Slashdot Mirror
Online Publisher Blocks LinuxToday Referrals
MadChicken writes "This weekend, LinuxToday found that their link to an article was blocked by CMP Media LLC (publishers of Information Week). The editorial with full details is here. Could this have impact on other online news sites?"
MIRROR
the admin of this box is a total ***hole, so i mirrored the article on it. bombs away.
They said they wanted to respect bluh bluh, but if they wanted to these types of blocks can by bypassed by opening a new browser window using JavaScript and going to the site in those.
Slashdot should also be taking note of this, I relised this could happen a few months ago.
http://www.informationweek.com/story/showArticle.j html?articleID=18400894
Can I tell my brower not to tell that I'm following a link when I enter a site?
yes. that would solve the problem.
in mozilla you can set the network.http.sendRefererHeader value to 0.
or just open the link in a new tab.
I just don't trust anything that bleeds for five days and doesn't die.
Edit user.js and add/change
user_pref("network.http.sendRefererHeader", 0);
No more referers sent.
The Doormat
If you're not outraged, then you're not paying attention.
2. Set 'network.http.sendRefererHeader' to 0
3. Enjoy.
This simply kills off the referer tag from being sent and lets you through. While it's very unlikely this will cause problems, some web sites might not work w/o the tag.
"And a voice was screaming: 'Holy Jesus! What are these goddamn animals?'" - HST
Not at all. If they block us, we just middle-click in Mozilla Fire$animaloftheweek or any other browser that does tabbing. Problem solved.
;)
But that's too easy. I'm supposed to tell you to hack your browser so it doesn't send the referring url. This is, after all, Slashdot.
Posted Anonymously to protect the innocent and because I already modded in this thread.
Power to the Peaceful
The Referer header is what I consider to be one of the worst parts of HTTP. Alhough there are a few sites that require it for operation, I have rarely encountered any troubles simply not sending one. I believe it is considered somewhat "unclean" to send a bogus HTTP Referer header (such as the / of the dest server), so it might be better to simply disable it altogether.
The Links web browser has the builtin ability to set the Referer to a static value, the page being requested, or not send it at all. I have been referer-free for quite some time, previously with a proxy server, and now with links.
I would advise people to consider whether or not they want the administrators of every web server they visit to find out how they got there (including web searches and privately-hosted HTTP servers).
But even if it is intentional, it is totally within their rights to set up their servers any way they see fit.
I stand by my use. From wikipedia: deep linking:
"Deep linking, on the World Wide Web, is the process of placing on a web page a hyperlink that points to a specific page or image within another website, as opposed to that website's main or home page. Such links are called deep links."
"Some commercial websites object to other sites making deep links into their content, either because it bypasses advertising on their main pages or, like The Wall Street Journal, they charge users for permanently-valid links. Many critics charge that such sites simply want to establish policies that will "license" such links to the highest bidder. They argue that links are a fundamental part of "user-oriented" web browsing."
Here's what I do: Bitty Browser & Andromeda
On the other hand, some websites that don't like deep linking will only show you their deeper pages if you DO have a REFERER set from one of their other pages - so you have to go in through the front door. That's one reason you might not want to block REFERER permanently.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
While it's very unlikely this will cause problems, some web sites might not work w/o the tag.
Actually, quite a few use this as leech-protection, in order to prevent external direct links to downloads. Privoxy does this the smart way - it forges a referrer header from whatever site you're loading. If I follow a link to say, CNN, they will see "www.cnn.com" as the referrer.
Kjella
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Opera does.
Hit F12 and you get a quick menu with a bunch of handy toggles.
--
Power to the Peaceful
Yes, they can block who they want, but they don't have a right to determine who will have fair use rights. The message that they displayed was "Unfortunately, we cannot satisfy this particular request because it comes from a source that is not authorized to redistribute our content..." That implies that LinuxToday was violating CMP's copyright (because CMP has no legal right to decide who is 'authorized' to make fair-use excerpts. Thus, CMP has slandered LinuxToday.
On a wider scale, we have seen large corporate entities go to great lengths to prevent fair use. The RIAA and MPAA have redefined fair use and put copy protection into place to prevent fair use copying and backup. Broadcasters will have a "flag" in HDTV broadcasts that tells digital recording devices whether a broadcast can be recorded. Software companies have long fought against fair use. I just bought Unreal Tournament 2004. It uses a form of copy protection and, on top of that, requires that a "Play CD" be in the drive. You can't back up that CD using normal methods and you're hosed if it gets damaged or lost. (There were cracks out the next day, but 99% of people will never know about the cracks.)
We need laws protecting fair use before large corporations effectively quash it. Should CMP be allowed to "punish" a site for exercising their fair use rights to excerpt? I see both sides of this one, but, given the big picture of corporations deciding to prevent fair use, I have to side with LinuxToday.
You are probably aware of its existence, but just in case...
MultiZilla (http://multizilla.mozdev.org) provides just such a GUI. Granted, it is not built-in to Mozilla, which is what you were referring to, but it does provide the function.
Government's idea of a balanced budget: take money from the right pocket to balance...oh who am I kidding?
Just use privoxy. It also adds very good add and flash-blocking, if you want.
What are you talking about with The Hunger Site? The donations are still made whether or not you click on any of the ads. It's one of the few places still around that is pay-per-impression.
As for the other issue - the point being, they (i.e. Infoweek) lose money by paying for bandwidth that won't be made up on pay-per-click ads (as most are these days).
That said, Infoweek is still being stupid.
If everyone mirrored/posted links to mirrors more often perhaps the /. effect wouldn't be nearly as harsh and sites wouldn't take to drastic measures to try to keep their sites going.
Mirroring a site without written permission from the copyright holder(s) is a clear violation of copyright, while simply linking to the site is not. My bet is that if LinuxToday had mirrored the articles they'd be looking at a lawsuit from CMP instead of just being blocked. Mirrors just aren't a practical solution against a slashdotting under the current circumstances because there's no real time to get the required permission to set them up.
In Opera, You can toggle the sending of the Referrer Header at any time.
Use the quick menu: Just hit F12, then 'f'. (on v6.03 at least)
I can see lots of uses for this. You can use this to hide where you're coming from, such as clicking on info links from BitTorrent repositories of questionable nature. Or when trying to get through to sites who have blocked access via Referrer from Slashdot.
From the online docs:
"
Disabling referrer logging
Do you want Opera to send information referring to the page from where the document or picture was requested?
If you enable this option in File > Preferences > Privacy, Web servers can store information about the site that you last visited before you jumped to the current one. This allows webmasters to analyze how people find their way to his website.
Disable this option if..."
[Remainder of text deleted to fit within fair-use guidelines. Ahem.]
It would wreak havoc on the spirit of the internet to have user-definable Referrer fields, though...
-j.
Why bother?
When you open the link, assuming the error page doesn't change the link itself (didn't RTFA), you can click in the address bar and press Enter.
Viola.
A childish as, say, posting a rant without having read the linked article first?
Actually there is a plugin to do this. You can manually set the referer or have it be the URL itself. I have used for awhile now. it's very useful. I have it running right now. Nevermind the bad english, the guy is french.
http://refspoof.mozdev.org
It's functional. To install it you just have to go to http://refspoof.mozdev.org and follow the Install link. (you must do that with Mozilla RC3+ as browser). it should install automatically.
Thalasar
The quickprefs extension for Mozilla offers this sort of thing also.
Just so nobody is misled by your "entertainment publishing company" comment, here is a list of CMP Media's print rags (copy/pasted from their web site):
Bank Systems & Technology
BioMechanics
C/C++ Users Journal
Call Center
CMP Books
Communications Convergence
CRN
DB2 Magazine
Diagnostic Imaging
Diagnostic Imaging Asia Pacific
Diagnostic Imaging Europe
Diagnostic Imaging SCAN
Dr. Dobb's Journal
DV Magazine
EE Times
Embedded Systems Programming Magazine
Game Developer
Geriatric Times
InformationWeek
Insurance & Technology
Intelligent Enterprise Magazine
MSDN Magazine
Network Computing
Network Magazine
Optimize
Psychiatric Times
Software Development
SysAdmin
Technology & Learning
Transform Magazine
VARBusiness
Wall Street & Technology
Windows Developer Network
Xtreme Video
Several of which many SlashDot'ers probably read.
From time-to-time, I've gotten several of them. CMP is decidedly uneven -- some of their rags are good, some are woefully clueless. My personal assesment is that their management is mostly clueless, except for being able to sell advertising and bring those dollars to the bottom line.
So, while I agree with "I'd be worried, except that it is CMP media"... I think your characterization of them as entertainment media needs to be clarified as the sarcasm that it is.
In any case, their "please don't send me traffic" attitude is clueless.
There's a drupal module that does that. Coded by kerneltrap webmaster.
Buy a Nintendo DS Lite
When I try the new tab thing, the new tab still knows the referrer.
Try it with my homepage URL link or something, and when you get to the WhatReallyHappened page, right click on the page and view the "page info". The Referring URL is slashdot.org/blahblahblah/etc.
So I don't know for sure, but I'm guessing the new tab idea wouldn't work... You can always cut and paste the address into Google, but that's a PITA.
I'm not normally an irrational zealous dickhead, but I figure "When in Rome..."
The Mozilla PrefBar has a configurable checkbox option for sending referers.
Oh, no! You have walked into the slavering fangs of a lurking grue!
You actually need to manually drag the link to the tab bar, instead of just opening the link in a tab.
I think what's happending is that, by using the drag, you confuse the browser enough that it can't tell where the link was (because allt he receiving end sees is the URL).
/.ing them sends exactly the wrong message. You want them to see a sharp reduction in traffic to all CMP sites and reduced readership for their dead tree publications as well:
Bank Systems & Technology
BioMechanics
C/C++ Users Journal
Call Center
Communications Convergence
CRN
DB2 Magazine
Diagnostic Imaging
Diagnostic Imaging Asia Pacific
Diagnostic Imaging Europe
Diagnostic Imaging SCAN
Dr. Dobb's Journal
DV Magazine
EE Times
Embedded Systems Programming Magazine
Game Developer
Geriatric Times
InformationWeek
Insurance & Technology
Intelligent Enterprise Magazine
MSDN Magazine
Network Computing
Network Magazine
Optimize
Psychiatric Times
Software Development
SysAdmin
Technology & Learning
Transform Magazine
VARBusiness
Wall Street & Technology
Windows Developer Network
Xtreme Video
If you are looking to obscure your link, you can visit almost any popular site and repurpose their own redirection script. Almost all sites have this, for example, want to visit slashdot and have the referrer come from Google? Just use
THIS (http://www.google.com/url?q=http://www.msn.com)
This won't work if the site is restricting referrals to its own hosts, but otherwise it can obfusicate the referer.
Mirroring a site without written permission from the copyright holder(s) is a clear violation of copyright
shh don't tell Google, or Archive.org who both do just that, unless i "opt out" with my robots.txt
you know what would be a great plugin for mozila.
Privoxy does this, and it's pretty handy. As a webmaster, I hate it (seeing how users navigate around helps me improve the site), but as a user, I like hiding my referer [sic], because I know as a webmaster I point and laugh at the wacky search terms people use.
Here, lemme demonstrate... in the past 24 hours, I've gotten hits from "why I like cooking", "how do i get interested in stuff", and "how do you spell fiance". (Yeah, ask.com always gets the best Stupid User Queries. I should go see if they run a ticker like Google does (used to?))
Slashdot's token middle-aged housewife
You called it:
Update: As I was making one last pass through the 'Net before retiring Friday evening, I located a new source for the exact same story mentioned here. In order to provide complete coverage to LT readers, I have re-posted the story. I still intend to inquire about CMP's new policy at the start of next week.
-BKP