Why use this endnote approach in writing for the web? Make useful links here, so the reader can go directly from your sentence to the relevant provision, substantiating what you are saying and dealing with the text itself rather than paraphrase.

The question with which you title the essay is a good one, but it was never even slightly answered. Instead we have only a paraphrase of statutory material never actually used or discussed, and a series of lightly-expressed policy arguments that don't tell us what the point is. So, in the next draft, let's try to find out what is the point:

1. Why do we have "data protection"? Is the point to protect data, or people? If we are protecting people, what is the harm apprehended, and how does law prevent harm?
2. Are these rules based on contractual freedom? If so, why should we not expect them to be contracted around? If not, what is the condition of market failure or the theory of liability on which the regulation displaces private ordering?
3. What is the point of having rules that contradict US constitutional free speech guarantees with respect to the operation of US companies? Is the EC trying to create a barrier to market entry consisting of an abandonment of free speech values, the way the Peoples' Republic of China demands censorship in return for market access? If so, is this wise long-term public policy, or just a form of pandering to younger voters, now that the most important possible issue for European regulation---the control of mobile phone roaming charges---has occurred and there is no actual encore available?