Big reckoning for Big Tech? EUs fines on Meta, Apple wont change bad behavior

And just like that, the European Union’s massive fines on Apple and Meta ensured that competition would reign and the monolithic tech companies that structure our lives would never have such power again.Or perhaps not.Remember when the United States government went after Microsoft for having a Windows and Office monopoly and now they don’t anymore? No?Remember when the EU passed all those laws forcing sites to ask you if they could set cookies, and now no one is tracked on the web? No?How about when the EU passed the AI Act to safeguard against dangerous artificial-intelligence development, so we no longer have to worry about deep fakes or systemic risk?Technology regulation has never been easy, and its history is predominantly one of failure.For every Bell Telephone breakup, there are countless acts and cases that have been at best useless and at worst, counterproductive.If the Federal Aviation Administration is unable to monitor Boeing’s safety procedures well enough to prevent severe errors even after multiple crashes, what is the likelihood that government oversight can figure out the best way to correct for the monopoly power of huge tech players?Instead, we often get Band-Aids, which are what Wednesday’s fines — 500 million euros over Apple’s store and 200 million euros over Meta’s data collection — are.These companies are so absurdly huge that even proportionate fines will not make a dent in their bottom lines.If Meta can spend $46 billion on its “bet the company” metaverse strategy and have nothing to show for it, is 200 million euros likely to induce any real change?Over the last 10 years, Google has been fined well over $8 billion in three separate EU cases, some of which are still pending.Last year alone, the EU fined the company $2.4 billion over favoring their comparative shopping services.But with yearly revenues of $350 billion, those fines are, at worst, a minor drag on Google’s plans.To be sure, all the companies will make min...