This paper is part of Regulating the sharing economy , a special issue of Internet Policy Review guest-edited by Kristofer Erickson and Inge Sørensen. Disclaimer: This study was completed with the support of the German service sector union ver.di. We would like to thank the participating platforms and their communities for the opportunity to
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This study analyses the online discourse related to the failure of two internet policy initiatives in two democratic countries: Germany and the United States.
“Digital” is written big in the coalition agreement , which was signed to give way to the new German government. Will this propell Germany onto the front seat in international internet politics.
Currently dominant cloud services raise challenges in terms of security, privacy and user autonomy. Decentralisation, advocated by civil society, may overcome some of the drawbacks.
There are significant dangers in surveilling online communications unless the mechanisms and policies of surveillance are subject to strict and legally enforceable standards of transparency, oversight, and control.
Apple in Germany: the potentially long-lasting impact of a short judgment
Until the early days of June, Apple still has time to appeal against a Court ruling that nobody expects the tech company can afford to accept. The Berlin Regional Court in April decided [ PDF ] Apple's data protection directives were illegal according to German law. Will Apple appeal the decision? Yes, says everybody except Apple itself.
In Europe, education and free knowledge are subject to political restrictions that can only be effectively changed on the EU level. Wikimedia, the not-for-profit organisation behind the online encyclopaedia Wikipedia, believes this. The organisation could therefore soon open an office in Brussels to participate in the future debates about a