At some point control of one's own business future balances out a certain level of profit.

I also wonder if personel/talents/headcount to handle all that crap can become an issue. VPs (CEOs even) distracted with compliance etc.

Ones crap is anothers feature.

When all they need to do for compliance is to enable EU users to install apps without Apple as a middle-man then not much in the way of "personell/talents/headcount to handle all that crap" is actually necessary. What's costing them resources (and eventually money in the form of fines) is not complying.

You are vastly oversimplifying the issue. It’s not like there’s a bit that Apple can flip to just let EU citizens sideload apps.

I’d argue you’re vastly over complicating it.

There’s already mechanisms to side load, and install IPAs..

Why would it be more complicated?

It feels like some people don't imagine these companies to be ready for compliance. As if they don't have all the knobs ready to turn on a per-region/country/state basis as soon as the law changes and it becomes possible to lose even the smallest amount in stock value.

I know the Big Tech giving a finger to the evil bossing EU is a libertarian dream but it isn't happening; not while the said tech makes money hand over fist there. So 'fraid you have to live with your USB3 jacks for a while.

Have you seen how much they all bend over backwards for China?

Meta doesn’t. Their products have never been available in China.

Probably because the Chinese market is already full of Chinese social media companies. How do they expect to compete if they enter? It's not 2004 anymore where starting a social media on Harvard campus was a big ticket.

As far as I know, only Apple and Microsoft operate in China.

At least iCloud is run by a third party and not Apple (GCBD). Similar to how Blizzard does with their games and why World of Warcraft disappeared over night. Important distinction to make when it comes to privacy and security (there’s none) and how Apple washes their hands clean while keeping the Chinese government happy.

It is pretty much a requirement if you want to do business in mainland China.

Firefox also had a set of China-owned servers to sync data from Chinese users to.

(“Had” because I think they officially stopped the relationship with Mozilla China)