> $100,000 per day for a country with ~5.4 million people is a lot. If even 20 percent used Facebook regularly, then that would still be 10 cents per user per day. It's unlikely that Meta is generating so much profit per user - every day.
TFA underestimates the value of user data.
From [1]:
> by the end of 2022, Meta’s [average revenue per user] worldwide was $10.86. While in US & Canada, it was $58.77; in Europe, it was $17.29; in Asia, $4.61 and in the rest of the world, it was $3.52.
$17.29 ARPU, per quarter, comes out at about 19 cents per day. Sure, revenue, not profit, but this is still way above 10c/day.
And this is only in Europe, and it doesn't account for all revenue user data can generate. Once adtech has user data, it can sell it in perpetuity on data broker markets, which is likely where the long tail revenues come from. Long after the user stops using FB, or even if they don't use FB at all (shadow profiles).
So this fine from a small country is just the cost of doing business for Meta. If every EU country did this, and the fines were incremental, then it _might_ cause Meta to rethink their strategy in the EU.
Bahraini Dinar (and some other Dinars I believe) use 3 digits for their currency. I wouldn't assume no dollar does it. Sure, it's very unlikely. But if you've never dealt with some other currency, it may not by that obvious.
It took me a minute. My brain saw the period and then truncated the third zero to make sense of it. This is pretty common in humans. But because I thought that one hundred dollars was odd, I read the article, which I then realized it was one hundred thousand.
Cent is short for 'centime' or 1/100th, so indeed, nobody is using three digits to represent cents. But there are currencies with finer grained denominations than cents.
Think of it as a starting point. I'm all for applying network algorithms to fines like this: if you don't back off we'll double the fine. Every time it is levied.
And if the company can't pay then the execs are on the hook, everybody with a C-level title or a board seat. I would happily wager this would get even the largest entities into compliance within days, weeks at most.
The doubling of fines was tried successfully against microsoft back in the web 1.0 when they refused to acknowledge the antitrust fine.
Basically the EU(or even Norway) is way to big a market for advertisements for the industry to just ignore so sooner of later adtech will fold and play nice.
Meta makes (revenue) ~25 billion a year from EU. Very crudely compensating for Norway vs EU population (~5 vs 450 million), you'd estimate ~250-300 million revenue per year from Norway.
36M USD per year then works out to like 10-15% of yearly revenue. Meta reports overall operating margin in the 20-30% range, so 10-15% revenue loss is significant, but not immediately deadly... which seems to match the stated intent of Norwegian authorities.
Getting banned in multiple western countries (this won't be the last case like this I suspect) for refusal to comply with their democratically-valid laws is a great way to end up a corporate pariah.
If they choose to only operate in markets which let them operate entirely as they see fit, they may find themselves soon with no markets left to operate in.
Money from advertising. Sure, they can cut off everyone who tried to sue them... but won't last long that way. Also they could be still sued for the past non-compliance instead.
Lol indeed: throw their execs in jail when they transit through a country with which they have an extradition agreement (plenty of precedent for that), freeze or seize their assets, block them at the ISP level (ISPs would have to play ball unless they themselves would want to be come a target).
The idea that some crap company outranks a nation state with millions of citizens is ridiculous.
Also: even though Norway isn't part of the EU (though it is in Schengen) they could bring a case in the EU courts and have Meta's assets in Ireland seized. That would really hurt if the court allowed it.
Readit News
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36756101
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37045185
TFA underestimates the value of user data.
From [1]:
> by the end of 2022, Meta’s [average revenue per user] worldwide was $10.86. While in US & Canada, it was $58.77; in Europe, it was $17.29; in Asia, $4.61 and in the rest of the world, it was $3.52.
$17.29 ARPU, per quarter, comes out at about 19 cents per day. Sure, revenue, not profit, but this is still way above 10c/day.
And this is only in Europe, and it doesn't account for all revenue user data can generate. Once adtech has user data, it can sell it in perpetuity on data broker markets, which is likely where the long tail revenues come from. Long after the user stops using FB, or even if they don't use FB at all (shadow profiles).
So this fine from a small country is just the cost of doing business for Meta. If every EU country did this, and the fines were incremental, then it _might_ cause Meta to rethink their strategy in the EU.
[1]: https://fourweekmba.com/facebook-arpu/
Kind of interesting that here the *country* is david while the *business* is goliath..
Dead Comment
For clarity & comment skimmers:
TFA uses $100,000 in the subheading and beyond. Some European countries use `.` as a thousands separator, so it's not "a hundred dollars a day".
(Reference to https://gist.github.com/timvisee/fcda9bbdff88d45cc9061606b4b...)
BHD Bahraini Dinar
IQD Iraqui Dinar
JOD Jordanian Dinar
KWD Kuwaiti Dinar
LYD Libyan Dinar
OMR Omani Rial
TND Tunisian Dinar
0, 2, 3, 4 are all in use.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_4217
Dead Comment
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exponential_backoff
And if the company can't pay then the execs are on the hook, everybody with a C-level title or a board seat. I would happily wager this would get even the largest entities into compliance within days, weeks at most.
Basically the EU(or even Norway) is way to big a market for advertisements for the industry to just ignore so sooner of later adtech will fold and play nice.
36M USD per year then works out to like 10-15% of yearly revenue. Meta reports overall operating margin in the 20-30% range, so 10-15% revenue loss is significant, but not immediately deadly... which seems to match the stated intent of Norwegian authorities.
Facebook is in a similar showdown right now with the EU, appealing a 1 billion EUR fine: https://www.ctvnews.ca/business/meta-fined-record-us-1-3-bil...
Their disagreement with the Canadian government is coming to a head too: https://www.ctvnews.ca/business/all-news-in-canada-will-be-r...
If they choose to only operate in markets which let them operate entirely as they see fit, they may find themselves soon with no markets left to operate in.
It reminds them of the Canada govt trying to make FB pay for news. Ehh... NOPE.
The idea that some crap company outranks a nation state with millions of citizens is ridiculous.
Also: even though Norway isn't part of the EU (though it is in Schengen) they could bring a case in the EU courts and have Meta's assets in Ireland seized. That would really hurt if the court allowed it.
Fuck around and find out Facebook.