zlacker

>>bwb+(OP)
Americans fail to appreciate a few things about our economy

1. We have a large homgoneous market where you can build a product and it’s expected it can succeed for hundreds of millions of Americans

2. EU is the easiest second market, and another step change of hundreds of millions of customers in a somewhat unified market

3. there’s not an easy 3rd economy that replaces EUs wealth, population, and comfort with English + technology

When we piss everyone off in the EU tech company growth gets kneecapped and limited to US / Canada. Theres not an easy market to expand to without much deeper focus on that specific market and its needs, for much fewer returns.

>>softwa+Fk
Don't take the Canadian market for granted.

There's a strong desire to forge closer links with the EU now and reduce dependence on products that could be weaponized against us at any time. Geographic proximity doesn't count for much when it comes to software.

>>beloch+aL
Canada is subject to the Monroe doctrine. Forge a link too close and there will be intervention of sorts.

>>alexey+9s2
Threats only works if the threatened entity thinks they can avoid them via compliance.

Tariffs come anyway, both Canada and Denmark are under threat of annexation, and ICC suspensions of Microsoft emails show that governments cannot rely on US tech.

>>Ravus+Tu2
Yes, or as Cory Doctorow put it: "So now we have tariffs, and if someone threatens to burn your house down unless you follow orders, and then they burn it down anyway, you really don’t have to keep following their orders."

https://doctorow.medium.com/https-pluralistic-net-2025-12-16...