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Texas Court Blocks Screen-Scraper
An anonymous reader writes "A Texas court has granted American Airlines
an injunction against Farechaser to stop them from using a screen-scraper to copy airfare information from their website in violation of the terms and conditions. In a stunning display of hypocrisy, Farechase.com's own terms and conditions prohibit users from doing to them exactly what they are doing to AA.com. The EFF is involved, but it's unclear whether they're supporting the enforceability of a website's terms and conditions or Farechase's right to violate them."
They put their info up on the web.. anyone can do anything they want to with it. Losers.
If you are making information available to the public, what right do you have to be angry when someone, *gasp* uses that information?
Fortunately, American isn't basing their case on the idea that their prices are their "intellectual property," but instead are claiming that Farechase was trespassing on their chattel. I wonder if the decision on this could effect cases involving DoS attacks?
GPL be damned!
There is a fundamental distinction between programmatically scraping someone else's site and posting it as your own and an individual drawing down the website via a browser: fair use.
Provided fair use conditions are posted, I don't see where the scraper has a leg to stand on. If you are a competitor, you have different rules, as your intention and the actions that follow your intentions separate you from a normal consumer. To illustrate, it is fair use for me to go to the library and photocopy an article out of a journal and use it as source material for a paper. It is NOT fair use for me to photocopy the article and put it in my own magazine, publishing it as if it was mine, copyright and all.
That being said, I would be very interested in an informed reply from a lawyer that specializes in these matters.
if it is un-ethical to you, then why does the legality matter?
You could send an anonymous letter to your companies lawyers, boards of directors, and CEO.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
It sounds like you already know everything you need to know. Now you simply need to summon the courage of your beliefs.
You may be fired because of your beliefs. At that point, you just have to decide which is more valuable: your beliefs or your jobs (hint: your beliefs are). On the other hand, your boss may simply be having a weak moment in his own beliefs. You ought to try to talk to him about this, and not in a self-righteous way. Try to make the case that you can't build a successful company or a successful life without character. Your company and your own bank account might prosper in the short run, but eventually the way the universe works catches up to you...even if it's not before you die.
At any rate, it sounds like you've got the right tickets to begin with. Good luck.
If your bitterest enemies are people who hack the heads off civilians, then I would say you're doing something right.
Regardless, Farechaser should not tell its customers one thing then turn right around and do it themselves. Especially when they stand to make money doing so. Sure, it's legal, but that doesn't make it right. Personally I think they ought to nationalize most of the airlines given the current economic situation but that's not likely given the stockholders interests and the current administration.
As long as there is a Second Amendment, there will always be a First Amendment.
Jon Udell created a bookmarklet called LibraryLookup to take the URL of the page you are on and pull off the ISBN and check your local library for the book. It can be used at places like Amazon.com. It is a very creative idea of using different websites to create the useful application. Now one would hate to see applications like this be outlawed. Maybe the difference is that the use is personal (fair use) and not "commerical".
At that point, you just have to decide which is more valuable: your beliefs or your jobs (hint: your beliefs are).
You beliefs are only more important if you are wealthy enough to be able to be jobless. Only wealthy people can afford to be idealistic.
Nope, but that's what I used to believe. The truth is that one's principles require sacrifices sometimes. What you're saying is that there are no beliefs worth sacrifices, vis a vis, wealthy people are not required to make sacrifices for their beliefs. QED.
I think upon consideration you'll discover that's not what you believe either.
If your bitterest enemies are people who hack the heads off civilians, then I would say you're doing something right.
There is a connection between screen scraping and privacy arguments.
Many here are posting "What's wrong with screen scraping? The information is there, I can get it, what's the problem?"
By the same token, many decry things like Amazon.com selling their address just because "they have it".
Information is information. If you have the "right" to scrape whatever you want and distribute it however you want, then companies have the right to distribute your personal information to whomever they want, under whatever circumstances they want.
I prefer to live in the world where control over information on the societal level is still allowed; no concept of privacy can exist without it. Not letting people screen scrape isn't even something I'd consider a "price".
To be a bit more theoretical, there is value in information transfer.
This is a summary of a much longer and more complete argument, but it should get a lot of the point across. I won't be defending this on a point-by-point basis in replies as a result.
My advice here is make sure you have a new job lined up. I "took a stand" about 14 months ago, ended up being pushed out, and just got a new job a few days ago. Moral of the story? Have a fallback position, or a big bank account.
See, they can't fire you for refusing to break the law, but "you're not a team player" situations like this can lead to people getting fired for forgetting to refill the printer paper, or failing to turn off the lights on Friday night or something stupid like that...
And definitely don't tell somebody you're interviewing with the reason you want to leave--You will almost automagically be eliminated from consideration for saying something "negative" about your former employer...Even if it is the truth.
You have to come up with a creative quasi-lie to explain your desire to take the risk of changing jobs in a shitty economy.
Who did what now?
This decision made by the Texas court could set a precidence for all future cases revolving around this sort of alleged violation.
Once a court makes a decision like this, future cases will reference this decision in future litigation.
I for one, as a lawyer for several extremely major tech companies, pay close attention to events like this. These decisions will outline the legal ground on which this activity will be judged in the future. Asside from my personal involvement, this also could have major rammifications on the way business develops on the internet.
No, this might not be impacting you directally, but it could modify the way you do business on, use, or enjoy the internet, or the free market in a very general perspective. Essentially, these seemingly benign legal events can have tremendous impacts on society, business, legal, and a host of other realms that make up your life.
Yeah, this seems insignificant, and in most cases will be for you, but... don't blow these things off so easily.
Mostly, legality is important so I can show it to my boss. I want to convince them not to do it, not just to farm it off to someone else with different ethical guidelines.
I can't say that I don't give a fuck. I've just run out of fuck to give.
This logic is BACKWARDS.
If people scrape you and mirror your data, the load on your server should go DOWN. If this is not actually the case, then you can't really claim any sort of harm.
This would be better described as "involuntary mirroring" than "screen-scraping".
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
Our company gave up its internal call center ops. Another company bought it lock, stock, and server.
They also made an offer to all the current phone people for continued employment. Not all accepted.
Now...we (I) had written a personnel database to manage the phone peoples schedules, hiring, firing. This included name, address, phone, SSAN, paygrade, etc, etc. The new company also bought this.
I get a phone call from the IT VP "Send so and so a copy (incl design, etc) of the personnel program. Including all the data. They want to get up and running as soona s possible."
"WHAT??? We can't give out all that personal information! What about all the people who did NOT join the new company?"
He pushed, I pushed back.
"OK...I'll do it, on one condition. A signed letter (not an email) from:
The head of HR
The CEO
The COO
The head of our law firm
and you (the IT VP)
Otherwise, I'll send them a sanitized copy. No personal data whatsoever."
After much discussion, they backed down.
I went over and installed the sanitized program.
Bottom line...if you feel it is illegal/immoral, stand up and be counted. If you're wrong, you'll find out soon enough. They you do whatever they want.
If you're right, the powers that be will not stick their neck out that far.
Protect yourself. Otherwise, when the shit hits the fan, you will be one of the scapegoats.
Some things to remember about pilot salaries:
1) They can only work until age 60. FAA rule.
2) They typically spend 8-10 years before making $75,000/year. My buddy is 32 years old, has flown for a 'regional' since 1997, and is still only making $50,000/year. And with the downturn since 9/11, it could easily be 7-10 years before he moves up the ladder (and he'll have to take a pay cut when moving to a 'major' airline the first few years).
3) Any number of health conditions can end your career without warning, or just leave you unpaid. Have a heart attack at 55? Forget it, you're done.
4) These guys have to be tested in a full-motion simulator every 6 months. Blow more something here, you could find yourself out of a job.
5) No ability to "laterally" change jobs. If you fly for an airline (such as Braniff) and have 15 years seniority and are a 747 captain, and Braniff goes out of business, you're new job will have you sitting in the co-pilots seat of a DC-9 or 737, making 36 grand a year again.
6) Oh yeah, you're in charge of the lives of hundreds of people each day. Your mistakes don't cause downtime, they cause DEATH.
Now tell me again why pilots are overpaid?
Steve
Well, he is not wrong in asking you to do this. There is a difference between doing something that is 'not legal'- ie something the business can get sued for, and something that is 'illegal', ie he cannot ask you to rob a liquor store.
First, you need to get some CYA. Tell him you will do it, but he has to make his boss aware you were asked to do this, and you need it in an email, etc. That way you cant get fired and used as a scapegoat.
Whether it is legal or not, I do not feel that it is ethical, and may leave the company if I am pushed to do this.
Well, since he is not requesting your legal/ethics advice, you should pretty much do what he says. Of course, quitting is the ultimate form of protest (barring suicide), but he will probably just hire somebody else and have them do it.
And of course, you couldnt pick a better time to leave your job! There are tons of jobs out there, hanging on trees like ripe fruit waiting to be picked.
Manipulate the moderator system! Mod someone as "overrated" today.
it's not "stealing". It wouldn't even be "stealing" if this information was worthy of copyright. HOWEVER, the fact remains that this information is NOT worthy of copright protection.
But, its not just about the information, they are accessing their hardware using their bandwidth ignoring the agreement. Its the same thing spamers do that make everyone here yell. Funny how people can change their opinion when the afected is a for-profit company.
I can open a restaurant and give menus away so my clients can order by phone, but if a fellow comes every day and takes a menu of mine just to copy the precies to his own menu I would never give one to him again, is my damn right after all since are my menus I printed in the paper i bought with the ink i bought, same with bandwidth.
Sigs are for morons... Wait a minute...