to be being tracked surely?