Peter Fleischer writes:
Re-read Don Quixote as you follow the debate about revising Europe’s privacy laws. Is it more noble to pursue the glory of fantasy over the indignities of the real world? Do we want to defend an obsolete chivalric code, while the rest of the world looks on with derision? Do we want a strong privacy law that can be operationalized or a glorious piece of literature?American companies are starting to freak and shriek about Europe’s upcoming new privacy laws. In turn, various European politicians are publicly posturing about how all this is required to rein in American companies, while feigning resentment that American companies are lobbying for their interests in Brussels. In reality, of course, the new proposed EU laws are full of flaws, in particular imposing lots of pricey new compliance-bureaucracy obligations, and threatening minor compliance violations with absurdly-high fines in the range of 2% of a company’s global turnover. But let’s not let reality sully this tale. Don Quixote is defending privacy against the American-mega-corporate-privacy-slayers. Don Quixote is defending the Right to be Forgotten.
Read more on his blog.