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JavaScript User Prohibitions Are Like Content DRM, But Even Less Effective (teleread.com)

Posted by samzenpus on from the no-cut-and-paste dept.

Robotech_Master writes: It always puzzles me whenever I run across a post somewhere that uses JavaScript to try to prevent me from copying and pasting text, or even viewing the source. These measures are simple enough to bypass just by disabling JavaScript in my browser. It seems like these measures are very similar to the DRM publishers insist on slapping onto e-books and movie discs—easy to defeat, but they just keep throwing them on anyway because they might inconvenience a few people.

7 of 188 comments (clear)

  1. Wouldn't the point of this stuff by rsilvergun · · Score: 3, Informative

    be to trigger the DMCA. No matter how trivial it is you just violated the law by bypassing it...

    Also how slow a news day does it have to be for this to make the front page of /.? Seriously, it's not even a blog post. There's no content.

    --
    Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
  2. Aggregators by Bite+The+Pillow · · Score: 3, Informative

    Years ago, fark.com went from external images to hosted images. I didn't see the endgame.

    This week, JavaScript is required to load the images. It's vendor lock in all over again. Because who uses an external host if you can just click upload?

    And then I see the same advert every 5 posts.

    Forbes is a white page to me, LATimes us just the menu with a word or two, and several other sites have absolute divs that cover most of the content.

    Your whining about idiotic DRM is just the tip of the iceberg. Bypassing by disabling is one thing. Loading a giant page that renders illegibly requires server resources that, as long as I mostly have wi fi, I'm willing to refresh repeatedly to ensure it really is a problem with the site.

  3. Re:JavaScript. by Aighearach · · Score: 3, Informative

    Sorry, false pedant, in this case "Javascript" is just a colloquialism for ECMAScript.

  4. Re:How do you stop someone from viewing the source by cfalcon · · Score: 4, Informative

    Javascript is a steaming pile of shit, riddled with vulnerabilities and broken from tip to top.

    So of course they try to allow some overrides:

    http://stackoverflow.com/quest...

    Basically, you can google anything with "javascript disable" and get developers asking how to fuck their users in the pee hole. Often, there's an answer.

    It wouldn't actually prevent users from viewing source though- I'm not aware of a way to do that. However, if there is, you can find it at good old google bombing expert sex change:

    http://www.experts-exchange.co...

    Also note: the real workaround for this isn't globally disabling javascript, though if everyone did that the web would shape up immediately. The real workaround is the various -monkeys that let you redefine pieces of javascript locally. Many sites go through several hoops to prevent loading on a browser that won't run their shitscript, but redefining parts and/or loading your own CSS can get you around most of it.

  5. Re:JavaScript. by Psion · · Score: 3, Informative

    Nope, sorry. It's called Javascript, but it has nothing to do with Java. It's a totally different, interpreted language.

  6. I hadn't noticed by evanh · · Score: 3, Informative

    With No-Script blocking all scripting by default, it hadn't dawned on me that such activities occur.

  7. The average user by Roodvlees · · Score: 3, Informative

    You overestimate the average user.
    They have no idea that that stuff can be bypassed so easily.
    If they did know, they'd think it's too much work.
    Then they'd forget about that being possible.

    --
    Thank you, Bradley Manning, Edward Snowden and so many others, for courageously defending humanity, my freedom and more!