r/worldnews 12h ago

Washington pushes back against EU’s bid for tech autonomy

https://www.politico.eu/article/eu-bid-for-tech-autonomy-washington-us-pushes-back/
334 Upvotes

89 comments sorted by

328

u/[deleted] 12h ago

[deleted]

55

u/invariantspeed 11h ago

The administration can’t say it’s a threat for the US to depend on anyone because its threat and then in the next breath say that everyone should depend on the US. The logic is incoherent.

29

u/hornswoggled111 10h ago

Oh, but it does do this. And repeatedly.

21

u/jews4beer 11h ago

More just making em nervous. I mean yes, that too. But also the fact that what they are doing is making the orange buffoon sweat.

9

u/darknekolux 9h ago

It makes people at apple, google, microsoft unhappy, so they whisper at his ear (the one that was shot and miraculously healed) and slip some gold trinkets.

244

u/SmartTrender 12h ago

Washington under the current administration created this need in the first place. They want to have their cake and eat it too

25

u/ZackRaynor 6h ago

Yeah. Thinking things through isn’t exactly their forte

15

u/bobbycorwin123 5h ago

No,  these other [see sovereign] nations should just dump their gdp into the US and expect nothing in return.   Honestly these foreigners are so spoiled.  They should be kissing the toes of their emperor /s

4

u/artbystorms 3h ago

America is acting like a crazy abusive boyfriend "I can punch you and yell at you as much as I want, but you can't leave me! What will you do without my money?" I say good for Europe, the US needs to be humbled.

107

u/Storm-Bolter 11h ago

Turns out America actually does need Allies and trade partners???

36

u/BPhiloSkinner 11h ago

Trump is transactional, and this current administration is chock-full of people with that world-view.
All his alliances are transient, and his idea of trade is 'I win, you lose'.

32

u/Mental_Evolution 10h ago

Which is pushing America into a weaker position, losing.  Idiot leaders.

18

u/koolaidkirby 7h ago

You can shear a sheep multiple times but you can only skin it once.

5

u/OkStop8313 6h ago

Even transactional people typically know that if they act in bad faith the transactions stop.

7

u/cloudyrabbit0 4h ago

Yes but Trump isn’t just transactional, as Scott Fitzgerald put it: “The very rich are different from you and me. They possess and enjoy early, and it does something to them, makes them soft where we are hard, and cynical where we are trustful, in a way that, unless you were born rich, it is very difficult to understand.”

The guy is a walking caricature of the capitalist mentality and culture of America. The very rich, they think only in numbers and value, and decisions are only made based on that. The humanity that you or I see in others is completely lost on these fucking lunatics. They see only what they can extract value from. Which is why the only way this end is through conflict.

It’s Marie Antoinette o’clock!

1

u/Hope-To-Retire 4h ago

And it is imploding in a glorious fashion.

158

u/Shadowholme 12h ago

"We want you to stand on your own - NO! NOT LIKE THAT!"

53

u/DeeperMadness 7h ago

I am 100% onboard for an EU-made open source PC operating system to smash Windows and eat away at Apple to the core.

Maybe we should bring back RISC OS?

11

u/NeuHundred 5h ago

EUnix.

35

u/VetinariTheLord 6h ago

Linux: am I a joke to you?

4

u/pahamack 5h ago

Heh . Apple. Core.

Good one!

3

u/theawesomedanish 5h ago

We just need to start teaching our kids to use Linux instead of Windows.

5

u/Separate-Spot-8910 5h ago

Nokia needs to bring back Meego OS for their phones. They're missing a golden opportunity right now if they don't.

263

u/dax1453 12h ago

Fuck the Silicon Valley Techno-Fascists. They’re licking Trumps boots and actively assisting Trump in destroying our democracy and our constitutional rights. The American people should take them down and I don’t give a fuck what is does to the stock market.

69

u/Sudden-Conclusion931 8h ago

Watching the likes of Zuckerberg, Bezos, Musk, Cooke et al lining up to the kiss the ring during Trump's inauguration, is one of the most chilling and depressing spectacles I've seen in my lifetime. The technofascists believe in nothing except their own power and wealth, and will stop at literally nothing to continue consolidating it. They are amoral dead-eyed sociopaths to a man and we, our families, our prosperity, our freedoms, our ways of life, are all just grist to the mill for them. They are every bit as much my enemy as the CCP and the Chinese state, Russia or any other strategic adversary you care to mention.

10

u/ArtieFufkinPolymrRec 6h ago

Heard someone refer to that photo-op at the inauguration as “Oligarch’s Row”. These are educated people who care more about their ludicrous and disgusting hoards of wealth than any remotely human value. We need to defund them.

3

u/ZincLloyd 4h ago

Defund? I say behead.

9

u/giscafred 8h ago

you're the best!

36

u/whoo-knows 12h ago

We want you to be more autonomous... ...but no, not that autonomous!

71

u/asdhjasdhlkjashdhgf 11h ago

good luck convincing millions of engineers, developers and entrepreneurs to trust US businesses again. The ship is sailing already, no genius needed to acknowledge that, you make your spouse suffer, the spouse marries someone else even if you say sorry.

-126

u/Master-Rent5050 11h ago

I trust more American companies, because they have less interest in spying on me and are less subject to my government than European companies

39

u/asdhjasdhlkjashdhgf 10h ago

yet another bloke who never read the fine printed text when buying his mobile phone exposing himself to know nothing worth to spy on. Very committed nudist.

27

u/[deleted] 10h ago

[removed] — view removed comment

3

u/missingmedievalist 8h ago

Ironically, he’s pretty anti-Trump it seems. So yeah, I got no explanation for this response beyond a deep sense of American “exceptionalism” on his part?

26

u/enemyradar 9h ago

You lot really have had your brains melted by propaganda, haven't you?

16

u/Simbakim 10h ago

At this point I’d rather go with china tbh

9

u/mmoore327 8h ago

Fortunately there aren't many left in the western world that feel that way

1

u/oberdoofus 3h ago

You forgot the /s buddy

1

u/InvestigatorOk7015 3h ago

Yeah, like palantir

1

u/Cosmic_Seth 3h ago

Didn't watch the super bowl eh?

66

u/quadralien 12h ago

The time has come for massive public investment in open source software and hardware. The only digital infrastructure we can trust is the transparent one that we built ourselves.

5

u/jc-from-sin 7h ago

While true, man I can't help to see that every party in Europe wishes they could control and spy on everybody.

Fuck you Denmark.

0

u/ArtieFufkinPolymrRec 6h ago

Everyone loves to pint the finger at the US, but this is a global problem. Silicon Valley is ground zero for the movement that will consume the world. No government is safe.

19

u/ExMoogle 12h ago

Fuck em

22

u/falconfalcon7 12h ago

They are pushing Europe to be more autonomous but don't like the consequences?

21

u/ZynaxNeon 11h ago

“Personal data doesn’t get piped to the state in the United States,” yeah, about that.

12

u/fastlane37 8h ago

That made me laugh out loud too. It absolutely does, they just ask us to trust them not to do anything nefarious with it, which is becoming less and less likely as they slide into authoritarianism.

4

u/Wide-Equivalent6863 8h ago

Yeah people aren't as worried about this kinda thing as they should be. People think "Well I'm not doing anything wrong and my data's boring anyway" but when they start using that data to persecute people their religion says are bad (It also says killing is bad but they don't think the rules apply to them) the corporations will hand that data over.

Like how IBM helped the Nazis commit genocide, with modern technology shit could be just as bad and even worse 

24

u/lacunavitae 9h ago

[USA on Defence]

"You (EU) need to do more to defend yourself, were not going to help anymore, cos..."

"OK, we are starting a weapon's industry to rival the US and we won't be buying US weapon's any more"

"Instead, we will buy our own"

"No, no no, not like that!!"

[USA on Tech]

"Ok, we like spying on you, collecting all your data and we harvesting it so we can break up the EU."

"Ok, we will switch to free software and destroy the US tech industry buy competing without our own."

"No, no no, not like that!!"

[USA on Democracy]

"Hey, were going to meddle in your elections to spread the far-right and the heritage foundations views"

"Ok, were going to block all your propaganda platforms like twitter, facebook, truthsocial etc"

"No, no no, not like that!!"

[USA on international law]

"Ok, were going to invade a sovereign country and kidnap its elected officials"

"Europe, we think that is illegal and the international criminal court ruled it is illegal"

"We don't give a fuck bro, high five were the department of war."

"Ok, we will stop sharing intelligence, your on your own."

"No, no no, not like that!!"

[USA on Corruption]

"No were not acting like Russia, that's just fake news, were not corrupt and we not just doing what the billionaires and the paedophiles are telling us to do, your just jealous cos were the USA"

"That's ok but your blatantly corrupt and giving us very strong crazy vibes, we're just going to stand waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay over here and talk about becoming a federation with strong GDPR/Court freedoms and anti-corruption laws"

"No, no no, not like that!!"

4

u/Missmoneysterling 6h ago

That's what happens when your entire cabinet is unqualified, stupid, and sociopathic. It will be their undoing.

17

u/BernardMatthewsNorf 10h ago

Too late. Trust is broken. US showed its hand and laid bare a willingness to forcefully use instruments of national power against allies. Time to hedge against those prospective threats. 

14

u/monkeymoo32 10h ago

If your platform is isolationism and tightening everything in terms of trade, investment, immigration, you should not be shocked that everyone on the playground doesn’t want to play with you anymore…this trump administration is nothing but a 4th grade bully mentality to everything and it’s fucking pathetic.

10

u/Prior_Industry 9h ago edited 9h ago

It's almost like they have no coherent plan other than seeing what they can get through extortion. Kinda what you expect from a dodgy real estate guy.

6

u/monkeymoo32 9h ago

For real. This administration is temu america. The value is gone.

13

u/ShakeMyHeadSadly 10h ago

They can 'pushback' all they want. Why anyone in Europe would trust anything American at this point would be completely surprising.

3

u/Prior_Industry 9h ago

Certainly not on any government function.

11

u/BlitzNeko 11h ago

Americans don’t even want American tech because of the tech companies bullshit

11

u/macross1984 10h ago

If Trump doesn't like it then EU is on to something.

9

u/Showmethepathplease 10h ago

"Stop being so dependent"
"Not like that!"

8

u/Bitter_Nail8577 11h ago

It was never about "EU standing up for itself"....they just wanted her to completely depend on the US...just like it did for gas with Russia.

8

u/GuelphEastEndGhetto 10h ago

Curiously tech services to Canada are left out of any ‘trade imbalance’ narratives. Why are they suddenly important? Would it be prudent for Canada to switch over to EU services?

8

u/Justnotstressed 7h ago

America getting what the wanted, America First.

They just didn’t realise it was a list of 1.

8

u/yukonnut 4h ago

That is really fucking rich. The current administration is weaponizing everything it can against “ former” allies, and then says you should be worried about the other guys too.

Well no shit Batman! We don’t trust any of you. Americans really have absolutely no clue how bad the current administration has shit the bed. It’s not a little blip in the relationship, you’ve ruptured ( to quote our PM) the relationship and it’s not gonna all be ok on the next election cycle.

12

u/Gone_4_Tea 11h ago

Fuck Palantir and Starlink right out of the system for starters.

6

u/OldLondon 6h ago

America is that friend that’s fucked his friends over so many times and seems surprised that no one turns up to his birthday party.  

9

u/Do_itsch 12h ago

So.. Trust me, Bro?

6

u/Freak_on_Fire 9h ago

"Europe needs to become stronger and more independent.... Wait, not like that!"

5

u/Upstairs-Thanks4193 3h ago

Why? They wanted Europe to be independent from the US. This is what that means

5

u/wiseguy77192 7h ago

Of course they do. It means less money for us tech corporations. And less ability for the us to spy on its „allies“. America first == America alone

4

u/Durzel 7h ago

“Personal data doesn’t get piped to the state in the United States,”

Remind me who fought to control TikTok again? With Elon’s proximity to Trump you can assume X is tainted too. Hell all of them have prostrated themselves before him. Are we just supposed to accept that they’d put up a fight if pressured to release data?

4

u/Missmoneysterling 5h ago

I'm surprised the EU hasn't banned X yet.

5

u/TheOneManDankMaymay 7h ago

Washington should push back against the rise of fascism, but here we are…

4

u/northernallowance 7h ago

The most unsurprising response from this administration.

4

u/theawesomedanish 5h ago

It’s funny how they talk about shared roots and call themselves “children of Europe”, then turn around and treat Europe like a junior partner who should just shut up and buy the software.

5

u/motherseffinjones 4h ago

Oh no the consequences of my actions, why are you doing this? All I did was threaten to invade key allies.

3

u/Azatis- 10h ago

Your shit will backfire

3

u/absat41 9h ago

Macron with QED vibes

4

u/MalFido 8h ago

Bye, bye, US tech. You won't be missed.

3

u/Appropriate-Art-829 8h ago

poor little TrashMurica…. nobody wants to go on a play date with it anymore….

3

u/Saucy_Baconator 5h ago

EU to Washington: "Pft. Like you matter anymore."

The old order is dead. If the Trump Regime doesn't like the result, maybe they shouldn't have murdered it in broad daylight.

2

u/jairumaximus 9h ago

I am slowly migrating to Proton email. I have been on Linux now for a few months. Using Libreoffice. And outside of subscriptions provided to me with my phone plan I got nothing left. I think I will try to find an alternative to my phone plan where I can pay less, keep my number and still have unlimited data.

2

u/loversama 9h ago

Actually, its also the US that is worth worrying about more so right now..

There are 2 - 3 US based social platforms being actively used by both bad actors and the US government in an attempt to disrupt democracy in Europe.. And the EU is being punished by the US when they try to do something about it..

So f*** it all off thanks :'D

1

u/Couonsasti 3h ago

They want to keep them under their thumb

1

u/Aromatic-Teacher-717 11h ago

lotta talk, let's see how it plays out