Will the EU's new law change the digital landscape? | Opinion
Rob Fahey
Contributing Editor
Friday 8th July 2022
Following years of negotiation, the European Union's Digital Markets Act has now cleared the European Parliament -- pretty much the final major legislative hurdle it faced ahead of being adopted into law, which is now scheduled to happen towards the end of this year, meaning that legal obligations under the Act will come into force in spring of 2023.
The Act is a pretty big deal in terms of the regulation of tech giants, being arguably the most ambitious attempt yet by any major government or international organisation to control the way that huge companies run platforms that are vital to the success and functioning of many other businesses.
No matter which side of the issue the EU fell on, it was always going to be controversial, and now that the text of the Act is locked down, it is being widely scrutinised to try to understand what the real-world impact of its provisions will be.
There's some clarity about that already, not least because quite a few of the Act's provisions are relatively straightforward -- but the devil, as ever, is in the details, and the specifics of how the Act is interpreted, implemented and enforced will not really start to shake out until next year.
On paper, though, this is a hugely consequential piece of legislation for the games business, especially in Europe but also perhaps in other parts of the world. It fundamentally changes some underlying rules about how major tech platforms are regulated, and while its provisions will only apply within the borders of the EU, the sheer scale of that market will likely see the knock-on effects of the regulations spilling out into other regions as well.
What makes the DMA so significant for games is that
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