<story><title>A legislative path to an interoperable internet</title><url>https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/07/legislative-path-interoperable-internet</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>munfred</author><text>Here is the full text of the ACCESS Act of 2019 bill: &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.congress.gov&amp;#x2F;bill&amp;#x2F;116th-congress&amp;#x2F;senate-bill&amp;#x2F;2658&amp;#x2F;text&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.congress.gov&amp;#x2F;bill&amp;#x2F;116th-congress&amp;#x2F;senate-bill&amp;#x2F;265...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;I highly recommend that everyone reads it - it is extremely short, well written, and probably the single most important piece of legislation to HN folks in the past decade.&lt;p&gt;As the bill is right now, it require communications platforms with 100M monthly active users in the US to make their services interoperable with other platforms. The bill presumes that platforms using open protocols already (like email) are fine. Facebook and it’s messenger platform is likely to be the only one meeting the threshold.&lt;p&gt;I&amp;#x27;m not American, but if you are and you care, I would suggest you to call your representative and explain why you support (or not) this bill. Remember that as it goes through congress, it can, and most likely will, be heavily edited or gutted to fit the many competing interests whispering in their ears. If you think the bill is good as is, tell them that! Personally, I think the bill is perfect, except for the 100M user threshold to start demand compatibility, which I think should be lowered to 10M.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>jkarneges</author><text>&amp;gt; the bill is perfect, except for the 100M user threshold to start demand compatibility, which I think should be lowered to 10M&lt;p&gt;I kinda like the high number, as it means the spirit is to prevent monopolies, which is one of the most compelling reasons for regulations to exist. Make the number too low, and it would invite criticism from people about regulations being overbearing. I don&amp;#x27;t know if that number is 100M, 10M, or 1M, but just something to be mindful about.&lt;p&gt;My sense is that if Facebook is legally forced to interop, then all other smaller&amp;#x2F;future players will voluntarily interop anyway.</text></comment>
<story><title>A legislative path to an interoperable internet</title><url>https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/07/legislative-path-interoperable-internet</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>munfred</author><text>Here is the full text of the ACCESS Act of 2019 bill: &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.congress.gov&amp;#x2F;bill&amp;#x2F;116th-congress&amp;#x2F;senate-bill&amp;#x2F;2658&amp;#x2F;text&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.congress.gov&amp;#x2F;bill&amp;#x2F;116th-congress&amp;#x2F;senate-bill&amp;#x2F;265...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;I highly recommend that everyone reads it - it is extremely short, well written, and probably the single most important piece of legislation to HN folks in the past decade.&lt;p&gt;As the bill is right now, it require communications platforms with 100M monthly active users in the US to make their services interoperable with other platforms. The bill presumes that platforms using open protocols already (like email) are fine. Facebook and it’s messenger platform is likely to be the only one meeting the threshold.&lt;p&gt;I&amp;#x27;m not American, but if you are and you care, I would suggest you to call your representative and explain why you support (or not) this bill. Remember that as it goes through congress, it can, and most likely will, be heavily edited or gutted to fit the many competing interests whispering in their ears. If you think the bill is good as is, tell them that! Personally, I think the bill is perfect, except for the 100M user threshold to start demand compatibility, which I think should be lowered to 10M.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>vsskanth</author><text>Can interoperability and data portability still be legislatively mandated if APIs were ruled copyrightable in the Supreme Court (Oracle vs Google) ?&lt;p&gt;Can monopolies go further and claim their user graph and user data is also under copyright ?</text></comment>