That certainly is.... a take. Still a silly one if you ask me. If that were true they wouldn't fine EU companies either. Yet, that is also happening.

It's kind of like an ambulance-chasing lawyer. Yeah the driver at fault did real harm and owes money to the victim. But the lawyer is not a selfless justice crusader - he's looking for a payday. That's how I see the EU in these cases.

Sorry, you are not really making a better case for your argument. The budget of the EU largely comes from other places. Fines like these don't even register on there meaningfully. That alone should tell you enough.

The fact that a 290 million euro fine isn't considered meaningful does tell me a lot.

The EU is the largest economical block in the world. 290 isn't that much for them.

You aren't even trying, are you? It is not that meaningfull within the overall annual budget of the EU. If your take that they are just doing it for the extra cash was even remotely true they'd need to fine a whole lot more companies than they are doing now.

At this point I am sure that you are either:

- Trolling. In that case, good on you I guess.

- Really are not trying and not willing to try either. Which is a shame, mostly for you though.

Either way, it is not worth it to further respond to you. As in both scenarios you will just respond with another half backed goalpost moving response.

What does "upset" mean here? How does this human emotion "upset" apply to the European Union? Is Uber "upset"?

Sorry, I should be more specific - EU bureaucrats whose only way of making money is taking it from someone else. They are probably not too upset.

All governments are funded by "taking it from someone else", usually in the form of taxes. Member state contributions, VAT income, and customs duties provide over 90% of EU funding. These fines of companies are a drop in the bucket, not the main way the EU finances itself.

Fines were less than 1% of the revenue of the EU in 2023, to be more precise. I don't know how people here got the idea that the EU can fund itself only with such fines, to be honest.

I don't dispute any of this

As a US citizen residing in the EU, I can maybe play the role of an interpretor or anthropological informant. Your idea that the GDPR is just a kind of gotcha, as if the high fines were a kind of disingenuous speed trap, is a reflection of American distrust of our own government but is not a good model for understanding what is going on here.

The GDPR and high fines are an earnest reflection of the will of the European people not to have their private, personal information used in potentially harmful ways.

If I can be allowed to similarly anthropomorphize, the EU would honestly rather that US companies respect EU citizens' data rather than receive high fines. I know I would.

Yes we are upset about American companies breaking the law and using unfair market advantage to get ahead. It's certainly not a win-win. The fines are a drop in the bucket.

Here you are on the internet which America invented, on an American website, complaining about how America is unfair, while they pay you billons of dollars in fines.

> Here you are on the internet which America invented

Oef, another poorly researched, oversimplified take on things. I'll throw you a bit of a bone, the prototype internet or the precursor to it is indeed mostly a US invention. The modern day internet has been shaped by many international contributions from a variety of sources. Tim Berners-Lee is an English computer scientist to give an obvious example. Not to mention that it is very likely you are viewing this on a wifi connected device, which is a Dutch invention.

I didn't say that America "shaped" the internet, I said that America invented it, which is a fact that you've admitted.

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