https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cw4dd9lzx02o

There was a policy in place at this year's Eurovision to only permit people to bring in the flags of the 37 competing countries and the rainbow flag. This meant that it was not permitted to bring in the EU flag.

This policy also meant that the eventual winner Nemo was not allowed to bring in the non-binary flag, and had to sneak it in. Ireland's Bambie Thug wore a sort of trans flag bikini(? I don't know clothes) for their performance.

A spokesperson for the EBU said that this policy was the same as in 2023, but from what I've heard it wasn't as rigorously enforced in Liverpool. Every year there is a flag policy for the venue. Some years it's just specific flags being banned, e.g. that of ISIS.

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alphabet, amazon, apple, eu, europe, europeanCommission, facebook, google, meta, microsoft

Author: seanmpuckett

The European Commission opened non-compliance investigations under the Digital Markets Act into Alphabet's rules on steering in Google Play and self-preferencing on Google Search, Apple's rules on steering in the App Store and the choice screen for Safari and Meta's 'pay or consent model, as well as Amazon self-preferencing own branded products in searches -- all in violation of the requirements of the DMA.

The European Commission has opened formal proceedings to assess whether X may have breached the Digital Services Act (DSA) in areas linked to risk management, content moderation, dark patterns, advertising transparency and data access for researchers.

On the basis of the preliminary investigation conducted so far, including on the basis of an analysis of the risk assessment report submitted by X in September, X's Transparency report published on 3 November, and X's replies to a formal request for information, which, among others, concerned the dissemination of illegal content in the context of Hamas' terrorist attacks against Israel, the Commission has decided to open formal infringement proceedings against X under the Digital Services Act.

The proceedings will focus on the following areas:

• The compliance with the DSA obligations related to countering the dissemination of illegal content in the EU, notably in relation to the risk assessment and mitigation measures adopted by X to counter the dissemination of illegal content in the EU, as well as the functioning of the notice and action mechanism for illegal content in the EU mandated by the DSA, including in light of X's content moderation resources.
• The effectiveness of measures taken to combat information manipulation on the platform, notably the effectiveness of X's so-called ‘Community Notes' system in the EU and the effectiveness of related policies mitigating risks to civic discourse and electoral processes.
• The measures taken by X to increase the transparency of its platform. The investigation concerns suspected shortcomings in giving researchers access to X's publicly accessible data as mandated by Article 40 of the DSA, as well as shortcomings in X's ads repository.
• A suspected deceptive design of the user interface, notably in relation to checkmarks linked to certain subscription products, the so-called Blue checks.

_{not a fan of the Israel framing there, but... also not surprised}

The European Games Developer Federation calls for EU regulation on non-negotiable contracts in wake of Unity backlash

The Commissions should introduce a specific regulation for non-negotiable B2B contract terms. The regulation should provide sufficient time (e.g. in a minimum, six months) for markets to react to significant changes in non-negotiable terms and conditions that a service provider has communicated to their business users in a plain, clear and understandable manner (e.g. now it is unclear how Unity counts the installs). Furthermore, the Commission should bring much-needed market certainty by banning retroactive pricing and contract changes.

You not only played yourself, you potentially played all the greedy moneyghoul American companies.
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