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Utah Trying To Restrict Keyword Advertising ... Again

Eric Goldman writes "The Utah legislature has tried to restrict keyword advertising twice before, with disastrous results. In 2004, Utah tried to ban keyword advertising in adware; that law was declared unconstitutional. In 2007, Utah tried to regulate competitive keyword advertising; after a firestorm of protests, Utah repealed the law in 2008. Despite this track record, Utah is trying to regulate keyword advertising a third time. HB 450 would allow trademark owners to block competitors from displaying certain types of keyword ads. In practice, this law is just another attempt by the Utah legislature to enact a law that doesn't help consumers at all but does help trademark owners suppress their online competition."

11 of 257 comments (clear)

  1. Seems a sensible restriction by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

    It seems Utah merely wants to prevent advertisers from getting married to too many keywords.

  2. Re:remove the Mormons tag by Ironchew · · Score: 5, Funny

    You have experienced the horror of keyword advertising!

  3. Re:remove the Mormons tag by RobotRunAmok · · Score: 4, Funny

    Please remove the "Mormons" tag. Not all Mormons think that way. San Francisco has liberal Mormons, Texas has conservative Mormons, and there are libertarians dispersed throughout.

    Oh, c'mon, Dude!! What's wrong with you? Geez... Christian-bashing is the last socially acceptable form of bigotry left to Americans, and now you want to take that away, too?

  4. Utah? by girlintraining · · Score: 4, Funny

    This is a state where 58% of its inhabitants claim membership in a single religion, and the overwhelming majority of the legislature comes from this demographic. They're not exactly known for their progressive views on technology. Might I suggest we kindly totally and completely ignore this state? They're clearly out of touch with not just reality, but the rest of the country as well. At worst, Utah-nians just won't be able to go online, and golly gee what a shame that would be. -_- Now go ahead and mod me to hell for stating the obvious. Or can we at least re-classify this under "It's funny, laugh." ?

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  5. Re:remove the Mormons tag by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    Yeah really. The correct tag would have been "lds", not "mormons".

  6. Re:Uh, WordPerfect and Novell? by girlintraining · · Score: 2, Funny

    You mean, like, when the mormons invented WordPerfect, one of the first great Word Processors, or pioneered networking with Novell, the first great networking company?

    Whoah. Hey, did you, like, know Robert Oppenheimer worked on the Manhattan Project and studied Hinduism? So, like, the entire religion of Hinduism can claim it invented the nuke! That's, like, totally and completely awesome! Dude!!!!!! -_- /Sarcasm.

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  7. Re:remove the Mormons tag by Mister+Whirly · · Score: 2, Funny

    Yeah, that would be a full time job around here. With a few assistants. Working 28 hour days.

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  8. Re:Uh, WordPerfect and Novell? &Linux/Unix too by irenaeous · · Score: 2, Funny

    You forgot to mention SCO! The people from which Unix was pirated to form Linux! Where would tech be today without great Utahnian innovators like Darl McBride and Blake Stowell?

  9. Re:remove the Mormons tag by CaptainPatent · · Score: 2, Funny

    There needs to be a "+1 Priceless" tag for comments like this.

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  10. Re:remove the Mormons tag by geobeck · · Score: 5, Funny

    I think the difference boils down like this:

    • Jews and Muslims consider Christ to be a prophet.
    • Christians consider Christ to be The Prophet.
    • Televangelists consider Christ to be The Profit.
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  11. Re:remove the Mormons tag by Tubal-Cain · · Score: 1, Funny

    LDS is how someone on LSD spells LSD.