The European Commission has unveiled what it bills as an ambitious reform of the digital marketplace and it clearly appears to deliver on that billing. It includes proposed new rules for social media, online markets, ISPs, and other platforms that operate in the European Union, as well as a definition of who qualifies as a digital "gatekeeper" and stiff penalties for gatekeepers who get out of their lanes.

The new rules were set out in the Digital Services Act and the Digital Markets Act.

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The Digital Service Act covers network infrastructure companies, access providers, domain name registrars, cloud hosting services, online marketplaces like Amazon, app stores, and social media platforms, with tougher rules for "very large" platforms, which the EC says pose "particular risks in the dissemination of illegal content and societal harms."

The reforms include transparency reporting, complaint and redress mechanisms, vetting third-party suppliers, user-facing transparency about online advertising, external audits, sharing data with authorities and researchers, codes of conduct, and more.

The goal of the act is to "improve the mechanisms for the removal of illegal content and for the effective protection of users’ fundamental rights online, including the freedom of speech," as well as to strengthen public oversight of online platforms, particularly those very large platforms that reach over 10% of the EU population--Facebook, Amazon, etc.

The Digital Markets Act is "a set of narrowly defined objective criteria for qualifying a large online platform as a so-called 'gatekeeper.'" If they meet the definition, they will have a list of "do's and don'ts" that apply to their daily operations.

A company will be considered a gatekeeper if it: (1) "has a strong economic position, significant impact on the internal market and is active in multiple EU countries"; (2) "has a strong intermediation position, meaning that it links a large user base to a large number of businesses"; and (3) "has (or is about to have) an entrenched and durable position in the market, meaning that it is stable over time."

Any company to which those apply (1) must allow for interoperability by third parties in certain situations; (2) must allow businesses to access the data they generate when they use a gatekeeper platform: (3) must provide advertisers tools and info to verify the their ads on the gatekeeper platform, and 4) allow business users to contract with customers outside the platform.

Those are the do's--or, more accurately, "musts." The don'ts include (1) favoring their own services or products in rankings; (2) preventing consumers from linking to businesses outside the platform; and (3) preventing the de-installation of pre-installed software or apps.

Failure to do or not do what they are supposed to could result in fines up to 10% of a company's total annual worldwide sales and periodic payments of up to 5% of average daily sales.

“As representatives of the world’s leading companies across all the segments of industry, we recognise our shared responsibility to maintain a safe, competitive, and innovative online environment,” said Guido Lobrano, of tech association ITI. “All relevant stakeholders need to work together towards these goals. While ITI and its members will develop detailed views on the legislative proposals in the coming weeks, we support the Commission’s effort to safeguard citizens from illegal content online and will continue to advocate for rules that maintain a well-functioning, competitive online ecosystem. We look forward to discussing these and further aspects of today’s proposals with the European institutions in the coming weeks. We are committed to serving as a useful resource to all stakeholders involved in the process.”

But ITI did not like the designation of "gatekeeper," which it found pejorative. "There should be no negative implication attached by default to companies designated as gatekeeper under the DMA criteria," it said, adding that it was not appropriate for the legislation "to label the designated companies with an inherently negative definition. This designation is only a prerequisite to attach more stringent obligations to platforms that play a systemic role in a market. Talking about a 'provider of core platform services' would be, for example, more appropriate."

John Malone’s international cable operator Liberty Global moved closer to domination in the land of Hans Brinker and wooden footwear Friday, receiving approval from the European Commission that helps pave the way toward completion of its planned acquisition of Dutch cable company Ziggo.

“We are pleased that the European Commission has approved our pending acquisition of Ziggo, which will benefit consumers and businesses across the Netherlands given our commitment to investment and innovation in the Dutch market,” Liberty Global CEO Mike Fries said in a statement. “We are excited to create a national cable champion, and look forward to restarting our share buyback program very soon."

Liberty Global, which already owns a 28.7% interest in Ziggo, announced in January its plan to acquire the rest of the company for about $13.7 billion.  With the addition of Ziggo’s 2.7 million subscribers, Liberty Global – which already has about 3.7 million Dutch cable customers through its UPC Netherlands unit – would reach about 90% of homes in the country. According to the Commisson, the combined company would control between 60% and 70% of pay TV subscribers in the Netherlands.

“The approval from the European Commission is an important milestone in the process of combining two individual cable companies into a strong national provider for Dutch consumers,” Ziggo supervisory board chairman Andrew Sukawaty said in a statement. “Both the Management and Supervisory Board have unanimously recommended the offer to shareholders as we believe it is in the best interests of Ziggo and its stakeholders, including shareholders.”

To help with approval of the deal, Liberty Global agreed to divest of its Film1 premium pay TV channel and to terminate clauses in its carriage contracts with content companies that limit their ability to offer programming over the Internet. Liberty Global also agreed not to include such clauses in any of its carriage agreements with programmers for eight years.

"The commitments offered by Liberty Global ensure that the acquisition of Ziggo will not be detrimental to Dutch consumers, who will continue to enjoy the benefits of innovative services and choice for watching audio visual content,” Commission vice president in charge of competition policy Joaquín Almunia said in a statement.

Liberty Global expects the deal to be closed by next month.