[pp.int.general] Sad day in France

[Valentin Villenave]

2009/5/12 Chris Lockie <chris at lockie.org>:
> It may be simplistic to look at it this way, but isn't anything that forces
> you to install certain software, or software from one particular
> manufacturer, going to fall foul of the EU's competition/antitrust laws?
> Even if it gets past the Conseil de la Concurrence it's going to be screamed
> at by the EU, as Microsoft knows well enough already.

Not necessarily. I can see several ways of avoiding that:
 - the government may issue a regular call for bids among software companies
 - the government may leave companies develop whatever spyware they
want, and then deliver a "government-approved" label to only spywares
that fit their goals; if several spywares get "approved", this
provides the citizens with some sort of a choice...
 - more probably, the government (from what I have read) may do what
it does best: let each ISP handle this side of the question, and
engage special partnership with software companies to "propose" their
customers a preconfigured spyware.

> Presumably it would be implemented in France and then have to be referred to
> the EU, but ultimately it's hard to see how this has a long-term future.

It has not, anyway, since the recently-adopted #138/#46 amendment is
likely to make this law incompatible with the EU. Not that the current
French government cares anyway: for instance, for the last decade
they've been convicted every other month by the European Court of
Human Rights, and that hasn't stopped them from repeatedly violating
human rights and civil liberties here.

Regards,
Valentin