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Amazon Sues Alexaholic
theodp writes "ZDNet reports that as Jeff Bezos tap-danced out of a cringe moment at Web 2.0 Expo prompted by Tim O'Reilly's questioning of why Amazon couldn't get along with Alexaholic (now Statsaholic), Amazon had already filed a lawsuit to legally spank the tiny company into oblivion."
Keep up the good work.
Under the influence of Post-Cyberpunk Gonzo Journalism
Why does that name sound so familiar?
What?
Another generation learns the old truth... the upstarts always seem to start as the Good Guys taking on the Big Faceless Corporate Machines. Their CEOs are hip and appear smiling, sharp but casually dressed, on magazine covers. Even after they go public, they maintain that halo for awhile, give lip service to idea of making the world a better place instead of just making a buck. Why not make a little less, and give something back to the people?
Then one day, the upstarts turn into the Big Bad Guys. There's just no way to tell the difference. The need to dominate the industry is overriding, and the end justifies every means.
That is a mistake, or rather a mistaken response to the claim. Yes, statistical significance is attainable but only if the sample is representative (i.e.) is random. The critics' claim is that Alexa's data is not representative, in other words the sites that choose to give Alexa their data are somehow don't represent a random sample of all the websites out there. It isn't a question of size but rather of quality.
The folks at Dewey, Cheatham, and Howe beg to differ.
What?
Yes and Tim showed him what it was like to be food on stage in front of an audience of wolves. Kinda nice when you consider the brow beating he gets over amazon's one-click patent. http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=230983&cid =18750539
Under the influence of Post-Cyberpunk Gonzo Journalism
That headline could actually make sense in today's world.
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
It has been shown in multiple studies that statsahol use is a gateway to statsajuana and statsamphetamine. Good for Bezos!
At least according to US copyright law, raw data does not contain the expressive component necessary for copyrights.
From the complaint:
"Alexa seeks to force Mr. Hornbaker to stop infringing Alexa's trademarks and to stop pirating Alexa proprietary data."
I don't know exactly what Alexa does, but the only thing protectable in a database is its *design and *structure -- and that only if those attributes exhibit creativity (rather than the ordinary constraints of the relational model).
My turnips listen for the soft cry of your love
Alan Graham here...I'll answer you...since you actually don't get the thrust of the piece.
It smells bad to have someone from a $16 billion dollar company pitch to an audience of web 2.0 developers about how you can trust them with your business and pretend to be a good steward of what web 2.0 stands for...while you're suing one guy for upwards of $500k...especially when you had a year to shut him down and you only did that after you took all his ideas. On top of that you operate a company that would not exist without the volunteer efforts of every single person who installs the Alexa toolbar and reports that data back to the company...and they even admit...no data/volunteers...no Alexa.
What I expect Alexa to do is to find it in themselves to work with the community that they depend on...in a more open way. I have nothing against them making a buck...but this type of lawsuit is heavy handed.
Alexaholic hot links images from Alexa using javascript, that's all it does. It's not a mashup. It doesn't create any graphs, all it does is pulls images from Alexa behinds the scenes and displays them on a page full of ads.
nothing to sue for here....it's not specific enough to be liable and most definately True as an opinion with plenty of examples.
Sometimes I feel like I'm the only one who still boycotts Amazon over the one-click patent. That O'Reilly sold out doesn't mean that I have to. Still, it's getting more and more difficult to avoid Amazon, especially when I have to explain to well-meaning friends and relatives that I can no more accept a gift bought through Amazon than I can accept a gift made through child labour.
You only used one click to submit your comment, so GO SUE YOURSELF!
I still am too... but yeah, when RMS gives up it makes you feel pretty lonely...
You guys are hardcore, tougher than stallman. :) Is it about the price or the principle at this point?
Under the influence of Post-Cyberpunk Gonzo Journalism
So Alexa built their business on the backs of the volunteers that provided the data they now claim as their proprietary data. Building on that ethical triumph, they see someone else make good use of the same data and proceed to sue them into oblivion - but not before taking all the good ideas this person had for their own. Of course, we're talking about Amazon; the people with that "one click" patent that they've used against competitors more than once.
I'd say something about this being good reason to avoid Amazon in the future - but I already came to that conclusion a long time back. There was a book I'd heard about and I wanted a copy. Nobody seemed to have it in stock - but Amazon did, and they took my order for a copy. After a week I was wondering where my book was and checked Amazon's website for order status. Backordered. But they should have it for me in 5 to 7 days.
After a couple of months of this I finally contacted the publisher of the book to see what was going on. What was going on is the book that Amazon was selling me was OUT OF PRINT and had been for a few years. You'd think Amazon might communicate that little detail to me, wouldn't you? Nope; they maintained the fiction of "it'll be here in 5 to 7 days" right up until I cancelled my order. You should see how their attitude changes at that point; I must have been transferred to a "customer retention" specialist.
OK, here's the real truth about the big Amazon catalog. It's the ISBN catalog; they just borrowed that data and imported it into their database.
I'm expecting someone from Amazon to jump up and say "I stole it fair and square, it's MINE now."
Alexa is not malware unless you consider IE malware (which you might well.) Both the Alexa toolbar and IE/Windows are installed by the user voluntarily after they agree to the license. Same old, same old. Why do you think MS and Amazon have armies of lawyers? If you use Windows and IE, and can't keep track of what you're running, you get what you deserve. If you like the related-links feature (the same tech as in Amazon's "people who bought this..."), then use it and accept sending your clickstream data. Or don't. Most end-users will never know or care.
Use OS X or Linux and Firefox. (ducks)
Seems to me that Alexa would have done best by offering him a job - he's obviously bright, highly motivated by their technology and an expert in their problem domain.
I've never been to Statsaholic until just a few minutes ago. There's nothing good about this site at all. I guess it might have been relatively better than Alexa before the Alexa redesign a few months back, but now it seems to be pretty broken.
...not using the APIs.
He was "avoiding an API fee", but the data he wanted was not available through the API anyways, so he screen scraped alexa. If alexa had wanted that data available they would have made it available through the API.
The guy (hornbaker) admittedly says he wants to turn this into a PR battle. And I remember him explicitly trying to stick it to amazon before he changed the site name.
I don't really know who the hell to cheer for here, so I'm just gonna sit back and watch.
"The need to build the internet comes from something inside us, something programmed... something we can't resist."
I must admit I did read "Amazon Sues Sexaholic" first time round. But what if we turned the tables around..
Sexaholics Sue Amazon
That would be one classy action suit!
Do it yourself, because no one else will do it yourself. [beta blockade 10-17 Feb]
Well, when Amazon was starting out there was a continuous flood of Amazon spam in the usenet groups I read. They seemed to be encouraging 'our affiliates are spamming not us' spam. I've never done business with them because of that. The one click patent and the 'geo locate and quote higher prices if we think you'll pay more' e-commerce system cemented that opinion.
Oh my god... a business behaving like a business rather than like a friendly community contributor? I can't believe it! Why on earth would this business behave as if its only concern is making money?
Moderator hint: a comment is neither "Flamebait" nor "Troll" if it is true.
This is an ancient story, my friends, that existed long before the internets. A lot of grteat entrepreneurs start off as idealistic young types with a idea and a dream. And pretty soon the money, and power gets a hold of them and they end up paranoid, dictatorial, vicious businessmen. One day you're a curious young inventor named Thomas Edison, but pretty soon you're a wealthy shark trying to personally destroy Tesla and Westinghouse to defend your giant corporation.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
Did you even read the summary, for God's sake? This is about a conference where Bezos is trying to get a bunch of web 2.0 developers to buy into using his APIs while his company, Alexa, gave tacit permission to Alexaholic, who are paying them for data, to use their API. Then Alexa steals all Alexaholic's ideas and plans to sue them into oblivion.
"Yeah, dudes, web 2.0 is totally open. Sharing is caring. Oh by the way, if you get big enough, we'll steal all your ideas and sue the pants off you."
As consumers wise up under the continued pressure of immoral and unethical businesses who only care about making money, the businesses who offer consumers what they want: morality, fairness, ethics, and reciprocity, will be the ones who succede. Businesses will need to act like ethical entities if they want to continue to make money.
You aren't being in any way insightful or wise when you point out that businesses want to make money. By presenting it in such a simplistic manner, you are offering up an excuse for immoral behavior on the part of these companies and simultaneously denigrating those of us who do not enjoy doing business with scoundrels as naive fools who don't know how the real world works.
News flash: We know how the world works, Einstein. We just don't like it.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
You aren't being in any way insightful or wise when you point out that businesses want to make money. By presenting it in such a simplistic manner, you are offering up an excuse for immoral behavior on the part of these companies and simultaneously denigrating those of us who do not enjoy doing business with scoundrels as naive fools who don't know how the real world works.
You obviously don't understand the difference between an explanation and an excuse. I wasn't in any way excusing Amazon's behavior. I was just pointing out that there's nothing shocking or surprising about it.
Until the rules of the economy are changed such that ethical behavior and profits coincide 100%, you're going to keep seeing businesses behaving badly. Period.
Moderator hint: a comment is neither "Flamebait" nor "Troll" if it is true.
You obviously don't understand the difference between an explanation and an excuse.
;-). It was a knee-jerk reaction on my part. I've just seen far to many apologists for the status quo here lately and it irks me. I thought you were one of them. Anyway, I agree with you, we need to make companies bear the real social and economic costs of their unethical behavior before they will stop behaving unethically.
Oh man, I'm sorry. That's exactly the same line I use on my wife
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
My lawyers are polishing their C&D's at this very moment...
Hola; I tried to email you through the slashdot interface but it seems to not be an option. We did defeat prop 90 (yay!), so I just wanted you to know your sig was out of date.
In Soviet Russia, it failed you.
SCNR
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
Thanks! I don't see signatures so I completely forgot about it.