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Craigslist Forced To Reveal a Seller's Identity
mi writes "The Academy of Motion Pictures Arts has won a judgment compelling Craigslist to reveal the identity of 'Daniel,' who tried to sell two tickets to the Oscar ceremony recently. The plaintiff's argument against such sales is scary and can be taken very far very quickly: 'If you don't know who's inside the theater, it's very difficult to provide security.' Craigslist's handling of the case may be even scarier, however — instead of fighting tooth-and-nail for the user's privacy, as we expect Google, Yahoo, and AOL, and even credit-card issuers to do, Craigslist simply did not show up in court and lost by default."
If they want to know who is in the theater during the ceremony (for 'security' reasons... dun dun dun!), why do they even have physical tickets? Why not just a list of who can get in? Do the invitees REALLY have to show a ticket to get in? "Sorry, Mr. Cruise. No ticket, no entry!"
Craigslist has to be about the seediest place to do business on the internet. Nothing about their service screams 'high quality,' much less 'we care.'
When it comes to Craigslist then it's a case of buyer, and seller, beware.
The site originally started out as a good idea but rapidly became spammed up with dodgy sellers, fake ads and boring rants.
While there are still a few nuggets of gold in among the trash (best of rants and raves is always worth a look) it's increasingly becoming irrelevant.
I'm not surprised they didn't bother to show, since they take such a lax attitude that getting into a battle to protect user anonymity would just be too much effort.
"...invitees to the Academy Awards show are explicitly told they cannot sell or give their tickets away."
What does "explicitly told" mean? It doesn't sound like a binding contract. Why don't they issue tickets that say non-transferable right on them and require id at the door?
"If you don't know who's inside the theater, it's very difficult to provide security," Quinto said.
If you're too stupid to keep a list of the people you've invited, with their ticket numbers, then providing security will indeed be difficult.
Typical Hollywood idiocy.
If they're worried about who's in the theater, then it seems like they'd be more interested in the identity of those *buying* the tickets, no? Do they have prohibitions against giving the tickets away if you get them legitimately? Can I donate them to a charity auction, and do they send the Oscar Gestapo to the auction to fingerprint and photograph the winners at the charity auction?
If not, then why is Craigslist such a security threat?
[b.belong('us') for b in bases if b.owner() == 'you']
Should Craigslist be forced to pay for lawyers whenever someone posts something they shouldn't on their site? I say no. What did this guy ever do for them? Craig's not making any money off his posting. None. Why should it pay for lawyers for him?
Why is this Craigslist's problem? There is no requirement that they fight to help you keep your anonymity. If Daniel doesn't like the result of the court's decision, he can hire his own attorney to fight it.
I don't blame the academy for wanting tighter security, and they have a valid reason for WANTING to know the identity, but security at the Oscars isn't Craigslist's responsibility, and they're not ENTITLED to that identity.
Forcing Craig's to stop the auction and prevent the sale? Reasonable. I would think that the extent of their liability would be to remove the auction of (what are presumably) non-transferrable tickets. Had they actually shown up in court, they could have had a good shot at protecting the sellers identity.
There's potential here for an unfortunate precedent.
Here's a handy tip I've come up with to determine, in a business vs. business lawsuit, who will win: Who has the most money to spend on lawyers?
If CL had attempted to fight the suit, with its meager resources, it would have lost. Then, the case may have stood as a precedent to future such cases.
CL was smart, not only for its own limited resources, but also for the larger communities that it and others serve, to not attempt to fight this suit. Let someone with deep pockets stand in and try to win a case that can stand.
(IANAL)
You:But all I want to do is to see the movie.
Clerk:Sorry Sir but we have to know who is in the theater. It is afterall for your own protection.
Undetectable Steganography? Yep, there's an app fo
This strikes me as the classic fallacy for suing online service providers, to challenge the messenger for the messages that they deliver. Craigslist is about as fast and lose as sites seem to come, and all that's needed is a legitimate email address to post ~ which costs about five cents and ten minutes to set up. The service has absolutely no guarantees of poster accuracy, honesty, or legitimacy ~ honestly, about on par with a web board. Keeping eBay and Amazon on their toes is valid, in my book, solely for the fact that their sites enable transactions, but beyond that, it's buyer beware.
This lawsuit makes about as much sense as bringing the FTC in to a flea market. You can't impose any sorts of regulations without completely warping the existing system, in which case it's no longer a flea market.
Security has nothing to do with it. They just want to control who has access to the ceremony. "Knowing" who is there really has little to do with whether a place is secure, especially when there is no checks on who has access other than being "in the know" or "in the cool crowd."
This thread of replies should be mod'ed +5 informative. Why is it even news if it is in their privacy policy that they will turn over the information? Reading that kind of makes this a total non-story.
Spelling and Grammar errors have been added to this post for your enjoyment
How is this Craiglist's fault? "Daniel" was doing something he was barred from doing. Shouldn't people be more upset that Daniel is doing this instead of being upset at Craigslist for investing massive amounts of money to protect someone else's dubious behavior?
If brevity is the soul of wit, then how does one explain Twitter?
The real question is why the MPAA spent the money on lawyers and court costs when the could have just bought the tickets!
The Admin and the Engineer
Craig didn't show up to defend someone he does know, I don't think anyone is surprised. God forbid, that someones actions actually have a consequence. They knew reselling the tickets wasn't allowed, I personally don't see why it is craiglists problem to begin with.
At least it's not like Digg, where nobody reads anything!
Given how many posts go up on Craigslist each hour, that's a huge number of potential lawsuits. I don't think it's a realistic for Craigslist to be able to show up each time they are summoned for a frivolous lawsuit filed involving their site.
If the tickets are on sale to the Public? Then It's the public (very large and diverse group) you've invited? Everyone knows the public is a very dangerous group...Thats why many people hold Private gatherings.
If the concern is security...Don't sell to the Public.
Or am I missing something?
-DML
Maybe they want to know who Daniel is so they know who not to give tickets to in the future.
They aren't talking about security in the terrorism/national security sense. Ever been to a private night club? The bouncer outside the door that lets people in based on how they're dressed, or their social status? That's the sort of security they're looking for.
They send out tickets to the people they would like to come. These people are the people that they feel "deserve" to be there. Now, these tickets are transferrable between friends. It is reasonably assumed that anyone they invited would give their ticket to someone of a similar status, by the nature of friendships and how people give shit away. When you have someone selling the tickets, however, you have the potential for the unsightly to sneak in the back. The tickets are the bouncer at the front door, and you don't want him to be easily purchased.
The terrorists would have been smart enough to sell their Oscar tickets using an anonymized craigslist email address pointing at a throwaway webmail account they signed up for using Tor from their neighbor's open access point...