lock-the-spock

Interesting is also the mistranslation of "Dame", a lady from a wealthy family, as 'princess'.

This is a governor's wife, not a princess.

Such projects are EU funded but in fact implemented through national or regional programmes agreed by the regional authorities... So it's usually at that level that favouritism or corruption plays in.

Even the concrete and steel houses often start with wood framing of some sort and end with wood as a structural part of any ceilings and roofs. Not to mention stairs, room structures/interior walls, ...

Few buildings in Europe are today solely made from wood, but nearly every building will be part wood. From the frame on which walls and floors are built up with other materials up to the roof where for most houses the very structure is made from wood, it's clear wood is one of the most essential building components. To be honest I struggle to think of any building I've ever seen that has no wood - except for semi-subterranean structures or those built out of natural structures I can't think of any.

I guess you miss the selling point(s) as you see the phone only as its final product and the direct benefits to you. That has never been the ambition. Here's why I bought Fairphones for my family:

* Fair supply chains. This was their original selling point and is still an incredible unique feature. They changed cobalt and copper supply chains and established tracing mechanisms that now other manufacturers can also use.

* Self-repairable. I switched two screens so far, probably not a huge cost difference to the neighbourhood dirty phone repair shop, but I feel better about it.

* Social enterprise, giving back to the community

* Nice to know my funds go mostly to a good cause and everyone in the supply and production chain is treated well (they even pay a premium to manufacturers so workers at the assembly line get paid a fair wage).

I am well aware it's not the best phone. It's rather clunky, camera used to be weak (got much better with the latest update), and I had some small issues. But overall a solid phone, I support a de kind of ecosystem that really improves things down the line and I don't need to feed Sony or Apple execs money.

EU legislation generally sets a maximum, but then you also have to prove proportionality to determine the actual amount (damage done + fine). Any such amount will certainly get challenged in the courts, so the Commission will get its ducks in a row before actually settling on a number.

I'm sorry that you have such an emotional reaction about a company being threatened with a fine (not even penalised yet) for harmful behaviour which they could immediately choose to stop if they'd want to.

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Two scenarios: Company A violates consumer rights. Government does nothing, consumers continue to get ripped off.

Company B violates consumer rights. Government threatens fines. Company either fixes the problem (consumer hsrm reduced) or eats the fine (and the money can be used to pay for useful stuff). Either way, they can no longer gain by tipping off consumers and have every reason to stop if the fine may be repeated for a repeat offender.

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Calculating on global profits is standard practice and is done the same theme the US calculates fines (depending on what the fine is about - you might have different reference points for different harm). This is the only solution as otherwise companies will play the usual whack-a-mole where they create an "affiliate Europe" that is legally separate but pays 100% of its net profits as a licensing fee for the brand name to the parent company, thus making 0€ (more difficult to play this game with gross sales, but there are still plenty of ways to fudge those numbers).

The EU has its own subsidy programmes as well but it is a lot more complex. You need 27 governments to agree to make something happen, from 400.000 people Malta to 80.000.000 million people Germany. The small countries are terrified to be squashed by German and French power to give subsidies to their own national company, ruining the single market.

In fact you have the same issue in the US but the states have no direct say, and statistics are not done the same way - so you don't see the impact the same way and don't have discussions the same way.

Yes but Spotify gets only 70% of that cut while apple gets 100%. Without the apple tax Spotify might be able to either go down in price or increase quality/breadth/payouts to creators/other offerings/... The market is distorted and you pay more and get less if one monopoly takes all others for a ride.

You might enjoy this as well, similar big picture and fascinating, but a bit more scientific and focused on the human element.

> The Weirdest People in the World: How the West Became Psychologically Peculiar and Particularly Prosperous

Why would they do that? U.S. military vessels were already attacked so they need no further casus belli if they wanted war. On the contrary Huthis have announced that they intend to cut cables. So the responsibility is rather easy to point to.

Nothing illogical, Russia had been limiting supply due to supposed technical reasons for months before, with a clear intention to empty European/German reserves. Look at the charts of gas flows and storage prior to the war and the literally hindreds or news articles on this.

You should probably put this in quotes as OOP is disseminating russian propaganda.

Sorry but you seem to be repeating russian war propaganda. The U.S. sabotaging north stream makes zero sense and Russia was already arbitrarily and randomly limiting supply through North stream for months before. That Russia was involved is pretty much fact and established by several western intelligence reports. The only other possible part with a good cause would be Ukraine but they'd be stupid to sabotage the pipeline and alienate all their essential allies.

Counterexample: If a set of IPs consistently and intentionally run DDoS to shut down small sites or e.g. newspapers, should the government not intervene? If they cannot stop, say, the russian government from running such attacks would it not be the only route to block such IPs?