I’ve got my hamster gifs warm and ready for Ofcom’s next set of letters

Another interesting pivot: usually enforcement correspondence is confidential. 4chan published all the letters which was incredibly politically damaging in the US. Now Ofcom is *asking* targets to publish the letters, meaning they're trying to play the same game

Of course, the problem is that big(ger) tech companies lack the institutional capacity to properly fight the UK. Their legal teams will not allow it, the business teams won't accept the price of walking away/being blocked/not going on vacation in London. So they comply.

Big tech companies also won't do (and arguably can't do) what little tech did, which was to centralize the response in a single legal team so we could see all moving parts in one place. The big boys all want to not be the slowest gazelle. They will not coordinate their defense.

Ultimately, as a solo practitioner I am limited in what I can do to stop foreign censors being successful on US soil. I can keep them away from my clients, which means I can probably scare them off of 99% of US websites The majors won’t run my playbook, so they’re on their own

What this means is that UK regulators have figured out that their effective reach is limited to companies with UK footprint. Which is fair enough, the UK is sovereign over its own territory. But they still claim the power to regulate Americans on American soil.

Australia figured this out, by targeting a dozen of the largest companies for its social media ban and leaving 4chan alone. The eSafety Commissioner there is American and thus understands the nature of the obstacle our country presents.