US Court nullifies FTC requirement for click-to-cancel

From a different article [1]:

> But the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit said the FTC erred in its rulemaking process by failing to produce a preliminary regulatory analysis, a statutory requirement for rules whose annual effect on the national economy would exceed $100 million.

> The FTC had argued that it was not required to prepare the preliminary analysis because its initial estimate of the rule’s impact on the national economy was under the $100 million threshold — even though ultimately the presiding officer determined the impact exceeded the threshold.

This is a case where congress really did pass a concrete law, and the court is requiring the FTC to follow it. Sucks that a reasonable rule is getting voided for the sloppiness but I really don't think the courts are indefensibly out of line.

[1] https://thehill.com/policy/technology/5390731-appeals-court-...

It's interesting that businesses can build an obviously toxic subscription model that robs consumers of both money and time, but when asked to change it now we have to consider their costs.

I understand the idea behind the threshold for changing rules but this still feels very broken. There is a constant struggle of having to do everything perfectly to make any positive progress, but bad actors can operate however they like with seemingly little repercussions.

While I share your frustration, I don't think we should lower the bar for positive progress. Because that's how one becomes a bad actor themselves.

The bar should be where changes happen to move in the correct direction easily, while moving in the incorrect direction harder. If the rule was to "force companies to have confusing cancel processes", the rulemaking process would have zero burdens, because the "potential gains" of doing so would be enormous.

That is easy to say. However I don't think you can define "correct direction" in a useful way that also gets at what you mean. Every definition you can come up with someone will find a loop hole that fits the letter of your definition, while it is against what you mean.

By putting process in place for rules we give us time to notice bad rule proposals and give us a process to stop them.