Slashdot Mirror
Another Publisher Challenges Legality of Links
NewtonsLaw writes: "It seems that the legality of hypertext linkiing has once a gain been called into question according to
this story running on Wired.com.
As the former online publisher of 7am.com, I was once threatened by the Nando Times in a similar manner when I was linking to their stories.
Local TV broadcaster TVNZ also made all sorts of noise about the illegality of linking to their content
back in 1966 but have since come to their senses.
Over the years I've had similar bitchy complaints from a number of online publishers who simply haven't worked out that links from other sites are something to be encouraged because the drive traffic and boost search-engine ratings.
A great resource for those interested in the history, opinions and law on the matter of the legality of linking is the
Link Controversy page created and maintained by Stefan Bechtold.
Most publishers eventually realize that trying to block linking through the courts is a really dumb thing to do -- but there's always someone who simply doesn't get it."
about the illegality of linking to their content back in 1966 but have since
1966? Excellent prior art for the BT patent!!
Those New Zealanders are more advanced than I thought. But still not enough to get the World Cup. Go you Wallabies!
Those guys had a website up even before Arpanet was functional? Now that's innovative.
Under NO circumstances can anybody link to my site. There's nothing I hate more than seeing links to my site all over the place. Fucking links...
'Course, back then we didn't have no fancy new-fangled Pee Cees ta link with. We had ta write our "web pages" on paper, and instead of a link, we wrote down driving directions for how to find the specified document. Porn 'taint no fun when ya gotta drive 250 miles o' back country roads ta find it. I tell ya, the Interweb was different back then... we had ta use REAL superhighways instead o' this Information Superhighway.
"Destroy science and religion. Science would re-emerge exactly the same; but not religion." - Penn Jillette, paraphrased
There are sites out there that block outside linking, they figure out that you're being redirected and send you to a nice outside linking not allowed page.
Why can't these fools just do that.
Free Mac Mini
I find this 'you're not allowed to link to me' mentallity hilarious. As we all know a link is no more than electronic 'word of mouth' or a sign post. The arrogance that goes along with "you're not allowed to tell people where our public content" is beyond me.. and let's face it, anything on the web IS for public viewing.
It may be copyrighted, but that's not the same as 'no public access'.
The article makes reference to "deep links". If sites are so worried about that, why don't they just do what the NYTimes does and require that people register to be able to read specific pages? Anyway, lots of sites, /. included, are encouraging people to link/import to headline pages by using the Netscape .rdf files. I could understand sites getting narked at people who, say, directly used <img src> to access images on their site, but hyperlinks... what's wrong with that?
It takes about 2 seconds for them to configure their webserver to check Referrer headers and deny deep link requests from another site. Either they are so stupid that they don't deserve to own a website at all, or they are so evil that they'd rather order everyone else in the world around instead of simply fixing their own problems. Either way, it would not be a pity if some outraged activist took a pair of wire cutters to their Internet connection.
Is Holger Rosendal Danish for Hilary Rosen? They're cloning these assholes, those corporate jerks!
here is an idea from now on write to the editor or webmaster of the wensite..asking permission if they get enough of these eamils then they will stop emailing
Didn't realize that hyperlinking was so prevalent way back when I was still in 3-corner pants :-)
That aside;
"Deep-linking is the nature of the Internet. It is without question the killer application for the World Wide Web," Thorborg added. "It will be a very sad day for the entire Internet if the Danish Newspaper Association wins this case."
This quote says it all. When will these idiots realize that they aren't helping themselves? Don't they want traffic driven to their site? I thought that was the whole idea of having a web-site.
I dunno, maybe I'm the one who's missing something here...
"Michael, I did nothing. I did absolutely nothing - and it was everything that I thought it could be."
I laughed when I saw 1966. It's a typo, the article is from 1996. Duh.
Anyway, I'm reminded of something from the currently ongoing bnetd fiasco: The EFF linked to a Penny Arcade comic on the subject. Penny Arcade doesn't agree with the EFF and said, "Instead of linking to the comic, please link to the rant." One guy from the EFF said, "OK" and removed the link, then an hour later the link was back and an email arrived saying "Linking's perfectly legal, we'll do as we like." So PA changed the target of the URL to some messed up thing involving dogs and some old guy. Very amusing.
Moral: if you don't want someone linking to you, don't raise a fuss, just mess with your referrer permissions and all.
[o]_O
I just don't get it. IANAL, BMMI (but my mom is), and it just doens't make sense. This information is posted in the public domain, ok? Now, as long as you give credit it should be fine. An analogy is this: when you are quoting from a book do you have to include the whole fscking book in your quote? No, you don't. As long as you give credit it is fine. The theory being if it is interesting enough they just might buy the book - the same thing should apply to webpages. These people should be jumping for joy they are being linked to especially because they derive numerous benefits - including a higher google rank =). My god, if you can quote sections of newspapers why can't you link to them? Argh. Oh well stupid people shouldn't breed...
.. Hilary Rosen. I dunno. Coincidence? I think not.
One last odd tidbit:
Holger Rosendal, spokesman for the Danish Newspaper Publishers' Association (DNPA)
Holger Rosendal
. . . that if you don't want people linking to something, you shouldn't put in on the Internet! Come on, how hard is this? Anything that is on a public server is fair game. That's the whole point of the Internet.
This message contains No Text because THE SUBJECT SAYS IT ALL!!!
wow, so they had a problem with one of the 17 existing links back then?!
MARIJUANA, SHROOMS, X: ONLINE?! - E
If they're so paranoid about deep-linking, fix your webserver to check the referrer property of the HTTP request, and direct them to the main page if it wasn't an internal link.
This is TRIVIAL to do on most webservers through cgi scripts... however you now have to deliver all your content through CGI (or SSI, or PHP, or ASP, or whatever), which is pretty common on websites these days anyways.
Stop bitchin if you can fix your own problem with minimal effort.
MadCow.
I used to have a sig, but I set it free and it never came back.
It seems to me that a company would WANT traffic to its website. IMO, linking is similar to verbally telling a person, "Well, if thats what you're looking for, then 'Company X' might be a good choice for you." Its basically a free form of advertisement, and companies are discouraging it?
What if I said "My political opponent said somthing alarming on page 56 of his new book." Does "the user ... experience something different from what [he] intended" and if so am I therefore not allowed to refer to pages of his book, only to say the book name and tell the audience to find the quote themselves?
Sound pretty rediculous when put in terms of a physical medium. Not to mention my 1st amendment right to say "such and shuch information can be found at this and that location."
"You saved 1968." - Ms. Valerie Pringle to the crew of Apollo 8
I don't see what the problem with links is when the matter is thought about logically. Deep links may bring people past advertisements, but (how can any company not realize this?) it is generally going to be a 1-time bypass that exposes people to their content, and possible gets them more readers.
As far as the legality of it goes, claiming any types of links is just totally absurd. If I walk through the streets with a sign on my chest that says "McDonald's is on 18th street and 6th avenue," would my actions warrant a lawsuit? I admit IANAL, but let's hope not. It seems to me that all websites, unless they require registration (as suggested in the post), should be considered partially public places, as they are more or less freely accessible. Will it soon be illegal for me to bookmark webpages that aren't homepages, because I'm accessing material while bypassing the author's intended starting point? That does not seem like much of a reach if what ol' Bruce Sunstein advocates becomes law.
It depends on how nasty you want to be.
Fight Spammers!
The problem isn't linking.. it's deep-linking for profit.
Isn't this the same sort of thing as the virus/hacking type technology? I mean viruses and hacking are illegal, but its still a matter of measures/countermeasures. Is not the ability to link or block links going to be a function of measures/countermeasures regardless of whatever laws that may get passed?
--"The best argument against democracy is a five minute conversation with the average voter." - Winston Churchill
There isn't any way a lawyer would get billable hours for a solution like that, therefore it isn't viable.
Just like with the Amazon used book controversy, author's of content should be able to control what happens to it when they create it. If someone doesn't WANT their story linked, they should be able to say no. If someone doesn't WANT their book sold used, then they should be able opt out of having a used listing next to their new one. I'm tired of seeing arguments like "well this is good for them so they shouldn't be griping". Let them make their own judgements about what's good for them
You are kidding, right? You do realize you are placing your web server
voluntarily on a public Internet? If it bugs you so much, why don't you
just use a firewall and block everyone except those lucky few who you
want to have access. Also, please post your web server IP address so
we can slashdot the hell out of it.
Why do you have a website again?
"...claiming any types of links is just totally absurd..."
That should be: "...claiming any type of links is illegal is just totally absurd..."
Oh, so if I go to your website without your permission it is stealing? Well,
If website = on public domain then
I don't have permission = tough shit;
print("Take website out of public domain");
I just have my server redirect people that directly link to a page I don't want them to (irc channel server list for example) to a nice little javascript.open infinate loop a la beast & oldie porn ads, goatse.cx, and the little thing that resizes to full screen and says "Hey everybody, I'm looking at gay porno!" Oh, and I do mark pages I do not want linked as being so repeatedly. I figure if they want to be dicks, they deserve it.
Any sufficiently advanced influence is indistinguishable from control.
sshhh
Don't moderate flamebait as Troll. Know the difference or you will be Meta-moderated.
... my only experience with macs is a 68040 I had, but there used to be a control panel that let you use the numerical keypad as a mouse.
Accessibility or Handicap Options or something like that.
Tim
Omnia vestra castrorum habetur nobis.
If you host an http server on the internet, you are inviting people to look around. The nature of the web is that a web page is open unless proven otherwise. It is like a store with no locks on the door. If it is locked then I won't go in. If the door is wide open, I will go in.
If someone puts a big sign up to tell me that they don't want me to go in and I go in anyway, then I am doing something wrong, but not until.
Bye!
I can't believe that none of you got the joke/irony here. Calling someone collect means that they get to choose whether to pay to talk to you. Requesting a page from a web server means that the web server gets to choose whether to give you the page (possibly based on your referrer, etc). It is exactly like calling collect - the choice is entirely up to the responder, not the requester.
Basically aozilla agrees with everyone else, he/she just didn't include the smiley so that you could get the joke. So here it is:
:)
Your right to not believe: Americans United for Separation of Church and
Bravo! Thanks for explaining that to the humor-impaired.
T'was a (almost) brilliant troll... hehehe
You are kidding, right?
Yes, I was making an analogy to spam.
You do realize you are placing your web server voluntarily on a public Internet?
Just as people are with their mail server.
If it bugs you so much, why don't you just use a firewall and block everyone except those lucky few who you want to have access.
I ask the same question of those who believe spam should be illegal.
You're wrong about referrer checking being uncommon. Many sites that use the Adult Check system or other subscription/age verification service have one main page which allows ID checking and keep their artwork and content on other pages. How to protect the artwork? The referrer header is quite commonly used to ensure that only link requests from the same site are honored. Of course this header can be forged by a dedicated pir8, but the forger would have to have prior knowledge of where the artwork was located and probably has a Adult Check subscription anyhow to know that.... the real benefit is that "deep links" cannot be followed by the majority of people out there and cannot therefore consume the Webmaster's bandwidth without paying.
Pr0n has paved the way, and it is time for the rest of the world to follow. People will just have to learn to configure their proxy servers and firewalls to comply with something that is definitely a valid part of HTTP.
The nature of the web is that a web page is open unless proven otherwise. It is like a store with no locks on the door. If it is locked then I won't go in. If the door is wide open, I will go in.
My website is not a store. It is more like my house. By accessing it you are trespassing on my private property. It doesn't matter whether or not I locked the doors.
ok then your [sic] infringing on my copyright! Could you as [sic] me next time before STEALING my comments for your own?
This story makes these guys look like total assholes. What the fuck.
If someone deep links to one of my pages that somehow screwed up navigation, and I asked them to redo the link elsewhere, I would expect them to either comply or remove the link.
Sometimes it isn't what you HAVE to do, but what is polite. Of course one can do it with referrers, but why can't people be nice regardless.
Deep linking to an image is REALLY poor... <IMG SRC> directly to an image on my server is REALLY rude. Not only do you effectively steal bandwidth and copyrighted work (blah blah blah, letting anonymous access, etc., blah blah blah) you REALLY fuck up our ability to understand what is going on on our sites.
Alex
Cornell has the legal text for the Fair Use Doctrine on-line here.
In other words, the original author of the work has no rights at all to dictate to me whether I can resell a book that I legally purchased from him.
At least, not in the United States, he does not.
Chivalry is not dead, it's just frequently misspelt. - M. Langley
I can't believe that none of you got the joke/irony here.
I can't either.
Calling someone collect means that they get to choose whether to pay to talk to you.
True...
Requesting a page from a web server means that the web server gets to choose whether to give you the page (possibly based on your referrer, etc).
True...
It is exactly like calling collect - the choice is entirely up to the responder, not the requester.
It's also exactly like... Receiving spam!!!
Basically aozilla agrees with everyone else, he/she just didn't include the smiley so that you could get the joke.
Yes, I do agree with everyone else that we shouldn't have laws against accessing websites or making collect calls.
Or spam!
ok then your [sic] infringing on my copyright! Could you as [sic] me next time before STEALING my comments for your own?
If email address = on public domain then
I don't have permission = tough shit;
print("Take email address out of public domain");
ok then your [sic] infringing on my copyright! Could you as [sic] me next time before STEALING my comments for your own?
Yes, I do agree with everyone else that we shouldn't have laws against accessing websites or making collect calls. Or spam!
What about DDOS (distributed denial of service)? Should 13-year-olds have the right to flood you off the network by hammering your connection with thousands of well-formed HTTP requests?
Will I retire or break 10K?
Some of the danish newspapers are against sites that leech off them, and claim that what they leech is their own and sell the content to other people.
Imagine Slashdot copying every story they link to, and claiming that it's their own story, and charging you 10 cents for their service.
The newspapers don't mind what Slashdot does (well, except slashdotting them of course), because they're still getting the exposure they want.
Well - some of the newspapers that is. Some of them want you to link like this:
"Open a new page and type in http://www.cnn.com
Click on the "U.S." link in the left hand menu.
Click on the "U.S.: Friendly fire pilot reported being fired upon" link in the top right hand corner, right under the picture of a jet fighter.
If it's not there, tough luck."
Others are quite cool with just linking like this:
CNN.com reports - U.S.: Friendly fire pilot reported being fired upon
We do not live in the 21st century. We live in the 20 second century.
This is not a Fugazi
Why do you have a website again?
Same reason I have an email account. So people who I choose to let use it can use it.
ok then your [sic] infringing on my copyright! Could you as [sic] me next time before STEALING my comments for your own?
Quite an amusing opinion, coming from someone whose .sig links to a website that takes all the text content (stories and user comments) from Slashdot and re-formats it into an ad-free digest.
What is amusing about that? I have permission to link to that site.
ok then your [sic] infringing on my copyright! Could you as [sic] me next time before STEALING my comments for your own?
If someone deep links to one of my pages that somehow screwed up navigation
The design of the World Wide Web, indeed the very definition of a URL (which stands for uniform resource locator), requires that each valid URL point to a resource. If you structure your resources (that is, web pages) such that a request for a particular resource produces useless navigation, that's your problem. It's not very hard to write a script to check what frame you're in and open a new window, or to provide a link at the top of a page that sets up the proper frame environment.
And it's not very hard either to redesign your site to use CSS Positioning or <table> layout instead of frames. Which of the top 10 most popular web sites still uses frames? Yahoo! doesn't; CNN.com doesn't; MSN doesn't (except for external links within Hotmail messages); Google doesn't (except to display context for an image search result); Slashdot doesn't.
Will I retire or break 10K?
It's not really that hard to prevent people from doing it. Why try to stop an individual when Google's going to find it anyway?
If you don't want to have pages directly linked to, you have a few very simple options:
1.) You can identify a search engine spider from it's logs, and set up your site to present it with different content. If you're using PHP, for example, all you have to do is create an if/then statement that basically says "if it's google, send them no data. Anything else, let them on through." It's not very hard to write this type of script in PHP. It'd take me minutes to do.
2.) Frames setup: There are some sites there that use a frames setup where by default a bookmark set in any portion of the site will only be established to the portal into it. It's easy to get around, but you could get your message known.
3.) You can trap the right mouse button so that an error box comes up that says 'Please do not link to this page, send them to the home page instead.' Being polite about it, like that, would be useful in preventing somebody from doing something you don't want them to do.
4.) If you really really want to prevent somebody from deep linking, you could provide a registration page so that somebody with a valid username/password can get to it. Kind of like NYTimes.
As you can see, there are steps you can take before you get the lawyers out. Try those first, being polite to the user and letting them know what you do/don't want is far more effective than challenging their rights.
"Derp de derp."
Even though the web is a very far cry from Xanadu, Ted Nelson outlined this entire issue in his seminal book, "Literary Machines".
Basically, it comes to this: either you're part of the web, or you're not. In Xanadu (no pun), if you were to participate and place your works in the Xanadu database, you are implicitly giving people the right to link and cite (and make marginal notes) about your work. If you don't like that, then don't publish. The same is true for the Web. If people don't want to be linked to, they should just get the hell off the Web, plain and simple.
Last time I checked, receiving spam wasn't something that I had a choice about. I suppose you could say that my ISP's mail server had the choice not to accept the message, but there's not really a standard for making that decision, at least in the same way that a web server can check referrers to make a decision about serving a page.
The thing with spam is that it often masquerades as a real message, so you pretty much have to download it to find out that it's spam. Or else just ignore mail from anyone you don't know, which isn't always a viable option. Spam uses fraud (often including forged headers and poorly-secured third-party servers) to work; essentially removing the choice of whether or not to get spam from the reach of most people. If the choice of whether or not to get spam were as simple as the choice whether or not to accept a collect call, don't you think most people would choose not to get spam?
Your right to not believe: Americans United for Separation of Church and
In other words, the hypocracy lies in the nature of the site you link to, coupled with the fact that your link to said site is tacked on to the end of a post where you compare a website to an unlocked house, and its content to be the private property of the owner.
This is not a Fugazi
We have no problem with people linking to our site.
What we DO take issue with is individuals and companies stealing our content by linking directly to it and representing it as their own.
This is most rampant with graphics. We try to provide high-quality images about the products we review and the items we write about. Everybody likes big and clear pictures.
Many of these have to be converted from massive TIFF files into Web-sized JPEGs or GIFs. It may not seem like a big deal, but it takes someone's time and effort to optimize every image and fit it within our internal site guidelines to make it as accessible as possible to Web surfers at large. That adds up to a lot of time and effort.
There are those companies who steal our content outright without any attribution whatsoever. A friend was talking to one of his colleagues, who told him that his previous employer regularly visited our site specifically to steal our graphics. (That site has since gone out of business).
And there are those offenders who link directly to our content on their sites -- again without attribution -- causing us to bear the bandwidth costs of transmitting hundreds of megabytes worth of data without any credit, benefit or return to us.
We have found our content abused on major sites (household names), without any response from the Web staff of those companies when we try to contact them about it.
Most of our content is available for syndication. If you like it and want to use it, ASK.
As a footnote, we are considering acquiring and implementing some form of digital rights management, which is something we don't want to do. However, if we continue to see this kind of content theft, then we need to get it under control before the costs reach a point where we are forced to shut down our site.
One thing I'm curious about is what would the general consensus be on someone who inlines an image on their page that comes from your webspace?
I have a lot of pictures which I've taken myself, and lately I've discovered that they're showing up on other peoples pages, directly inlined from my own.
Myself, I dislike this, as I end up having to pay the bandwidth for someone elses webpage.
oops! I Did it again!
sig my booty, check my website
I can't think of a good refutation to the following analogy:
Your right to swing your arms ends at my face; Your right to link ends at my webpage.
To the average person, an argument such as this would probably seem entirely reasonable. Why isn't it?
You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
"It seems that the legality of hypertext linking has once again been called into question according to this story running on Wired.com."
"As the former online publisher of 7am.com", as opposed to the offline publisher of 7am.com.
"Local TV broadcaster TVNZ also made all sorts of noise about the illegality of linking to their content back in 1966 but have since come to their senses" Should be legality, and lets make it 1996 instead of a couple decades before the web.
. . . be encouraged because they drive traffic . . .
Editors, would it kill you to at least check the submissions and fix the obvious errors in the stories in which you post?
My next Slashdot post will be ready soon, but subscribers can beat the rush and see it early!
not that it matters, I agree with your point
I compared my website to a house. Slashdot's website is more like a store. In any case, if slashdot can prove that that person is accessing slashdot's site without permission, they should sue them for trespassing.
ok then your [sic] infringing on my copyright! Could you as [sic] me next time before STEALING my comments for your own?
My nickname is nandoz, just thought that was similar to nando. On to the point if you post your link to the internet you can expect that people will link to you. The internet is based on hypertext-transfer-protocol, if you can't deal with hyperlinks go away. Almost all of the people that I have spoken to on-line are all about the free-speech aspects of the Internet, you either want it or you don't. One day there will be a place of nerdly bliss, a place where all the piss-ant little whiners need not apply.
Last time I checked, receiving spam wasn't something that I had a choice about.
Neither is receiving hits to my website.
I suppose you could say that my ISP's mail server had the choice not to accept the message, but there's not really a standard for making that decision, at least in the same way that a web server can check referrers to make a decision about serving a page.
Not all browsers send referrers, and some proxies filter them. Besides, the user can always copy the link address and then paste it. Or what if I want to allow links from free websites, but not from commercial ones?
The thing with spam is that it often masquerades as a real message, so you pretty much have to download it to find out that it's spam.
Links from free websites often masquerade as links from commercial ones.
Or else just ignore mail from anyone you don't know, which isn't always a viable option.
Or else just ignore links from any referer you don't know, which isn't always a viable option.
Spam uses fraud (often including forged headers and poorly-secured third-party servers) to work; essentially removing the choice of whether or not to get spam from the reach of most people.
Spam doesn't always use fraud. It rarely involves forged headers, and even less often involves open relays.
If the choice of whether or not to get spam were as simple as the choice whether or not to accept a collect call, don't you think most people would choose not to get spam?
It already is. "You received mail from spammer@spam.spam, would you like to download it?" Or alternatively, at the server level, simply disconnect when you receive the MSG FROM line. Or don't accept the incomming connection in the first place!
ok then your [sic] infringing on my copyright! Could you as [sic] me next time before STEALING my comments for your own?
These jag-offs want the ease of linking, but don't want others to link to them. It's like putting up a sign on a public street, and then telling people not to give each other directions to reach the sign that don't pass the other signs posted. There are numerous ways to make it so that content needs to be accessed sequentially, and the onus is on the owner of the content to not simply put the stuff out in the open!
I wonder if authors of regular books bitch about readers who read then last chapter first. What legal right does the author have to dictate how the work is used, as long as it isn't used commercially or taken credit for?
BlackGriffen
.htaccess
In other words, stop whining about hotlinking and fix your server problem. The web is full of criminals, get used to it and protect yourself.
Cheers,
Backov
In the law there is no overlap between theft and copyright infringement whatsoever.
Thanks for the link, dude, I found some excellent graphics to steal there!
Comon, none of this requires legislation!
If your web hackers are so incompetent that they don't know how to deal with these kinds of issues, you are in the wrong business. But because of incompetence like yours, we risk having deep linking ruled illegal, threatening the very fabric of the web.
Another responder said, "Run a script to change the names of all your pictures and all the references."
Here's another idea. . . store the images as binary-objects in a database, and use PHP or ASP to fetch and display the images. The same PHP/ASP could secure the images from any external links.
In the meantime, I suggest a revision to an old agade: Those who can't do, legislate.
!#@%*)anks for hanging up the phone, dear.
There are always technical solutions, too.. why not generate a session key on the home page and require it to be part of the request for any other pages? That'll stop that pesky Google too.. It will probably stop many users from browsing your site, but that's what they want to prevent, right?
They are free to use other protocols. May I suggest a raw telnet BBS? That way they can have people log in, enter their e-mail, sell their firstborn children, before they are allowed to access the precious content. Putting a page on the web (including internal hyperlinks of course), and then getting pissed when someone 'deep links' to that page, is like putting numbers on your door and getting pissed when someone sends you mail.
Also, who said anything about legislation? I think you've heard one too many CBDTPA arguments and it's spilling over into your other thoughts... :)
Also, not Informative. Maybe Insightful.
"linkiing"
"has once a gain"
"back in 1966"
Could we PLEASE have someone actually read these over twice before they're put on the main page???
This from the guy that syndicates my coments without my permission!!!
How's this? Find out the most rampant abusers from the logs, and anytime a referral comes in from there, hit 'em with the goatse.cx guy.
Last post!
I make them for Slashdot's readers and OSND, not for you!
./ OSDN says.
Answer to me I could care less what
Get it?
"Bruce Sunstein, an intellectual property law attorney..."
Based on what this lawyer thinks his title as an intellectual property law attorney is an oxymoron.
"I don't think it's selfish, to eat defenseless shellfish." -NOFX
ok then your infringing on my copyright! Could you as me next time before STEALING my comments for your own fame?
Thanks again
someone SHOULD take cutters to these idiots connection. It seriously makes me shake my head at how the layman and end user think THEY are qualified to determine how something like this should work... Perhaps the government should outlaw all a href's. Seems its all the rage these days to try and legislate common sense into the idiots of the world. And your absolutely right about referrer checking. Someone beat some sense into these idiots.
My website is not a store. It is more like my house. By accessing it you are trespassing on my private property. It doesn't matter whether or not I locked the doors.
Hardly! It's more like putting up a pavilion at a park, then getting pissed when people wander through.
Face it, unless some kind of access control is put up, a webpage WILL get viewed, linked, indexed, searched, and ranked. I know this first hand. I put up a personal webserver, but because I hosted one little project that I told Freshmeat about, now I'm getting hits from blogs in Germany.
Improvise, adapt, and overcome.
Just refer all these anti-linking morons to BT, the bastards claiming a patent on linking... and hope for something like a matter-antimatter collision. yes.
--- this comment is presented in WIDE SCREEN STEREO!!!
I mean, how fucking hard is it to block pages with forign refers? Not very hard at all, actualy.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
and a loss
You can also check the refer to make sure it's comming from the right place. If it's not there, then deny access. Still not difficult to pull off.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
If your problem is people doing then disallow nonlocal referrs on .jpg files.
.html file, that should be a *good thing*.
If the problem is people coming to your website, downloading the images, and posting them on their website, make sure that the image comment (most image files have an editable comment field) contains "Copyright © 2002 Your Site, Inc." and sue them for copyright infringment.
In no case do you need to sue someone for linking to your site. If they're linking to an
-- The act of censorship is always worse than whatever is being censored. Always.
Then bypassing the password is a criminal violation of federal law.
Fight Spammers!
Is it really so hard to understand that an attack on "linking" is an attack on the very fabric of the Web? The very thing that made it popular to begin with? If you discourage linking, then the Web is NOTHING. There's a reason it's analgous to a spider web. If you remove the strands that connect to form the web, well, you don't have one anymore. I cannot believe that such intelligent people fail to understand something so trivial.
Why bother.
Are we talking about no links to their "special" site or some sort of licencing scheme to add such a link.
Sounds like someone wants to make some money.
Those Kiwis they are so advanced.
I liked this quote:
""When someone provides a link without my permission, which grants a user access to a part of my website without going first to my site's home page, the user may experience something different from what I intended when I established my website,""
In further news a new police force has been formed to arrest all book buyers who read the last three pages of a book first. After all, by placing these pages at the back of the book the author intended them to be read last.
This is complete horse crap. Sure someone may have gone to great lengths to design an "experience" at their web site, but hey, lots of people aren't out there for an experience. They're out there for information.
I suppose if they really wanted to site admins could add a plug-in to look at the HTTP-Referrer link and redirect to the front page if people don't link from within the site, but then we might as well throw out bookmarks.
Ever since people started to think that Digital Rights Minimilization was legal things have been going down hill in a hurry.
I guess we might as well shutter Google right now. It's a regular deep link pimp daddy.
--- I wish I could hear the soundtrack to my life. That way I'd know when to duck.
Sorry, but the internet existed long before your company did.
Now, because you and your company came along -- and a bunch of others like you and your company -- and you've decided that you don't like the way things are done on the net -- the way they've always been done on the net, the way that was essential to the net's success -- you want to punish all of US and destroy the internet WE'VE worked so hard to create.
Corporations are ruining the internet with their corporatization, spam, pop-ups, pop-unders, banner ads (yes, that includes slashdot -- there's a reason I block these fucking ads), promotional materials, and high-glitter low content web-pages.
Even "respectable" sites like the Wall Street Journal (wsj.com) are sickening in their lack of ethics. I pay money to get access to the Wall Street Journal online. And for paying that good money to them, what do I get? ADS. Fucking ads. I have to use an ad-blocking hosts file for wsj.com, a site which I PAY TO HAVE FULL ACCESS TO!!!!
People act like companies have brought the internet to life. No, companies are to the internet as street-trash whores are to city-dwellers: sure, they're fun for a while; but then you get sick.
Corporate websites are a plague to the internet, a plague that comes in a candy-coated package. Companies are like the white man that came over to America and pretended to be nice-nice to the Native Americans while offering them virus-loaded blankets and "firewater".
We need to resist this corporatization of the net.
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
Hellooooo, idjits, all you have to do is deny outside referer urls. No fancy file name scrambling is necessary.
The internet was created with OUR TAX DOLLARS.
The internet was created by OUR researchers.
Who were paid with OUR money.
SORRY, you lame entreprenuing lazy fucks, if you don't like linking, get the fuck off the web.
Internet. World Wide Web. Net. Web. Network.
Do those words mean anything to you cheap entrepreneuing fucks? To me, they mean INTER-CONNECTED, like a spider web. If you don't like it, pack up your silk and get off our web.
Deep linking is one of the things that defines the web. Its a great benefit, which saves bandwidth and server space. Why should the same information be replicated elsewhere many times (I'm not talking about the typical 3 mirrors that exist), when it already exists on one site? Why should users have to use globs of bandwidth going through your 10MB front cover web page, when all they want is a 1KB file in your site?
The internet should be architectured to maximize the overall net performance, not to benefit an exclusive -- who are bandwagon parasites to the internet -- and small group, at the expense of the community -- who created, supported, and nurtured the internet.
The intenet is OURS. It doesn't belong to corporations. It is, and should be kept as, a complete commons. It is a utopia of information. The ideal of the internet is that some day, eventually, you would be able to find any information instantaneously. The goal is to make the internet into a giant perfect brain, in essence, a neural network so to speak. Its goal is to be a place where I can go and retrieve information almost as quickly as if I'd had that information memorized and locked away in my brain.
Anything which detracts from that goal is anti-internet and should be shunned.
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
... why isn't it a standard/normal/expected feature these days to control web traffic based on who wants it and where they're coming from? Sure, a *few* sites check referers when serving pictures, but it's the exception rather than the norm. And I don't really see why; the technology exists, why isn't it easier to use and used more?
In general, we're still stuck with an archaic 'public file system' notion of the web, rather than the intelligent 'request/response negotiation' notion that was originally intended, primarily because public-file-system was easier. It makes me sad.
is competition good, or is duplication of effort bad?
Anyways, I'm glad someone gets the point. It's not the actual link to Alterslash that I had found amusing. It was the apparent show of support for a site that effectively screen-scrapes Slashdot and repackages the content, and the fact that it was tacked on to a comment espousing a seemingly contradictory philosophy.
Stealing and repackaging someone else's content is the issue here, and is much worse than merely linking to someone else's page without credit. The link in the
This is not a Fugazi
BTW, I have a patent on this ... it's like surfing normal, but only in a different pattern.
Karma? Karma? I don't need no stinkin' karma.
Seems to me that if folks dis-allow "deep linking" as policy, then the Internet powers-that-be should help them out by removing such addresses from the DNS registery to help them avoid this terrible deep linking problem.
This way they won't have to worry about anyone voiding their copyright.
As one other poster (at least) said - if you put content out there that isn't password protected, then IT'S PUBLIC INFORMATION. That is the whole IDEA of the internet in the first place.
Have you compiled your kernel today??
all you accomplished was providing multiple links for people to click on to get to nando.net. Woopee. You just ensured that we (I work for them) get more ad revenue from page views. Man you're a real rebel.
As an aside, the biggest objection is when people rip off our content. Why? A couple reasons. First, we make money (gee...a business trying to turn a profit...an online news business even) based on page views through advertising. Yeah, I know, most people ALT+W ad windows or ignore banners. We also make money by reselling our content to people. The other reason is that copyright is involved. Slashdot may be "take my content, take my code, do as you please unless you're trying to write a book with it" but the Associate Press, Reuters, etc., take a dim view of such things. As such, we're protecting ourselves and them via threat of lawsuit. Then too, the link posted is a four year old story. You'll notice that there haven't been threats of lawsuits to Slashdot which has posted more links to McClatchy sites than I can count...Fresno Bee, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, even the Nando Times.
IANAL, I don't speak for my company, yadda yadda yadda, hence the anonymous post.
Most of our content is available for syndication. If you like it and want to use it, ASK.
You're posting your content on a free, publically accessable network. Although I may not copy it and claim it as my own, I may make hyperlinks to any and all content that is deemed "public" (this includes your images). If you feel that I should not be able to [img src="YourHighRezImage"], don't make YourHighRezImage publically accessable to all websites. There are a number of ways to make content (images/binary or HTML/text) viewable to people visiting your site while disabling the ability to directly link to it.
The web is a web of hyperlinks linking to publically available information. It may be a common courtesy to ask to link to your content, but if it's on a public network I should not legally have to. Repeat after me, "Hyperlinking is NOT theft"!
There is no longer anything that can be done with computers that is nontrivial and clearly legal. -- Paul Phillips
(How thin can we stretch this "argument by analogy" crap?)
Unlimited growth == Cancer.
If you had read the artical, you would have noted that US courts have held that linking to an image and presenting it as your own IS copyright theft. [As opposed to just pointing to another web page.]
If you file with the copyright office in advance, you can collect punative damages that amount to big bucks. Even if you don't, you can collect fair market value from everybody who copies. Just send out some bills...
An engineer who ran for Congress. http://herbrobinson.us
i suppose that the only thing left to do is to form clubs where we all beat the living bejeesus out of each other with our bare fists, then use this as the starting point for underground liberation movements where our primary goal is to blow up all the buildings that contain all the spam/ads that made our online lives intolerable in the first place ...
WHO IS WITH ME?!?!?!?!?!
You're making a fundamental mistake, though.
You're trying to take a public network: one designed to allow communication from any party to any other, and then regulate communication over that network so that only people that youdo own and regulate it how their network should work. They've opted to build an open network, where everyone can attempt to send to anyone else, issue http requests to any machine than will accept them, and so forth.
If you don't want to play with the other kids, go buy your own sandbox -- until then, quit griping that there are other kids in the park.
If you're so pissed off about companies "stealing" your images then why don't you just watermark your url into them ?
Or check the referrer, as everybody has pointed out about a billion times.
How some dumb post like this, especially when it happens to be a commercial entitiy whining about people "stealing" from them got modded up is totally beyond me.
In fact I bet you got your employees to mod you up, didn't you ?
graspee
I suggest that most of you go back and read what I wrote. It's clear that some didn't even bother to read a word of what I said.
Again, We have no problem with people linking to our site .
Nowhere did I say that I am in favor of any legislation that outlaws deep linking.
BACKOV: Ignoring the condescension, your reply assumes that the natural tendency of people is to steal and the problem will get worse. What is necessary is education about the value of other people's work.
ANONYMOUS COWARD: Ha Ha Ha! Good one! =)
SPITZAK: We don't want to break everyone's LINKS to us. We want to prevent people from taking our work and representing it as their own -- also known as plagiarism -- and profiting from it without any recognition or recompense.
CAPTAINSUPERBOY: You appear to be one of the few who read and understand what I said.
J09824: You, too have missed the point. First, we are not 'in business' in the sense that you mean. We are a group of individuals from various professional backgrounds who contribute to Geartest.com in addition to our regular jobs. How many of your favorite sites have disappeared because they could no longer afford to pay the bandwidth costs? We aren't looking to get rich from our site, just to help people make informed decisions and hopefully break-even while doing it. If you want to know more look here or visit the site. If you can come up with another suggestion among the 'zillions' that you think are out there, we'd be glad to hear them. None of the ones you offered are practical for a whole host of reasons I'm not going to go into here, the least of which are privacy and usability issues. By the way, we don't have any 'web hackers'. If you're interested in helping out let us know.
Finally, your stereotypical, reactionary name-calling and accusations don't help anyone. The actions of your legislators is your responsibility. If you are too apathetic to make your views known to those people who are pursuing legislation against yor interests, you have nobody else to blame but yourself for any consequences.
PHXBLUE: Thanks for your suggestions. They are already on a list of options being considered as we're planning and working on our 3rd-iteration site design.
DAHGHOSTFACEDFIDDLAH: Hilarious! =) We'll put that one down as a back-up plan!
CHANDON SELDON: Again, see the above comments on linking. We'd rather not spend our time in the courts over what we consider to be a fun project. Hopefully it won't come to that. I agree with you that LINKING to our .html files is a good thing. TAKING our content (writing, images, etc.) without permission and without crediting us isn't.
DH003I: you want to punish all of US and destroy the internet WE'VE worked so hard to create.
Please enlighten everyone exactly what it is that you created. I suppose you are the REAL creator of the Internet and not Al Gore.
As for your outrage about corporatism, does your hypocrisy know no bounds? You vote with your dollars. If you don't like the WSJ service then don't pay for it. Why support an organization that is so obviously against your stated interests? Your protests sound hollow.
And next time you can leave your manifesto at home. Just don't forget to adjust your tin foil hat on your way out.
TSHAK: Thanks for your considered opinion. We are going to have to agree to disagree on this. Please clarify what you mean when you say 'free'. You say that others should not be able to copy and claim our work as their own. But if they directly link to an image and embed it in their pages without even a mention of where it came from, ignoring our requests to remove it when we ask, then they are de facto claiming our work as their own. Repeat after me, 'Taking content and representing it as your own is theft!' (Or you can call it plagiarism if you like).
HERBIEROBINSON: The distinction you make is an important one. See above re: litigation.
GRASPEE_LEMOOR: I'd rather not spend my time chasing down referrers when our page-views are consistently in the 5-figure range and on their way to 100,000+ territory.
On the remainder of your post, because you are so obviously responding from a place of ignorance -- especially with regard to commercial entities and a supposed conspiracy of 'employees' modding the post up (you might want to check your tin foil hat too) -- I'm just going to refer you to what I've written above.
Thanks to all for an interesting discussion!
Damn right! Corporations are a disease of the Internet. In e-mail, people get more spam and viruses than any other kind of message. On the web, the ads take longer to download than the content. Cookies and spyware are being secretly loaded onto thousands of machines. We made the Internet, and the corporations are trying to kill it for profit.
It doesn't have to be this way. We don't have to live in the world they would like to create. All we need are the right skills and the determination to use them. Let's make it happen!
"Well, put a stake in my heart and drag me into sunlight."
Thats like saying, "I have a house so that people I choose to let look at it from the public road can look at it." You'd better put a tarp over it (password) if you expect to be able to choose who looks at it. I'd question whether its really a "web" site at all, then. Its more like a VPN.
You're talking about copyright infringement - people copying your stuff and misrepresenting as their own on their web sites.
This has *nothing* to do with the deep linking talked about in the article.
Max
My god carries a hammer. Your god died nailed to a tree. Any questions?
Under any decent web server (Well, Apache at the very least), it takes less than two short lines to disallow linking from outside sources, and you can also be selective about who you let link where.
There should be a law against lawsuits that can be solved with technically in a few minutes. Isn't there a "good faith" requirement of some sort that would void lawsuits about any trivially solvable problem such as this one?
From the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works, the international convention defining international copyright, Article 2, defining what is copyrightable :
(8) The protection of this Convention shall not apply to news of the day or to miscellaneous facts having the character of mere items of press information.
It seems like they could not sue somebody for _copyright_ on liking their news pages, could they ?
When did "experiencing something different" become a legal issue ?
Depending on their cultural origin, mothertongue, state of mind at the moment, website load, etc... the users WILL have different experiences.
Also if someone wants to link at some material, forcing the people that click these links to go through a particular "experience", defined by the owner of said material, seems quite intrusive IMO, except if the viewer accepts it by agreeing to some licence, like on NYTimes website.
Simply cutting through the bullshit.
From the article:
"When someone provides a link without my permission, which grants a user access to a part of my website without going first to my site's home page, the user may experience something different from what I intended when I established my website," Bruce Sunstein, an intellectual property law attorney, said.
So, what is next, will it be illegal to read the last chapter of a book first since it might change the experience of the reader in a way the writer did not intend?
Silly - the deep linking he refers to is the kind where the original site is hidden. I.e., direct linking to .jpgs, or links to html that has only text and no branding or header info. As such, the linker is trying to pass off the content as their own work.
People put stuff on the web for lots of reasons - financial, or personal. The content is still "copyright" even if it's publicly accessable. Otherwise copying posters off the walls and using the images wouldn't be illegal either.
In short - it's not linking that's bad, it's the "passing off" that is.
In a way I kind of agree with you, but the moe I think about it, tough shit. You have no right to make money on the internet. If you can good for you, but we don't have to make it easy. Furthermore, it's pretty simple, if you play with fire, expect to get burned occasionally. I'm not saying I agree with anyone copying your text and placing it on their site as their own, but I can't say that I really care either. Corporate rights on the internet are not a big concern of mine, and never will be.
I'm the big fish in the big pond bitch.
Aaaagh! Will you hackers finally get it! The Web is NOT free! It is freely accessable which is not the same thing at all! You have no more right to copy or otherwise pass off as your own the content you see than you have to tape music from the radio and sell (or even give away) the tapes!
Just because I show you something, it doesn't stop it being mine.
Stop looking at my post! I never said you could! *shoots you*
Then the burden is on YOU to take care of access rights, especially in a public place.
I'm the big fish in the big pond bitch.
:)
hawk
Does anyone not realize that card catalogs at libraries were a form of linking? References with indexes to various popular magazines were forms of links. They just don't get it.
***
Charles Martin
Database Developer IV @ Santander Consumer USA
hawk
And when I go to the news stand and purchase a copie of the Wall Street Journal, what do I find covering a lot of the pages? Ads.
You are paying for access to the stories, not for a site with no ads.
Xaotik Designs
Would the Washington Post get annoyed if I told a bunch of folks to look at an article at (for instance) column 1, page 3 section B, in the 4/19/2002 edition ?
Would an author sue me for making a reference to a particlar chapter or page of their book ?
I don't think so.
ok then your infringing on my copyright! Could you as me next time before STEALING my comments for your own fame?
Thanks again
ok then your [sic] infringing on my copyright! Could you as [sic] me next time before STEALING my comments for your own?
markgreyam@hotmail.com
What Cue Cat fiasco? I never heard anything about it
What were you doing publishing it someplace publicly accessible if that wasn't your intention?
If there is nothing to link to on your server, or you don't run a web server on your machine, not much bandwidth will be consumed. If you need it for some internal use, setup a VPN or otherwise block unauthorized access.
-- Mal: "Well they tell you: never hit a man with a closed fist. But it is, on occasion, hilarious."
*And when I go to the news stand and purchase a copie of the Wall Street Journal, what do I find covering a lot of the pages? Ads.
You are paying for access to the stories, not for a site with no ads.*
Yes, exactly, I'm paying for full access to those stories. So since I'm already supporting THEIR business by paying them good money, why should I have to endure bandwidth hogging ads which consume more of my bandwidth than the actual information? I'm not paying them money so I have to waste my time downloading extra, irrelevant crap.
Pages that use ads say, "we have to use them to maintain a profit, to stay afloat". That's a rationalization, but at least its rational. After all, its not like any intelligent person actually buys something becase of an ad. But, when we PAY to access the site, they shouldn't bombard us with ads, since we're giving them hard money, and a good deal of it.
What's even worse is that wsj.com actually charges its paying subscribers extra money (over what they would otherwise) so they can continue to support their ads system.
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
I do believe some amount of maturity has to be displayed, though. On one hand we have Globalmegacorporation (TM) saying 'We don't want you telling anyone where to find our publically accessible data. We want them to come through our banner ridden, confusing, useless front page', and on the other hand we have people saying 'I'm going to use your images, simply because I can. I have no real need for it, but I'm going to do it anyway, because it's not illegal.'
Come on guys, show a little responsibility here. 90% of this intellectual property and copyright idiocy would be stamped out if people realised that:
a) The internet is publically accessible. If your page is on the internet, it is because you want it to be seen. Don't kick up a fuss when people actually DO see it.
b) Even if there is nothing illegal about linking to images/content, but the owner of the site requests that you at least ask him/her, send them an email asking. Don't go and link to their stuff just because you can. They may have a perfectly reasonable reason why they don't want other sites using their material directly from their server (bandwidth). However, if you do own a website showcasing data, 'I want people to come through MY front page' is NOT a valid reason. The internet was set up to convey information, and it will stay that way. People want to find information the easiest and quickest way possible. Visiting tens of sites, going through their front pages, browsing down a long list of articles, and so on, is not the quickest way possible, and if they find a site that shows them a list of news articles in a clear layout, they will use it. If you don't like these terms, don't use the internet to showcase your information.
So basically if I put an img tag in my page that links to one of your images, and then I write around it, "Here's a picture that I created," you then think I am violating copyright (stealing!)
It's way more vague than that, though. Basically, you're accusing me of stealing something that I never downloaded, that I never see, that I never host, and that I never distribute. I never possess your content, and I never copy it. Very interesting then that you accuse me of stealing it. What kind of definition of "stealing" is this?
I distribute the location of your content, and that's all. I rely on other parties (the viewers) to do what they will with that information.
Maybe they're using Lynx and can't see the image! Am I still "stealing"? No? So my "stealing" of the image is reliant on a third party completely independent of me? Wow. That sucks.
Physical newspapers that people pay for have always had ads in them, why should news on the internet be any different?
If newspapers (paper or internet) have no ads they get no income from them, and will have to charge more for the news. If you have a problem with this start nagging them to make and ad-free version for users that are willing to pay a little extra.
Blocking the ads takes income away from the people making a site. If you want to support a site then you should let the ads get through (if only they would make them use less bandwith).
I agree that ads can get too intrusive pop-ups are bad and pop-unders are worse. But this is another problem: advertisers failing to realize that annoyed people wont buy anything.
As long as ad-blocking software keeps killing the fairly innocent banners we'll be bothered by more and more annoying attemts for advertisers to get their message through (such as using referrer logging to force users past an ad page to get at the content)
The best thing for the internet would be for people to learn to just ignore ads they don't care for instead of forcing them to get more annoyng to get past blocker programs.
HK
- We are the slashdot. Resistance is futile. Prepare to be moderated -
I do believe some amount of maturity has to be displayed,
I am in total agreement. What I'm attempting to do is make a clear distinction between what's LEGAL and what's curtious/mature/etc. It's not illegal to be immature.
Even if there is nothing illegal about linking to images/content, but the owner of the site requests that you at least ask him/her, send them an email asking.
Exactly. Again, this should never be illegal, but some common edicate should be used when linking to someone elses content.
There is no longer anything that can be done with computers that is nontrivial and clearly legal. -- Paul Phillips
So, according to you, we should just let them win? We should let our internet become the tool of corporatization and exploitation?
"Innocent banner ads"? There is no such thing, as far as I've seen. Even ads on slashdot are a far cry from useful. Most ads are flashing banners, "Get Connected!" or rubbish like that.
Sorry, until ads start being non-graphic, informative, and TRUE, I'm going to block them out. I pay good money for my internet connection. 50% of what I download should NOT be ads.
The only ads systems that are acceptable are the one's used by google -- text based, and usually specifically targetted.
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
Yes, I can check on the referrer field. Ya know, that still creates a problem if someone's browser doesn't properly report a referrer field, etc.
I'm not even talking frames, what if I were to structure two particular pages as a series to tell a story. Perhaps a before and after that it is important that users see in that story. That, for example, was the example given on useit.com.
I can tell the robots to stay out, and I think that being able to ask people not to fuck with me site is reasonable.
Your argument is that I should risk alienating a legit user whose browser is screwy on the referrer field because another webmaster is being an asshole. That's fucking bullshit.
I do far more complicated parsing of requests than you understand.
I really don't understand why everyone on Slashdot seems to advocate being an asshole. Do any of you have friends? I certainly wouldn't be friends with someone that steals stuff from my house while I'm in the bathroom then tells me that I shouldn't have let people rummage around my house without watching them. And the Slashdot attitude seems to suggest that.
Alex
Ignoring the ads by not looking at them is not letting them win.
I agree that most banner ads are rubbish, but at least you can easily see them for what they are.
I fear that the future might bring sites where ads are placed in the content so that you won't know which is which all the time. Or a news site that randomly sends you to a sponsors home page every third time instead of the article you wanted.
My point is that the harder we fight back the harder they will fight back at us, and with more and more annoying methods of advertising.
I'm not sure of what you mean by specifically targetted. If you mean targetted at the topic of the site you are watching I agree. Ads should at least be relevant to the page you're on, a site about programming shouldn't have ads for vaccum cleaners. But if by specifically taretted you mean targetted at YOU then it's completely unacceptable. Having companies throwing ads at me is one thing, having them storing information about me and my web surfing habits is another.
- We are the slashdot. Resistance is futile. Prepare to be moderated -
What mystifies me more than anything else is why the companies who dislike deep linking don't just spend a little effort using Javascript, Perl, PHP, Java (servlets) and so on to just prevent deep links from working. All they have to do is run a few checks, like making sure their site is the referer, and checking to make sure their content is showing in a top-level window instead of a frame. Are they all lazy, or stupid, or do they just want to spend their legal budget so it doesn't get reduced in the next fiscal year?
Of course, this would require that they actually keep a few programmers around, instead of firing everyone after the site is built, but then, you can't have your cake and eat it too.
What this actually comes down to is that you are PAYING them and getting service you don't like. The answer is simple, tell them that you don't want ads, if the keep the ads, then stop PAYING them and get your news somewhere else.
Xaotik Designs
You can reach me at tofuchute@hotmail.com. Please submit your question there.
Why bother.