Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

AdNauseam Banned from the Google Web Store

adnauseam.io

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

281–290 of 344 posts

Re: AdNauseam Banned from the Google Web Store

#281

Post by heroprotagonist »

hsod wrote: post #254
heroprotagonist wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's arguable. Fraud generally requires intent to result in financial or personal gain. There's no gain here for the user. There's gain for the advertising company at the expense of the company purchasing the advertisements. But the advertising company is supposed to well-qualify their targets, right? It's on them for serving and charging for advertisements to people who don't want them or will 'click them' regardles…

I'm not a lawyer, but according to this definition the fraud perpetrator need not gain, only cause injury to the fraud victim: "A false representation of a matter of fact—whether by words or by conduct, by false or misleading allegations, or by concealment of what should have been disclosed—that deceives and is intended to deceive another so that the individual will act upon it to her or his legal injury." http://leg…

If we take that definition, what is misleading? Users are presented with something asking them to click and then they just automate the clicking. They aren't attempting deceit through their actions.

Now, if the advertiser knows that people are clicking things through a script, and has some clause with their agreement with the company that says 'We won't charge you when this happens' but charges them anyway, that would be deceit. But it'd be on the part of the advertiser to the company buying the advertisements.

Re: AdNauseam Banned from the Google Web Store

#282

Post by [deleted] »

arrosenberg wrote: post #276
joelwilliamson wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The case against Standard Oil was pretty explicitly because of anticompetitive behaviour, not price inefficiency.

The anti-competitive behavior was creating price inefficiency. Standard Oil owned almost the entire refinery market, and they were colluding with railroads so they effectively owned distribution. This vertical alignment meant they could effectively set whatever price they wanted because there was no other game in town.

[deleted]

Re: AdNauseam Banned from the Google Web Store

#283

Post by yellowapple »

cdubzzz wrote: post #249
recursive wrote: post #232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't even figure out how to install a stable version of Chromium. I only spent two minutes trying, but installing Chrome consists of one web search and one button click, so the difference is pretty obvious to me.

I thought for sure this was an exaggeration but you are absolutely correct. I couldn't find anything in two minutes either. I have Chromium installed on a my Ubuntu desktop but I think I had to add a PPA to get it.

No PPA necessary: http://packages.ubuntu.com/yakkety/web/chromium-browser

Most of the more-or-less mainstream distros ship Chromium in their standard repos. In fact, they're more likely to ship Chromium than Chrome due to the fact that the former is FOSS and the latter is not.

Neither macOS nor Windows have such a philosophy of "prioritize the FOSS alternative", so Chrome is unsurprisingly the better-supported option there.

Re: AdNauseam Banned from the Google Web Store

#284

Post by fapjacks »

WhiteOwlLion wrote: post #252
em3rgent0rdr wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Since the packets are being sent to your computer, I consider the situation analogous to a someone coming to your home and then you replying to them with bogus information. Maybe that still fits this definition of fraud, in which case I would say I don't believe such fraud should be legally suable. I think the users property rights of their computer trumps the advertiser's complaint about fraud.

The distinction is automation versus manual process. If you manually reply with bogus information, then your illustration works. When you automate the process, there's no intervention on your part. Ad blocking is fine with me, but when you intentionally click on ads in an automated way, this becomes click fraud. There's a certain level of click fraud that is tolerated by Google, but AdNaseum takes it too far IMO.

The intervention on my part is writing/compiling/installing/actively using the automation.

Re: AdNauseam Banned from the Google Web Store

#285

Post by saghm »

_euvw wrote: post #251
Analemma_ wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes? I'm honestly not sure how you could think otherwise. This is a clickbot just like any other.

In te Netherlands, we have stickers that we cab place on our real-life mailboxes: "No ads. No unspecified recipient." The advertisers (mailmen) are not allowed to ignore this sticker. Am I stealing money from advertisers? There is no such rule for online adverts. So what is a parent to do? By blocking them and obfuscating through clicking I am protecting my own sanity, and that of my children. This is my "No/No" stic…

> In te Netherlands, we have stickers that we cab place on our real-life mailboxes: "No ads. No unspecified recipient." The advertisers (mailmen) are not allowed to ignore this sticker.

Wow, that's actually kind of amazing. I wish we had that in the US...

Re: AdNauseam Banned from the Google Web Store

#286

Post by saghm »

neon_electro wrote: post #253
recursive wrote: post #232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't even figure out how to install a stable version of Chromium. I only spent two minutes trying, but installing Chrome consists of one web search and one button click, so the difference is pretty obvious to me.

Here's a (macOS-specific) guide, unfortunately it still requires basic knowledge of the Terminal and a working installation of Ruby. http://macappstore.org/chromium/

> it still requires...a working installation of Ruby.

Does OS X/macOS not still come with a bundled installation of Ruby? Or is the version it comes with too old to use with brew/brew cask?

Re: AdNauseam Banned from the Google Web Store

#287

Post by saghm »

yellowapple wrote: post #283
cdubzzz wrote: post #249

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought for sure this was an exaggeration but you are absolutely correct. I couldn't find anything in two minutes either. I have Chromium installed on a my Ubuntu desktop but I think I had to add a PPA to get it.

No PPA necessary: http://packages.ubuntu.com/yakkety/web/chromium-browser Most of the more-or-less mainstream distros ship Chromium in their standard repos. In fact, they're more likely to ship Chromium than Chrome due to the fact that the former is FOSS and the latter is not. Neither macOS nor Windows have such a philosophy of "prioritize the FOSS alternative", so Chrome is unsurprisingly the better-supported option…

> Most of the more-or-less mainstream distros ship Chromium in their standard repos. In fact, they're more likely to ship Chromium than Chrome due to the fact that the former is FOSS and the latter is not.

That's actually how I first started using Chromium early in my Linux days; I didn't really know the difference between Chrome and Chromium, so I just picked the one that was easier to install. Once I finally learned the difference, I consciously made the choice to use Chromium on all of my systems, even the non-Linux ones.

Re: AdNauseam Banned from the Google Web Store

#288

Post by WhiteOwlLion »

fapjacks wrote: post #284
WhiteOwlLion wrote: post #252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The distinction is automation versus manual process. If you manually reply with bogus information, then your illustration works. When you automate the process, there's no intervention on your part. Ad blocking is fine with me, but when you intentionally click on ads in an automated way, this becomes click fraud. There's a certain level of click fraud that is tolerated by Google, but AdNaseum takes it too far IMO.

The intervention on my part is writing/compiling/installing/actively using the automation.

You could make that argument for any bot, but in the eyes of Google or myself, I see it as click fraud. I think Google made the right choice here. If you disagree with surveillance and want privacy, there are other tools available such as Ghostery and µBlock. They provide what you want without being retaliatory.

Re: AdNauseam Banned from the Google Web Store

#289

Post by ben0x539 »

notahacker wrote: post #255
ben0x539 wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think you can reasonably frame clicking on too many ads as an act of sabotage. It's interfering with the metrics that some people who you don't necessarily have a business relationship use to make business decisions (like paying out money), but it's not obvious to me how you're obligated to be particularly cooperative in their gathering of the metrics. The system continues to work as intended, you're just not…

> I don't think you can reasonably frame clicking on too many ads as an act of sabotage. It's interfering with the metrics that some people who you don't necessarily have a business relationship use to make business decisions (like paying out money), but it's not obvious to me how you're obligated to be particularly cooperative in their gathering of the metrics. The system continues to work as intended, you're just n…

Fundamentally I feel like sabotage involves something like me going to someone's place and destroying their equipment like in your original analogy, also I'm probably being really sneaky about it. Naturally there's a legal and moral right to me not coming over and fucking up their shit, and probably to not be sneaky in some ways.

But here, they are wasting their money because they decided that they'd pay some amount per click. That doesn't somehow confer a legal or moral obligation on me, some random third party, to behave in such a way that this is actually a good deal for them.

That whatever they measure when my browser follows an ad corresponds to some amount of human attention is a gamble they're making, and in no way comparable to the expectation that in civilized society, someone doesn't walk into your store and smashes your merchandise without being punished for it.

Next we're going to go around and fine people for leaving their TVs running without paying attention to the commercials...

Re: AdNauseam Banned from the Google Web Store

#290

Post by ben0x539 »

ggggtez wrote: post #279
mring33621 wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm pretty sure that, in the USA, choosing to click ads would be protected under the first amendment.

You'd be wrong. Many people, even Americans, don't really understand that freedom of speech doesn't mean you can do and say anything you want regardless of the context or consequences.

I suspect the comment is a frustrated response to American courts declaring that all kinds of weird things are somehow protected as "speech", not an unironic endorsement of the practice.
Post reply on HN