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Gator-style Overlay Ads Are Legal, Says Court
donutz writes "C|Net has the scoop: "A federal court has ruled that pop-up ads for rivals of U-Haul International, placed atop the moving company's own site by a third-party software application, are legal." In this case, it was ad serving company WhenU.com placing the ads, but this decision could have a big impact on the court cases that involve competitor Gator."
I think it should be illegal, it's like your glasses modifying the newspaper you read so that (for example) near an article on Linux you see a blatant ad for M$.
-uso.
Dreams, dreams, don't doubt dreams, dreaming children's dreaming dreams. Sailor Moon SS
Obviously the court (Judge(s)) have never used a computer on the internet. I know not to accept the certificate blindly, but most people (wrongly) think that to open the web site you need to accept theor certificate.
The pop-up ads that bother me the most are the ones that look like Windows dialog boxes. You know - "Warning, your computer is too slow, click here..."
It's not like I've ever fallen for one, nor do I think many other /.ers have (They don't look right on Gnome or KDE).
The problem is that some of the "normal" people on the internet can't tell the difference until its too late. My dad is barely computer literate to open and save an excel file (only excel!). He would fall for one of those immediately
My main concern is that some of these may be used to activate some scripts or something. Once again, those who fell for the boxes probably use Internet Explorer. Need I say more?
Robert Bindler
A Computer Science student's views on technology.
Sure you can, and a lot of us do. The issue is not quite the same. Most Gator installations are done without the knowledge of the person who has it altering their desktop. (Remember, the general populace will click YES to anything) The people advertising on the (insert site here) site paid for that space. The adware effectivelly -steals- the space the rival paid for.
It's like having something on your TV that replaces Pepsi with Coke in every Pepsi commercial you see. Pepsi would have every right to be annoyed and probably sue since they - not the adaware client - paid for the timeslot.
Never attribute to malice what can as easily be the result of incompetence...
another ad program placed another ad over that ad?
and another...
you get the point, sounds kind of funky to me
paul
Gator can now effectively control a large portion of the web.
Since they can now edit web pages as they see fit (basically), sites don't have to get hacked, and this is all legal.
Why not have gator outright block pages, or slow them down. They can do what they want. This may turn into a bidding war. Your company's website is useless now, because a competitor can take control over it.
Sigh... and, now the Slashdot version:
1. Control Websites
2. ???
3. Profit!!!
No, but it's legal for you to buy the plot of land next to the billboard and (subject to getting the proper construction permits) build a bigger board of your own in front of their board. Their board is still there unharmed, it just becomes useless because nobody can see it.
Or, simply put, we need the companies like Symantec to consider any program that is distributed by tag-along means to be a trojan horse virus (even if it does technically click a "Yes" somewhere in the sequence) and then wipes it out.
This is a very interesting debate, due to the fact that it's still pretty unclear as to who owns the content when it reaches your browser.
Let's think about this for a second.
copyright, while the owners of the site can easily claim copyright on any copy, images, etc.. they can't seem to control copyright on the layout of the site by viewing this site. The fact that an ad is on a website doesn't make the layout and presentation a non-copyrighted object. On the other hand, doesn't the fact that the page is thrust into the public domain give everyone the ability to manipulate the content as they see fit?
license, if a site specifically had you enter into an agreement to view the site, and within the agreement you agree not to edit the layout and presentation of said site, then the fact that you installed gator on your system (how dumb) would violate the agreement and put the you in breach of the terms. Much like a physical establishment grants you license to enter their place of business. If you began posting ads in the store, you would be kicked out. Ahh.. but the catch is.. what if you are the only one that can see that ads? Then your not in violation of the license are you?
Very tricky in my opinion, but I opt to go with:
Users should have the right to replace ANYTHING they see while browsing using 3rd party tools, unless they specifically enter into an agreement with the content owners.
The courts worked in this case, much like they worked for Larry Flynt.
All of the multi-million dollar commercials are replaced by local retailers and companies, because the cable provider has changed the commercials.
Occasionally, even the billboards on the stadium walls are changed to retailers of a Canadian nature.
0110100100100000011000010110110100100000011000100
The internet will not remain a commercial piece of crap, as long as Joe Somebody can get a high speed DSL line, and create his own server with website. And, as long as he can do this with complete freedom. (No exeptions for child porn, russian brides, or slashdot) Also meaning no exeptions for what Gator is doing. People who get "tricked" into installing Gator, or are stupid enough to, are almost getting what they deserve.
The internet actually getting more free as I see it. As the prices for high speed connections, and server hardware go down, Joe Somebody has more access to his own webserver and site.
Error 407 - No creative sig found
Many websites use advertising to stay free (as in beer). One problem with gator style "pop overs" is that instead of the original website driving traffic to their sponsors, it drives it to gator's sponsors. Thus gator style pop-overs reduce advertising income from the original website owners. It also reduces sales income to the sponsors that support them.
In my opinion this is a big defeat for free information (as in beer). If this does not get overruled than many websites that are supported by web advertising will have to charge money or go out of business.
While it may be that Gator now 0wnz the desktop, the person nevertheless gave control over to the program -- a sort of "power of attorney" was granted to the adware by the user. They may have been fooled, but that's a far cry from the nonsense being alleged by uhaul or anyone else. They aren't trying to protect users from being suckered, they just want their monopoly on suckering^H^H^H, I mean, advertising to people.
I think that maybe adware (all software, really) should be properly labeled so that users know what they are clicking yes to. Perhaps we should have mandatory labeling for software similar to nutritional labeling required for food. I want to know what's in it and what it does. I want specifics on files, registry settings, TCP ports, drivers, services/daemons, and so on. Now, some may say that they can't disclose some info because of fears of IP protection or trade secrets. However, that isn't a valid defense to not disclosing the ingredients to a twinkie, and it shouldn't be on hiding the actions of an application.
Wasn't there some dispute on the 31st December 1999 along the lines that ABC, showing shots of Time Square, covered over ads for NBC (it may have been different three letter networks involved) electronically?
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
story time
I work at a LAN gaming center in Quebec, Canada, and you wouldn't believe the number of people that install wether checkers, time precision and other assorted crap on our computers. I have to run Lavasoft's ad-aware every night to keep things semi-clean. The thing is, when the pop-up installer apperars, they see "you time/date/sex dosen't appear to be exact, press yes to install our software that keeps it exact for you, sponsored by GAIN". They don't know what GAIN is, and when confronted with our "no installing software" policy, they plead that they only wanted to help us out in keeping our stuff right.
right
They need to put all the info out BEFORE they install the goddamn program. That and I need to install Mozilla everywhere...
In Canada, we don't fancy things like socks
Problem is been looked up from the wrong side.
All those Gator like spyware pieces of software polute system. I don't care about the adds, but I'm seriously having problems with performance on machines that are condemed to be not knowingly used for advertising means more than anything else.
At least they should provide a way where user chooses his advertising agent like selecting your default browser in control panel. If it is selected then it us running, if it's not then "go away". That kind of agents would be pleasant more than annoying.
And until that time when everyone can select his default agent, they should be treated as illegal.
Signature Pro version 1.13.2-3 release 83.5 beta3try7 after-breakfast edition
Maybe Judges, legislators, etc, would consider the consequences a little more if every half hour they get a pop-up on their screen with words similar to "You're an ass!", "Screw you, loser", and "Rebooting now, and there's nothing you can do about it either, because YOU agreed to the EULA, moron!"
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
Gator and Uhaul "have argued that their ad-sales and delivery tactics are legal because consumers agree to receive the ads when they download and install their software."
It would seem to me that adjusting a hosts file is even more on affirmative decision on the part of the user. Of course, when you run your own ad server, slashdot doesn't generate an ad impression. Theoretically, some of these services might allow a ad impression, but subsequently overlay that ad with another. Slashdot still gets paid, but the correct advertisement never shows up.
The latter system could be construed (by a sufficiently aggrieved advertiser) as fraud. Eventually, though, rates for banner ads will decline even more, depriving advertiser supported sites of much needed revenue. Presumably, that's why the Washington Post sued Gator (and won a preliminary injunction last year-- from the same court, to boot)
If I put up a billboard (or rent one for a month), and my competitor comes around and puts his ad overtop of mine, thats vandalism. How exactly is this different than this case? U-Haul rents or owns virtual billboards along "the information superhighway" and someone else comes around and puts their ad overtop of U-Hauls. Its vandalism. Even if its only for a few people, its still vandalism. Another example of the court not grasping the concept because its electronic.
The Doormat
If you're not outraged, then you're not paying attention.
I'd agree with the judges reasoning if the pop-up box to install Gator (it's an ActiveX component I believe, and there's a standard MSIE dialog box which prompts the user) said 'Do you with to install "Gator, a program which places additional advertising onto webpages. Part of the revenue from this business goes back to the website you're trying to visit"'.
However, the text presented to the user comes from the component author, and every time I've come across Gator it's along the lines of '"Date/Time checker, a program that blah blah blah enhances your internet experience blah blah blah" by Gator Corporation.' NO MENTION of replacing or adding ads to web pages.
Sure, it doesn't say that Gator doesn't do anything else, but I don't see how this is any different than, say, yet another chain mail which also happens to mail itself to everyone in your mailbox automatically. The primary purpose of the software is hostile and hidden to the user installing it, which is about as 'trojan horse' as you can get.
Unless your are a site operator having your ad crappola trumped by somebody else's ad crappola, just run Panicware or Webwasher and be done with it. There are a myriad of fine tools out there to kill adjunk as fast as the crapmeisters can dream up new XML applets.
Scruting the inscrutable for over 50 years.
I used to recommend Google AdSense as the best ad system I had ever seen...non-intrusive, context-dependent on the content of the page it is displayed on...until I discovered what happened in the link in my sig. Even the once well-respected Google is just another company now.
Now I'm of the opinion Internet ad systems are a doomed system no matter what. The Internet is supposed to be this concept of freedom and availability, which conflicts with commercialism that companies have tried to infect it with since the 90s. "Internet companies" and their cheesedick college graduate CEOs should be drug out into the street and shot.
"Sufferin' succotash."
It was CBS who had Dan Rather sitting in a Studio overlooking Times Square for Y2K coverage, but the famous Times Square Jumbotron has an NBC peacock on it and it's input is controled by NBC. CBS didn't want to allow NBC to control something going on behind Dan Rather's sholder, so they used a positional technology to cover up the jumbotron with a screensaverish animation of CBS logos. NBC complained loudly to anybody willing to listen, but nothing much came of it other than the fact that the existance of the change was pointed out.
Similarly, the owners of the real Times Square billboards complained that the recent Spiderman movie went to painstaking steps to recreate Times Square in their computer animations, but their billboards were forgotten and replaced with virtual billboards that were sold by by the moviemakers. They went to court telling about how much money they paid to obtain their billboard placements and how much it meant to them... and then they got laughed out of court.
The problem with Gator's approach is that all activity occurs client side. The code and structure of the website is not tampered with but rather what is transmitted from the site to the user is modified by the programs. Therefore, in most cases websites can do nothing with their code to prevent Gator from screwing it up.
What they can do, and what MS has proved is definitely technologically feasible with Opera and MSN.com, is redirect users detected using Gator and similar software. Currently, probably half of the people who visit these sites and load a different page than others, thanks to Gator, probably have no idea their computer is infected. THESE people are the ones the companies are suing Gator over because the customers have no idea they are getting a "false" image of the company's site.
If users with ad-changing spyware were redirected to a page similar to the ones people using third-party browser (not MIE or Netscape) frequently get on major sites, a page that said something to the effect of "You have software installed that may prevent the proper viewing of the site" and then named exactly what was messing things up, I would bet that a lot more action would be taken against spyware. People would be aware that their Internet is filtered and hijacked, and they would do something about it. Currently, I doubt future court rulings will be different until the technology and method of presenting/counter popups and ads changes radically.
Since using Mozilla, I could care less about ads. Get yourself a big enough userContent.css file, and you feel like you're Superman online. What's the big deal about ads? Just a little graphic here and there, right?
UNTIL...
I got married, and briefly used IE again until I installed Moz1.4 on the wife's PC. Man, THIS must be what everybody's so mad about. The ads are EVERYWHERE these days. It's out of control.
I used to feel like it was stealing content, viewing websites and blocking ads, depriving them of revenue generation capability.
But then I woke up.
VOTE!
1) Get Coca-Cola to pay my company mucho bucks to "popup" a Diet Coke ad everytime the TV viewer was supposed to see a Diet Pepsi ad?
3) Profit!
What about users customizing their DVRs to play content they _prefer_ instead of the ads they were going to see? (ie, show me those beer babes fighting in the fountain ad everytime that lame shampoo commercial comes on).
Or how about allowing the user to automatically skip commercials altogether? ... Err ... Whoops
If the user has in fact chosen to use Gator or whatever, the identification will not hurt anything. If the user has been tricked into installing the software, then such identification pratice not only helps the web site, but also the user. The only reason not to identify is if the company in fact needs to be dishonest.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
detect gator agent, redirect page to we are sorry but your computer is currently unsecure running the GAIN system and we cannot allow you access to our page. Please come back when you have unistalled the GATOR client and are running a secure browser and we will be happy to do business with you. Thank-you and good luck with your security errors, the management at U-Hual.com
errr....umm...*whooosh* *whoosh* Is this thing on ?
separate might have a different meaning to you, but to me it does not mean "on top of", nor "replacing".
So, if you have a seperate window on top of your browser that covers an advert it's wrong? Gator doesn't replace anything, so you are just buying into the FUD.
Someone has paid for an ad, in hopes that people will see it. Gator/GAIN overlays that content with their own.
Because users have chosen to install Gator/GAIN on their systems. A user is free to do whatever they wish with their own computers, and that includes installing Gator.
Buy an ad in the Yellow Pages. Have a 3rd party then go through every copy, prior to delivery, and paste over your ad with one of theirs. You'd agree with this?
No, but that is because your analogy is flawed. Like most analogies, this one is also stupid. Why do you feel the need to put it in a metaphor? Is the case not defined well enough to discuss rationally without the need to bring in irrelevant and poorly construed analogies? It is.
Gator advertises exactly what they do. Gator does exactly what they do. Users install Gator to get software for free. Users get targetted avertisements. Some of which overlay in a separate window on top of their web-browser. If disallowing popup advertisements from an application happens, the browser also must be at the front and no client-side software can modify the actual presentation of that web-browser.
Would you agree with that?
Dacels Jewelers can't be trusted.
I wonder what the court would say if an overlay ad were strategically placed over the logo of a website so as to conceal the ownership of the site.
Kinda like if the Slashdot logo being replaced by a FortuneCity logo.
Maybe then the court would have a problem. An old case comes to mind about a webmaster whose news site using frames to load news stories from other news site like CNN, etc.
If I run an application that strategically blocks advertisements, how is this any different from what this company is doing? In my case, someone else paid money for that particular ad to be presented, and I'm "overlaying" (more like overriding) it with another piece of information (a randomly generated quote). I think the court ruled correctly, as the user took action to install this program (whether he paid attention to the click-through license or not). I would think that, if the court ruled the other way, that would open up many popup blockers / advertisement blockers to various lawsuits.
Now, as to the issue of the click through license -- I wonder what other way we could do such a thing? Perhaps legal mandates stating that all applications / tools / utilities from 3rd parties must be plainly presented the user? The problem, of course, is that this would be a local (at best) solution, and, it would, I think, just create some wierd variant of that type of advertisements, probably doing more harm than good.
Michael C. Hollinger