Posted on 03/11/2023 3:00:58 PM PST by Twotone
Tensions between European telecommunications firms and U.S. Big Tech companies have crested, as telecom bosses mount pressure on regulators to make digital giants fork up some of the cost of building the backbone of the internet.
European telcos argue that large internet firms, mainly American, have built their businesses on the back of the multi-billion dollar investments that carriers have made in internet infrastructure.
Google, Netflix, Meta, Apple, Amazon and Microsoft generate nearly half of all internet traffic today. Telcos think these firms should pay “fair share” fees to account for their disproportionate infrastructure needs and help fund the rollout of next-generation 5G and fiber networks.
The European Commission, the EU’s executive arm, opened a consultation last month examining how to address the imbalance. Officials are seeking views on whether to require a direct contribution from internet giants to the telco operators.
Big Tech firms say this would amount to an “internet tax” that could undermine net neutrality.
Top telecom bosses came out swinging at the tech companies during the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.
They bemoaned spending billions on laying cables and installing antennas to cope with rising internet demand without corresponding investments from Big Tech.
(Excerpt) Read more at cnbc.com ...
Interesting given they built their entire healthcare systems thx to US R&D. Without us there is no EU or for that matter much other healthcare. They decimated their military spending thanks to us. One would think the least they could do is pick up the electric bill.
To Europe. America invented the internet Eurotrash, you are welcome. No w STFU.
Quite honestly this is a c level suite bitch that Alphabet, Amazon, Meta, Azure, Lumen, Equinix and the cablecos are not giving away 5 year peering agreements every time the carriers are jumping from 10G/100G/1TB/1TB/10TB/100TB technologies on the same old backbones. The entire model has changed, the clouds are the servers and wireless and home internet is the clients. Everyone else are 3rd party that are rent seekers at this time. The switches have always been 3-7k per port of the latest hotness, perhaps 14k if your at the top end of the non blocking, no oversubscription.
EU commies and censors. Internet access isn’t a right or free to those who can’t afford it at their residence. Basic service, not 100’s of megs and unlimited data volumes, is not expensive, especially outside the US. Or go to the library. Subscribers pay for their own Internet service to access those sites, which are paying for their Internet service to be accessed. Google should not be paying for me to access FR, because it will eventually stop me from accessing FR—and can.
“Pay their fair share??!!?” Have they paid their fair share when it comes to NATO or the UN?
I wonder how much involvement the
WEF and Schwabs minions have
since Schwab et.al. seems to be
involved in every single gawd D* mn
goings on within Europe and wherever
else the WEF sticky fingers are.
Thirty or so years ago, I would have made a Randian argument in defense of big business. But these companies are so anti-white and anti-Christian, I don't mind if socialist foreign governments take a bite out of them. The enemy of my enemy, etc.
Yes. NATO is an arm of the Pentagon. It exists to project American power into Europe. So it's appropriate that the U.S. funds it.
I don't think we should be in NATO. But I don't blame anyone else for not wanting to fund it.
As for the UN, it's a platform for Third World financial demands, for American LGBT promotion, and for Euro-American climate change projects.
No reason why any nation should fund it, so there is no "fair share." But if any nation is dumb enough to fund the UN, that's on them.
We shouldn't fund NATO or the UN. And if some other nation refuses to pay their "fair share" they have my compliments.
... and the world would be a far better place without either of you.
Using any G**gle product is as much as begging for a procotological exam every time you fire it up.
Yes, NATO largely ended war in what was the most violent place on earth.
Romans, Parisians et al have been able to live to almost 80yrs old without being warred on once in their lives for the first time in ages. They simultaneously decimated their own military spending.
I don’t think we should be in NATO. Victimization lasts forever, accomplishments like ending war in Northern and Western Europe can be wiped out by some rainbow flags and likewise nonsense.
Who do you think will wind up paying for any increase in fees?
You, me, and 100s of millions of other US Citizens.
Ahhhh, no thanks.
I am for anything that harms Big Tech.
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