I’m bald.

Ancient Roman satirical poet Juvenal wrote that all people care about are “bread and circuses” over 2,000 years ago and it still applies.

I think it mostly comes down to baby duck syndrome. People don’t like using a package manager for programs on their desktop but are fine using an app store on their phone (which might literally be running linux). People simply expect a desktop computer to work a specific way and when things are in different spots and called different things they get upset. I think it’s changing as more companies bake Linux into their product.

Steam Decks running Linux changes people’s impression of it. If a mainstream company sold desktop computers that came with Linux preinstalled I’m sure its use would skyrocket. It’s not that it’s impossible for the average user to understand, It’s that it’s not the default option.

Michael Cera. He does a good job, but the whole time you’re waiting for him to do his “awkward teenager” character.

The sidebar also says “this is an inclusive community” followed by a rule that excludes 50% of the planet.

“Why should you go to jail for a crime someone else noticed?”

Please don’t judge my sleep schedule, Nagatoro-san!

Plot twist: he has a foot fetish.

Ah yes…that’s why I downloaded them too…

Alright, this is just silly.

Yes, my friends don’t support me. Thanks random internet person.

I’m the only one in my friend group that watches anime and it led to them making lots of pedo jokes at my expense. I’m not a pedo and my friends know that. It’s just a running joke. And then they make a joke when someone new is around and everyone needs to explain I’m not actually a pedo…

Maybe I come off wrong in text? I wasn’t trying to be an ass. I don’t think any of my comments were rude. There’s a comment in this thread calling someone a cuck with upvotes. I’d say that’s being an ass. I was just trying to be realistic.

I’ve never said don’t sign it. I’m saying don’t be surprised when the EU declines to change laws. It’s probably going to take more than a petition to actually see change.

It’s not mutually exclusive. I’d suggest people do as many things as they can.

A boycott of the worst companies. I’ve seen lots of people commenting they’re never buying an Ubisoft game again under pretty much every article in relation to them. Perhaps boycotts haven’t worked in the past but this seems to have enough support and momentum that it could have a real direct impact. Recently, boycotts have been pretty impactful as the world has stopped buying US products and within the US, conservative groups have influenced many companies with boycott and social media campaigns against companies. It’s also something that all supporters globally can participate in rather than everyone just hoping a European law might affect products purchased elsewhere.

The petition was a great way to gauge support, but I feel like people are going all in on its success and when the EU parliament likely issues its “we take consumer protection seriously which is why we already have the best laws in the world and don’t need to change anything” statement, people are just going to act defeated. There’s going to be a doomer post about how the EU parliament is corrupt and piratesoftware is the devil that gets 1000 upvotes and then that’ll be it instead of using the support and momentum in a more direct and impactful way.

There are lots of ways to make a change. It shouldn’t be all in on a single petition and that’s it. That’s not how social and political changes happen.

Most of those resulted in “the laws in place are already good enough” responses. From your links

The EU response to stop vivisection:

The Commission considers that the Directive on the protection of animals used for scientific purposes (Directive 2010/63/EU), which the Initiative seeks to repeal, is the right legislation to achieve the underlying objectives of the Initiative. It sets full replacement of animals as its ultimate goal as soon as it is scientifically possibly, and provides a legally binding stepwise approach as non-animal alternatives become available. Therefore, no repeal of that legislation was proposed

The EU response to Save the Bees:

In its reply, the Commission underlined that rather than proposing new legislative acts, the priority is to ensure that the proposals currently being negotiated by the co-legislators are timely adopted and then implemented, together with an effective implementation of the CAP.

The EU response to Stop Finning:

the Commission commits to better enforce the EU’s already strong traceability measures by strengthening the enforcement of EU law that applies to the entire value chain - control of fishing at sea, full traceability of shark products from landing to consumer, consumer information, and prevention and redress of illegal trade - and ensuring the collection and reporting of complete and reliable information by fishermen and Member States’ authorities on all these aspects.

It is! It wasn’t created because of an online petition!

Oh I don’t know… how about banning glyphosate,

Glyphosate isn’t banned in the EU. From the EU website: “Glyphosate is currently approved as an active substance in the EU until 15 December 2033”.

There was a petition to ban it, but the response was “On the first aim, to ‘ban glyphosate-based herbicides’, the Commission concluded that there are neither scientific nor legal grounds to justify a ban of glyphosate, and will not make a legislative proposal to that effect.”

the Clean Water Directive received major updates as a direct result of collecting 1.80 million signatures.

You might mean the Drinking Water Directive, and 1.6 million signatures.

I see some press releases on updates, but I can’t find anything outside of government websites saying things have improved. I’d imagine if this was a big deal there’d be news stories on it.

Which EU law stemming from this process is your favourite?