Internet's biggest annoyance: Cookie laws should target browsers, not websites

The problem here is the problem everywhere; we still as a world have no remotely effective way to actually punish companies-as-bad-actors on the internet or in tech generally.

None of any technical ANYTHING matters until we (meaning law and government) inflict truly meaningful consequences. Fines, breaking up companies, perhaps even jail time, etc.

We have ways to do these things.

We just refuse to use them, because our politicians either believe that companies should have more rights than we do, or are terrified that if they actually try to enforce the law on them they'll lose out on massive amounts of campaign contributions (whether direct or indirect).

Yes. The problem isn't the letter of the law, it's that governing bodies like the EU need something like an enforcement czar who tells companies in no uncertain terms that if they're going to try to be clever they're going to get the ol' Jack Ma treatment. Stop letting the tail wag the dog.

And before someone says that it will hamper innovation, I used to live in China and talk to investors often, they would always stress that for every guy with a billion who can't play by the rules there's a thousand guys with a million who have no problem taking the market share, that's hardly an issue