Belgium Introduces “Freedom Fee” on US Commercial Software, Open Source Spared
Posted by Vegetable-Escape7412@reddit | linux | View on Reddit | 146 comments
Brussels — April 1, 2025
In a move that’s shaking up the tech world and raising eyebrows in Silicon Valley, the Belgian government has announced a groundbreaking new tariff: a “Freedom Fee” on all commercial software developed in the United States.
Effective immediately, the new regulation introduces a 17.76% tax on American-made proprietary software sold or used in Belgium — a number officials insist is “purely symbolic” and definitely not a cheeky nod to US independence.
“We believe in supporting software that reflects European values: openness, collaboration, and the joy of reading through thousands of lines of undocumented C code,” said Minister of Digital Affairs, Luc Verstegen, in a press conference held entirely via a LibreOffice Impress presentation. “This is not a punishment — it’s an encouragement to embrace open source. Also, Microsoft Excel crashed on us during the budget meetings.”
A Loophole for Libre
Under the new policy, open-source software is fully exempt. Government agencies have reportedly already begun transitioning from Adobe products to GIMP and Inkscape, with mixed emotional results.
Public schools will phase out commercial learning software in favor of “whatever runs on Linux Mint,” and the Finance Ministry has proudly announced that all future taxes will now be calculated using LibreOffice Calc macros, described by one insider as “a heroic but deeply confusing experience.”
US Tech Giants Respond
A spokesperson for a major US software company, who asked not to be named (but their name rhymes with “Macrosoft”), warned that this could spark a digital trade war.
“We support freedom — freedom to license, freedom to upsell, and freedom to crash during updates,” they said in a tersely worded Clippy-shaped press release.
FOSS Community Rejoices
Meanwhile, open-source developers worldwide are celebrating. GitHub has reported a spike in Belgian forks of previously dormant repos, including a sudden revival of interest in a 2003 Perl-based accounting tool named “MooseBudget.”
Local developer communities are planning a national holiday called “Libre Day,” during which Belgians will ceremonially uninstall commercial versions of antivirus software and replace them with open-source alternatives. Whether it’s a bold stand for digital sovereignty or just an elaborate April Fools’ prank with exceptional patch notes, one thing is clear: Belgium has officially ctrl-alt-deleted business as usual.
#AprilFools #DigitalSovereignty #OpenSource #TechPolicy #GovTech #SoftwareTax #Innovation #MadeInBelgium #FOSS #DigitalTransformation #CyberHumor #LinkedInHumor #EUtech
ZunoJ@reddit
Explicitly excluding free software from taxes is the best part of this joke
the_bighi@reddit
It doesn't mention free software.
ZunoJ@reddit
Open source software is free of charge by definition. After all you can just build it from the sources if you want
PandaMan12321@reddit
Just because all open source software is free, doesn't make all free software open source.
ZunoJ@reddit
Did I say or imply that anywhere? In the joke they impose taxes on US software but not open source, which is available free of charge. And that is what I said, nothing more
PandaMan12321@reddit
Your comment could be interpreted as all free software, not just open source free software
ArdiMaster@reddit
Sure, a percentage tax/tariff on free software wouldn’t work but the government is perfectly free to emplace other incentives/penalties against the use of OSS projects that have strong US influence. (Not that it would be wise considering the US influence on Linux.)
ZunoJ@reddit
How? If I can build the software from sources, how are they going to penalize me?
ArdiMaster@reddit
If you’re a business: declarations of conformity and audits. Probably not practical to enforce on individuals, I agree.
ZunoJ@reddit
Even if you're a business, how will they make the sources illegal? I don't know of any laws that would allow to specifically outlaw source code. As a business I can then adjust it a bit to compile my own version which wouldn't be the og version which might be outlawed as a binary
ArdiMaster@reddit
It would have to be like a compliance reporting thing. Every year or so, go through your software stack and write down: “we are using OSS project A, which has n US-based contributors and y% of code written by American contributors.”) If you only made minor changes, those percentages wouldn’t change much.) This gets submitted to some government entity that calculates and collects your “foreign OSS tax”.
ZunoJ@reddit
Were you ever involved in government audits? If so, do you think it is feasable to scale this up to every software used in every company in your whole economy?
ArdiMaster@reddit
Probably not feasible (but I’m German and “bogged down in procedures” is like our national motto at this point).
Also, “feasible” was never the goal in my thought experiment here, just “technically possible if the gov realllly wanted to piss everyone off”
ZunoJ@reddit
I'm german as well and my code is audited by two government agencies. It takes about twice as much time as it takes to write it (ball park estimate as this varies a lot by nature). I think it isn't even technically possible
shenic88@reddit
We need to do something to promote Free and Open Source software more. The most dumbest people are the people who run after pirate Windows. The most dumbest thing is, they don't even use Windows exclusive software, they just use that Pirate Windows to watch movies, listen to songs, make notes and browse internet using Google Chrome (mostly) !
AlvanR@reddit
Seeing this on 2nd of april; had my hopes up for a sec :(
EmbeddedSoftEng@reddit
I have a serious question. Assuming this is true, how exactly would they propose to collect the tax on software from the United States if it were open source?
JG_2006_C@reddit
Well force full gplv4 complyance no mit compnents alowed us the backed us us controled tax it
EmbeddedSoftEng@reddit
Trying to parse that sentence gave me an aneurysm. And to head off what I think you may have been trying to say, I'm not asking about the legal permission of a social contract permits the "act" of taxing something.
I'm asking for a software product that's freely tradeable across borders without fee or customs, how? By what mechanism, do you assign a tax amount to a digital commodity that is free (as in beer) and that your taxing authority has no mechanisms to prevent its free (as in speech) trade?
Sedlacep@reddit
It would be great if it weren’t an April Fool :(
aliendude5300@reddit
Seems likely to be an April fools joke, but I wouldn't blame them
ElMachoGrande@reddit
It's actually a good idea.
520throwaway@reddit
Sometimes the best ideas come from April fools jokes.
wwabbbitt@reddit
Gmail was released on April 1 after all.
CMDR_Arnold_Rimmer@reddit
They said "best ideas"
Argorian17@reddit
And the best news comes from The Onion. Weird times...
headedbranch225@reddit
Doesn't landfall release their games april 1st? I also know content warning was free last year today
bionicjoey@reddit
Pokemon Go
520throwaway@reddit
And on the topic of videogames, Yakuza: Like a Dragon.
Preisschild@reddit
Technically, sure, but practically we depend on US goodwill to ensure safety in Europe from actors like Ruzzia. The EU didnt step up to this responsibility yet.
ElMachoGrande@reddit
Russia has problems taking Ukraine. They probably will in the long run, but it's only one country. They can't take on the EU.
Preisschild@reddit
Yes, because the US doubled the EU help...
ElMachoGrande@reddit
Meh, we could take them without the US. What worries me is that it seems that the sides are changing, so we might have to fight the combined forces of Russia and US. We could take on either alone, but not both.
yoroxid_@reddit
not really as the average computer user in administration can't carry on the minimum knowledge to keep a Linux machine safe.
IMHO: those tariff and country 'fight' is just helping few billionaire to became more rich and powerful, we will end up like in Cyberpunk universe for real.
KnowZeroX@reddit
Like most don't know how to keep windows safe?
End of the day, why would they need to? Managements is always done by the tech department regardless what OS you use
yoroxid_@reddit
I am wandering why open source isn't an option on public sector and also many tech companies that rely on Mac
ElMachoGrande@reddit
No, but their admins can set ut up to enforce safety.
haufii@reddit
Maybe from a feel good standpoint, but I would be mad about a license price increase just as I would be about my government putting a tax on the services critical to my business functioning.
Not a good idea unless a tariff like this is somehow only passed on to the importer of said software, not the business owner.
QuadzillaStrider@reddit
That's literally how tariffs work. The importer always pays the tariff. They then pass the extra cost on to whoever they're importing it for, who passes it on to the end user. The business owner is always, always the one who ends up paying it.
haufii@reddit
Yes, that's what's implied but it never works out for the consumer...
Rhed0x@reddit
Most commercial software is SAAS anyway and it's probably next to impossible to regulate this in a way that wouldn't make it trivial to work around this by arguing that the customer is paying for support or something like that.
atomic1fire@reddit
Or use open source backends but the datasets are proprietary.
Like how AI companies work.
KnowZeroX@reddit
If the customer is only paying for support, then they have to offer the product free without support.
Suspect4pe@reddit
They'd just take whatever the monthly/yearly fees are. I don't see it as being trivial since that stuff is usually taxed as some rate anyway. I know at least in the US we have a sales tax on that kind of thing.
feel_the_force69@reddit
It's hilarious how good of an idea this is.
Cybernaut-Neko@reddit
I regret it's aprils fools but Belgian and particular Flemish politicians looooove that US cock like nothing else.
walterbanana@reddit
From the title alone you can tell it is a joke because Belgium cannot introduce tariffs. This would have to go through the EU.
aliendude5300@reddit
I'm not European so I didn't realize this. I thought any country could set their own taxes and tariffs
enginma@reddit
I hate this day. Totally had me.
derjanni@reddit
It's not like I'm already writing 30+ pages regulatory documentation for each software product as a EU citizen, already. Aren't April fools jokes supposed to be somewhat funny and not offensive?
_darth_plagueis@reddit
Are you writing 30+ pages of regulatory docs per software? This makes no sense.
the joke is funny to me, you found it offensive sonehow
derjanni@reddit
Why would this make no sense? The mandatory GDPR sub processor list is already 10+ pages for basic SaaS. Don’t get me started on NIS2 or AI Act documentation requirements.
_darth_plagueis@reddit
Is this for the users to write or are you a provider?
derjanni@reddit
This is for me as the software vendor to write. I am legally required to have all that at hand and no one other than lawyers ever ask for it.
deblike@reddit
Ay the very least not traumatizing.
Nestramutat-@reddit
Oh please no.
I work for a SaaS company where our #1 customer is the US. Thankfully my career isn't impacted by all this, and I'd like to keep it that way.
raptir1@reddit
How would you apply a tax to free software?
JG_2006_C@reddit
The mit componets and porytary backed componets
JG_2006_C@reddit
Eu plase make it real hop the swiss compy the same
Firethorned_drake93@reddit
With the current anti-america movement in Europe, I could actually see this happening xD
BC-Guy604@reddit
Not quite the same but you can spend way less on Microsoft licenses through G2A.com, a good way to keep less money flowing to America.
the_bighi@reddit
I wish this happened.
meagainpansy@reddit
They've been trying to do this for years.
Brufar_308@reddit
I thought they already did, but they call it VAT
meagainpansy@reddit
I should have been clearer. I meant they have been trying to move away from relying on Microsoft for years.
OttawaTGirl@reddit
Which is a 47% shame.
Microsoft has done a lot of work creating an ecosystem for office that is for, business, government, and education. With Government having a lot of say over what does and does not go into their deployments. Having a bought and curated ecosystem out of the box goes a long way.
LibreOffice doesn't quite behave as a unified product. Its still very much seperated, and you can't even get proper concensus on interface.
Their educational package is really sharp. And if taught properly, office can be a beast for human machine interaction.
It slaughters apple and google in fucnctionality and ability.
But the last couple years has seen microsoft become more douchy, and has lagged in rebuilding their apps. There are parts of word that have not been addressed in 25 years. A few simple upgrades and Office would be even more potent.
As for opensource alternatives? I have seen them fail more that succeed. You need a standard long term, unified goal, and i dont see it. Thats the paradox of microsoft. They dictate and isolate, but they fucking work.
(And all of this is with a big caveat that right now the Office, and windows direction is a shitshow that needs a massive change and rethink.)
tuborgwarrior@reddit
They purposefully suck at the open standard to keep their monopoly. Should be fined or broken up out of windows for this alone.
blind616@reddit
VAT is closer to a sales tax, and applies on all products. These recent tariffs are imposed to specially target and harm certain businesses or countries.
Swizzel-Stixx@reddit
That’s for everything though, anything and everything can bave VAT charged on it. Even made in europe stuff has vat charged, and some services too.
DoubleOwl7777@reddit
who can blame us? if the americans always vote fucktards into power we have to respond to that in some way.
meagainpansy@reddit
I mean, you can pretty much tell us where you live and we can tell you which far right party is on the verge of taking over.
JustSylend@reddit
wtf I legit can't believe Americans always think to themselves "nah my country is so great that even in its lowest the others must have it worse somehow!"
the far right parties are a problem but not close to taking over, that's just an under educated opinion
you don't need to defend US to us, we don't hate you specifically the American citizen, we hate the Walmart Putin you voted for a president and mostly make fun of how much you think the world revolves around you (it doesn't)
meagainpansy@reddit
No one said that other than you. You made it up in your head. My point was very obviously that it's not just the US voting fucktards into office.
France: RN
Germany: AfD
Italy: Brothers of Italy
Netherlands: PVV
Austria: FPO
This is a phenomenon reaching far beyond the US
You can think what you want about the world revolving around the US because no one said that other than you. But there isn't much debate about the military power of the US. It is absurdly and overwhelmingly powerful, which was once again my very obvious point. "What if Hitler had that"... Well, he almost does now. So you better hope we keep being the useless dipshits you like to think we are.
JustSylend@reddit
Yeah, Hitler is here and the US army is on their side, the same army that killed kids in Middle East. I won't bother
-LeopardShark-@reddit
Rule Brittania! rule the waves:
Britons never will vote-for-Farage-in-sufficiently-large-numbers-to-let-that-absolute-twat-into-government-despite-having-given-him-a-seat-being-a-national-disgrace-because-although-we’re-a-racist-country-we’re-less-racist-than-a-lot-of-other-places-and-a-huge-section-of-the-population-absolutely-despises-the-swine-so-when-it-comes-to-election-time-it-seems-unlikely-to-me-this-fraction-caves.
rx149@reddit
By voting in other fucktards?
aliendude5300@reddit
I wonder if hypothetically this did happen if Android devices would not be subject to tariffs but iPhones would. I imagine any system shipped with Mac or Windows would have the tariffs at 20% of the system value, not the software value
ZunoJ@reddit
Anti america movement in Europe? Aren't you mixing up who is anti and who is just reacting to orange nazi madness?
FrozenSoul326@reddit
but would it include video games?
nclok1405@reddit
If the game is developed in the US, then most likely yes.
However, commercial games with source code availability like Doom (1993) will likely be exempt.
12_Semitones@reddit
Sigh. Why didn’t I catch this right away? I got tricked up till the very end.
Minecodes@reddit
I would actually appreciate that. Our school has so many problems with Windows. You can't open 6 tabs in Firefox, Chrome or Edge on our school computers. Also, if you try to do any "advanced" work in Geogebra, you get a blue screen with the error: out of RAM. The computers didn't do that when they had Linux before Win10 (to be fair, it was Ubuntu 16.04 LTS while 20.04 was out).
Trennosaurus_rex@reddit
That’s not a Windows problem.
Minecodes@reddit
Then why is it only happening on Windows. When we had Linux, we had even worse hardware and it worked better
Omnizoa@reddit
When you saber rattle so hard you stab yourself in the leg.
xcorv42@reddit
It's a very small country the impact is insignifiant
Alienaffe2@reddit
Well. Time to switch to linux. Wait...
SandbagStrong@reddit
I could kindof see them doing it. We like making a big political stance without thinking about the consequences. E.g. Legalising sex work without considering that we already have a huge shortage of accountants and that accountants don't want to touch sex work with a ten foot pole.
RealSharpNinja@reddit
If I was a publisher and this was passed, I would raise the price by 200% of the tariff for all government agencies.
silenceimpaired@reddit
I wonder if today’s date has any bearing on this post.
RealSharpNinja@reddit
On my comment? No, dead serious. Do you honestly think a government, with all of it's beauracracy, could afford NOT to renew their contracts or buy licenses?
silenceimpaired@reddit
No I mean the post you are responding to. Your comment makes perfect sense. These companies have a monopoly and if a country targets your removal you might as well make the transition painful for them.
RealSharpNinja@reddit
Yup! And good luck filling the void.
culo_de_mono@reddit
Never gonna give you uo, never gonna let you down... xDD
AlarmingAffect0@reddit
Never gonna tell a lie, and HURT you.
AlarmingAffect0@reddit
I like this dood.
mwyvr@reddit
Not a bad April 1 effort. Kudos.
ViewPsychological933@reddit
I know it was a joke when I saw Belgium, no way our government would be this fast.
Raphi_55@reddit
Belgian police would be screwed big time!
Donny_Krugerson@reddit
I assume this is an April fool's joke, but it's a brilliant idea. All of Europe should do this.
perkited@reddit
The link does contain "aprilfools", so I would have to assume it is. I'm sure it will slip by a large number of people though.
79215185-1feb-44c6@reddit
Irrelevant country does something irrelevant.
Anyways...
Larssogn1@reddit
Typical American, doing typical American things.
meagainpansy@reddit
You better hope we keep doing American things. Imagine if Hitler had control of this.
NostraDavid@reddit
Hitler got defeated by the Communists.
meagainpansy@reddit
It's more like Hitler got defeated by the Allies, which included the Communists.
clotifoth@reddit
Typically Euros say this on posts where Americans are just existing somewhere, not bothering anyone
That's what I don't get
Alex_ragnar@reddit
Now say it without crying
clotifoth@reddit
Irrelevant commentary.
Opti_span@reddit
Yep, but clearly you’re an American, every American is the same!
cpufreak101@reddit
I love how they had to note open source would be spared as otherwise all Linux derivatives would be banned (although originally started as a European project, Linus moved to the US and gained US citizenship, and as the top maintainer of the Kernel, legally makes Linux a US based product. It has already been subject of US regulations, especially in regards to tech transfers to Russia)
Raccoon_Steven@reddit
Just put them on a blacklist.
Historical-Bar-305@reddit
This is good move only when you have alternatives.
Confident_Dig_4828@reddit
There is always alternative, if there weren't one, there will be one. It's the whole point of tariff
Historical-Bar-305@reddit
Linux just cant replace windows in many aspects like macOS cant do this (for now at least).there is no 100% alternatives.
Confident_Dig_4828@reddit
I didn't read the link, but operating system is not software.
Deathnote_Blockchain@reddit
Is this going to be one of those 4/1s where everything is like "why is this not a joke, this needs to actually happen"
Gamer1500@reddit
I was disappointed when I realized this is an April fools joke.
computer-machine@reddit
Right? But also, 0.1776×0.00=0.00?
serpikage@reddit
activation keys are a thing
Beautiful_Crab6670@reddit
In a realistic scenario, that'd make U, S of A respond by quadruplicating taxes on non-us-related software.
CammKelly@reddit
As a practical idea, there is a certain amount of legs to the idea. That being said, you would want to see heavy investment from the Government to curate replacements before implementation, otherwise all you just achieved is a 20%* tax on your own businesses.
Beginning_Deer_735@reddit
As a U.S. citizen, I have no problem with this. Open-source is the way to go, and Microsoft is evil.
Sndr666@reddit
First time I am sad it is a joke.
totemo@reddit
Belgium, man! Belgium!
Brynjar-Spear111@reddit
Commercial software is CRINGE!
SIMULATAN@reddit
Wait, this would actually be fire
povertyminister@reddit
Then we would have a chance to make our own software, as they do in China. Oh, I get it. It was a joke.
BranchAble2648@reddit
Amazing, but Macrosoft does not rhyme with Microsoft :*
FTFreddyYT@reddit
Lads, nobody pays for windows. 😂
Massgrave Ahoi 🏴☠️
debu_chocobo@reddit
Belgium can't levy its own tariffs, being in the EU. Shame, it would be brilliant for all sorts of open source software.
redcaps72@reddit
April fools used to be funny
ninzus@reddit
You got my hopes up only to tell me none of it is true :(
williamdorogaming@reddit
yay! 1/4/2025 ohhh…
ZunoJ@reddit
I know it is a joke but generally this is something that should be done in one way or another but I think we should stop to enforce american copy rights. That would hurt a lot more than tariffs
Snowrunner31102024@reddit
April 1st, the only day when people question what they read on the internet.
ilolvu@reddit
Nice one.
MattyGWS@reddit
It’s April fools but give it 24 hours
enoughsaid05@reddit
On another note, Trump denounces Linux as communist and threatens 300% tax on Linux.
Oh wait…
Unusual_Ad2238@reddit
May a dinosaur from space come down and eat you up. You mofo! I had my hopes up. <__<
Finerfings@reddit
"and the joy of reading through thousands of lines of undocumented C code"
Can't believe it took me until this point to catch on
housepanther2000@reddit
Good move by Belgium!
AdPast8718@reddit
Europe does realize that they don't have any software they can't use that is not American Windows, Linux, and Macos, right?
jaskij@reddit
Just fucking enforce GDPR already...
Stilgar314@reddit
You gave me until "the joy of reading through thousands of lines of undocumented C code"
LordAnchemis@reddit
Not an issue - if you use free as in free beer :)