Mozilla hit with takedown request for anti-paywall addons • Hacker News Board

Re: Mozilla hit with takedown request for anti-paywall addons

#261

Post by lazulicurio » Sun, Dec 02, 2018, 11:15 PM UTC

mindslight wrote: post #259

lazulicurio wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You know, I consider myself fairly liberal on technical issues, and I agree with you in the general sense, but I don't agree in this specific instance. This isn't a situation like Aaron Swartz, where the companies in question are restricting access to publicly-funded research. The newspapers are privately-funded entities that conduct their own investigative journalism. This isn't a situation like Weev, where there wa…

My argument isn't based on liberating content, but that it's simply not one's responsibility to implement someone else's business rules. The problem is that the publishers are still supplying their content for free, while then trying to attach arbitrary post-facto terms. It would be straightforward to just not send the article to someone they don't want to view it, but yet this is not what they have chosen to do.

The terms aren't post-facto, they're a priori. You can access the content if you paid for an account or if you're Googlebot. Impersonating Googlebot doesn't change the terms of the access.

Note the description from the add-on page "This extension will mangle your browser's requests to maximize the chances of bypassing paywalls". This is where there's a meaningful difference from the Weev situation.

You can also choose to not read the content if you don't feel it's worth the money.

Re: Mozilla hit with takedown request for anti-paywall addons

#262

Post by schlumpf » Sun, Dec 02, 2018, 11:42 PM UTC

mindslight wrote: post #223

Confusion wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rename the plugin and change the description. The message from Mozilla states that the problem is the intent of the plugin. The technological measures it actually takes are not illegal per sé, but are illegal when used to circumvent paywalls (of course IANAL). If you present this as a plug-in that allows you to view websites as the Google bot views them, for educational and debugging purposes, there is no problem. Yo…

The intent of the plugin should not be illegal - that is what this battle is ultimately about, and this takedown action is essentially baseless bullying via the legal system. Each party to a transaction has their own desires, and what these companies are ultimately trying to do make you conform to their internal business desires post facto. In any transaction there is a demarcation point where interests meet and then…

Your retail store analogy is a red herring. A browser plugin that “maximizes the chances of bypassing paywalls” is attempting not to be party to a transaction, because if it succeeds, the user has expressly not agreed to the seller’s terms.

Instead your position appears analogous to arguing that altering a driver’s license to gain free admission to a cinema by misrepresenting oneself as entitled to senior citizen terms of entry is justifiable despite being prohibited by law in that jurisdiction.

It’s clear from this and other posts that you have articulate, principled view on many issues. So why aren’t you addressing the underlying economic issue? Publishers, like any business, need to earn revenue. If technological barriers to accessing intellectual property — and the legal protection thereof — are not valid (your claim of “frivolous overenforcement”), whose economic rights supersede the content producers? And why?

Re: Mozilla hit with takedown request for anti-paywall addons

#263

Post by AnthonyMouse » Sun, Dec 02, 2018, 11:47 PM UTC

dao- wrote: post #237

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you want to have is a trustworthy place where >99% of users can get >99% of software. You can have that -- look at Linux package managers -- without preventing side loading. And in fact that's necessary to prevent despotism. The people operating the repository want people to use it. They don't want them getting things from untrustworthy places. But if they can just prohibit that , they can be tyrants -- refusing…

I think Linux is quite a bit different. Firefox shares its space with applications that have the same privilege, making sideloading into Firefox much easier, especially on Windows. And then Linux is also niche enough as a consumer OS that it's just not as attractive for malware in the first place.

> I think Linux is quite a bit different. Firefox shares its space with applications that have the same privilege, making sideloading into Firefox much easier, especially on Windows.

All the more reason to have a supported way to do it. If they require the malware to replace the Firefox binary with a different one, what happens when it does? The user ends up with twelve pieces of malware instead of one because the original malware author didn't bother to support browser updates properly and the user ends up with a browser full of publicly known security vulnerabilities.

> And then Linux is also niche enough as a consumer OS that it's just not as attractive for malware in the first place.

People have been claiming that as the reason there was so much more malware on Windows for decades. Then Windows adopted some of the same types of measures as Linux and the amount of Windows malware fell off considerably.

Re: Mozilla hit with takedown request for anti-paywall addons

#264

Post by mindslight » Sun, Dec 02, 2018, 11:49 PM UTC

lazulicurio wrote: post #261

mindslight wrote: post #259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My argument isn't based on liberating content, but that it's simply not one's responsibility to implement someone else's business rules. The problem is that the publishers are still supplying their content for free, while then trying to attach arbitrary post-facto terms. It would be straightforward to just not send the article to someone they don't want to view it, but yet this is not what they have chosen to do.

The terms aren't post-facto, they're a priori. You can access the content if you paid for an account or if you're Googlebot. Impersonating Googlebot doesn't change the terms of the access. Note the description from the add-on page "This extension will mangle your browser's requests to maximize the chances of bypassing paywalls". This is where there's a meaningful difference from the Weev situation. You can also choos…

The protocol is the transaction demarcation point - anything else is sophistry. Let's try out an analogous argument with physical goods:

Customer goes to Home Depot, buys a bunch of $5 aviators. Sells them on Amazon for $50. The distributor sues the customer-reseller for violating their contract to not commercially resell, which undermines their expensive offerings. Customer points out they never entered into any such contract at Home Depot. The distributor claims Home Depot is a mechanical conduit that only facilitates a larger relationship, and the transaction actually took place between the customer and distributor, with the "standard" terms having been available on request.

The fundamental truth is that the interests of any buyer and seller are only aligned at the exact time of sale - afterwards they diverge. What has happened is that pervasive information technology has got sellers attempting to retain some kind of interest in things after they've sold them, with the "transaction" never really ending (an oxymoron). Copyright is one of the hooks by which they're purporting to do this (which actually at the very least it needs to be reformed so a seller of "digital goods" cannot destroy your access to a copy you've paid for)

As I said before, society cannot function this way - non-pure ownership can work for big tickets (eg real estate), but centralization and every item having a history simply doesn't scale. And as I also said, there is a very simple remedy for publishers - stop sending the article to people they do not want to view it!

(Your argument also implies that it is illegal to suggest someone visit a URL with lynx to avoid a javascript popup)

Re: Mozilla hit with takedown request for anti-paywall addons

#265

Post by ngokevin » Sun, Dec 02, 2018, 11:49 PM UTC

dao- wrote: post #163

kingofhdds wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Significant part of FF's userbase decided in its favor exactly because of choice of third-party addons.

How significant? Firefox' market share was falling rapidly. (It still is declining, but not as dramatically.)

It's still falling even after the Quantum push. It's dipped under 5% total market share and under 9% on desktop. Losing a percentage point every several months.

Re: Mozilla hit with takedown request for anti-paywall addons

#266

Post by mindslight » Mon, Dec 03, 2018, 12:01 AM UTC

schlumpf wrote: post #262

mindslight wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The intent of the plugin should not be illegal - that is what this battle is ultimately about, and this takedown action is essentially baseless bullying via the legal system. Each party to a transaction has their own desires, and what these companies are ultimately trying to do make you conform to their internal business desires post facto. In any transaction there is a demarcation point where interests meet and then…

Your retail store analogy is a red herring. A browser plugin that “maximizes the chances of bypassing paywalls” is attempting not to be party to a transaction, because if it succeeds, the user has expressly not agreed to the seller’s terms. Instead your position appears analogous to arguing that altering a driver’s license to gain free admission to a cinema by misrepresenting oneself as entitled to senior citizen ter…

> whose economic rights supersede the content producers?

The owner of the computer they're insisting implements their business logic. It's trivial to simply not send the article to someone they do not want to view it.

If the extension moves on towards sharing an account, P2P distribution, etc, you would have a point. But as it is, it's only action is to interpret the content in a different way than the publisher desires.

Let's say an abutter of a drive-in theater sets up their own seats and starts selling tickets. The intent to "see a movie for cheap" would only become relevant if coupled with some action that is actually illegal.

Re: Mozilla hit with takedown request for anti-paywall addons

#267

Post by AnthonyMouse » Mon, Dec 03, 2018, 12:02 AM UTC

dao- wrote: post #222

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Where did I assert something similar to your example? It seems like a false analogy. The criticism wasn't even that my logic was flawed but that the same argument could somehow be made to justify any user-hostile action. That's why your logic is flawed. If a construct can be used to "prove" various known-false statements then it has no value in proving anything. > If the problem in your point of view is that I didn…

> If a construct can be used to "prove" various known-false statements then it has no value in proving anything. Yes, if... But it can't. That criticism of my statement didn't make sense. > There is no proof of it there either. The most popular platforms [...] I meant this: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18583257

> Yes, if... But it can't. That criticism of my statement didn't make sense.

It applies directly. Anything that gives the user a choice can make the user experience worse for a user who makes the wrong one. But it also makes it better for a user who makes the right one in a way different from what the developer would have had to use as a default -- because sometimes something is right for 70% of the users, so it should be the default, but the other 30% are better off with something else. Taking away the choice makes the 30% worse off to benefit the 10% of the 70% that would have chosen incorrectly for themselves. That is not a relative advantage.

> I meant this: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18583257

I'll reply there, but note that you haven't addressed my point -- other platforms survive and indeed have the largest share without prohibiting users from installing software, even when competing directly against others that do.

Re: Mozilla hit with takedown request for anti-paywall addons

#268

Post by craftinator » Mon, Dec 03, 2018, 12:07 AM UTC

mindslight wrote: post #264

lazulicurio wrote: post #261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The terms aren't post-facto, they're a priori. You can access the content if you paid for an account or if you're Googlebot. Impersonating Googlebot doesn't change the terms of the access. Note the description from the add-on page "This extension will mangle your browser's requests to maximize the chances of bypassing paywalls". This is where there's a meaningful difference from the Weev situation. You can also choos…

The protocol is the transaction demarcation point - anything else is sophistry. Let's try out an analogous argument with physical goods: Customer goes to Home Depot, buys a bunch of $5 aviators. Sells them on Amazon for $50. The distributor sues the customer-reseller for violating their contract to not commercially resell, which undermines their expensive offerings. Customer points out they never entered into any suc…

Very well done analogy and thought experiment!

Re: Mozilla hit with takedown request for anti-paywall addons

#269

Post by AnthonyMouse » Mon, Dec 03, 2018, 12:10 AM UTC

dao- wrote: post #176

pessimizer wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm also saying this threatened the very survival of Mozilla You are saying it, but not making any argument or offering any evidence for what you're saying.

We have telemetry data on performance, user retention, installed addons and how these things correlate.

> We have telemetry data on performance, user retention, installed addons and how these things correlate.

Then why is that not itself an obvious solution? Use that data to provide a default-on blacklist of known-malicious addons. Then you have a blacklist rather than a whitelist, so it can justifiably be more difficult for the user to override it and the user has no motivation to do so for a malicious addon they didn't intentionally install to begin with.

It also gives you the opportunity to allow the user to specify a blacklist provider, so that if the original vendor ever gets compromised because they're forced to operate in an oppressive jurisdiction, they can farm out the low-resource task of hosting the blacklist to someone who isn't compromised, and the user (or the distribution packaging the browser) can make that determination for themselves.

Re: Mozilla hit with takedown request for anti-paywall addons

#270

Post by lazulicurio » Mon, Dec 03, 2018, 12:18 AM UTC

mindslight wrote: post #264

lazulicurio wrote: post #261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The terms aren't post-facto, they're a priori. You can access the content if you paid for an account or if you're Googlebot. Impersonating Googlebot doesn't change the terms of the access. Note the description from the add-on page "This extension will mangle your browser's requests to maximize the chances of bypassing paywalls". This is where there's a meaningful difference from the Weev situation. You can also choos…

The protocol is the transaction demarcation point - anything else is sophistry. Let's try out an analogous argument with physical goods: Customer goes to Home Depot, buys a bunch of $5 aviators. Sells them on Amazon for $50. The distributor sues the customer-reseller for violating their contract to not commercially resell, which undermines their expensive offerings. Customer points out they never entered into any suc…

I don't find that analogy analogous.

Alice goes to Home Depot. Aviators cost $50, but they're on sale for $5 if your name is Bob. Alice tells the cashier that her name is Bob and shows an (obviously) fake ID. The cashier isn't paid enough to care, so Alice gets the glasses for $5.

I agree with you that anything Alice does after this point is her own business. I could accept an argument that Home Depot should've paid the cashier more to help prevent the issue. But I don't think that makes Alice's actions at the point of sale less fraudulent.

> And as I also said, there is a very simple remedy for publishers - stop sending the article to people they do not want to view it!

Which the publishers do. They don't send the article unless they think you're Googlebot.

> Your argument also implies that it is illegal to suggest someone visit a URL with lynx to avoid a javascript popup

My issue is with intentionally changing the user agent header to impersonate a well-known crawler that has been given access to the site under specific terms.

I don't have an issue with using other browsers or javascript blockers or ad blockers. There's a difference between spoofing a client-> server request and blocking a client -> server request.