Sen. Elizabeth Warren wants to build a new agency to police Big Tech
www.theverge.com
Sen. Elizabeth Warren has already helped create independent agencies.

The bill, sponsored by Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) and Lindsey Graham (R-SC), would create a new agency called the Digital Consumer Protection Commission that would be empowered to go after giant tech firms for a slew of anti-competitive behaviors and failing to protect consumer privacy.

  • admiralteal@kbin.social
    13·
    11 months ago

    I mean, is Warren now among the crusty relics who don’t understand technology? That’s the implication here.

    If you read the article, it sounds like a bunch of very sound and reasonable first steps being outlined. Seems like this is being torpedoed without a second thought based on pretty flimsy reasoning.

    If the concern is they won’t go far enough… the counterfactual is doing nothing.

    • HarkMahlberg@kbin.social
      2·
      11 months ago

      I probably wasn’t being fair to Warren by using OP’s words (crusty relics). I trust her far more than I trust most politicians, but I don’t trust Lindsey Graham at all, or any other Republican for that matter. “Bipartisan” bills like this include the likes of SOPA, PIPA, COPPA, and I’ve mailed my senator to protest them all.

      Around the world, people look at the US parties and don’t see “left wing and right wing,” they see “right wing and lunacy.” Ultimately I want more regulation of big tech, I want to see the busting up of the AAAMM monopolies, but the political environment that would create that kind of effective, authoritative, savvy regulator… well, we don’t live in that environment. So until our system and parties resemble the EU’s, these kinds of bills are kneecapped by bribery disguised as political donations (a la Citizens United), regulatory capture, and the other Reagan-era failed policies that have brought us to our current position.

      Like yeah, this part is great, especially considering Google’s WEI proposal:

      Specifically, the commission would ban the largest tech companies like Amazon, Meta, and Google from providing favorable treatment to their own products on their platforms to those of their competitors, otherwise called “self-preferencing.” Along with the Federal Trade Commission and Justice Department, it would also be allowed to authorize merger proposals and review past ones retroactively.

      I’ll take what I can get for now, but the US has a very long way to go.

    • Bipta@kbin.social
      1·
      11 months ago

      She basically wants to end cryptocurrency… Crusty? No. Understand technology though? Also no.

      • admiralteal@kbin.social
        8·
        11 months ago

        Well yeah, she’s a huge advocate for consumer financial protections and crypto has the potential to delete all forms of consumer protections in financial transactions. This isn’t a surprising position for her to take and it doesn’t imply a lack of understanding of the tech. Just tells you that her politics don’t line up well with the Venn diagram of anarchists and libertarians that think there’s no downsides to crypto.

        • Bipta@kbin.social
          1·
          11 months ago

          I don’t know that that’s a fair assessment. She seems interested in ending cryptocurrency, not ensuring it’s used responsibly.