211–220 of 442 posts
Many folks on here might be too young to remember, but there was an era where cable companies served premium channels with a scrambled signal to all customers, and sold access by way of attaching the appropriate filter. In fact, all channels were protected in this way, with your cable box holding the necessary filters. Albeit, some were merely hidden by a band pass filter and not scrambled. Anyhow, those arguing that…
They aren't making the api private, they are making it tricky . They have no intention (that I know of) of banning new browser technology. They don't say you must use Firefox/Chrome. Which means I can make my own browser and render it however I like. If the data was meant to be secret, it would be encrypted. At the moment, if I do > curl -L instagram.com I get a mix of HTML, JS and CSS. In plain old text. What am I a…
Their ToS disallows the use of unauthorized clients; if one were to accept the ToS, create an account, and use the unauthorized client then they would have violated the agreement and circumvented the legal protections around the private portion of their API.
> If they were trying to limit access to their data, they would, like cable companies do, provide a secret to me so that I could decrypt the response.
They do. That's the effect of having portions of the API and data accessible only to those who are logged in, and have agreed to the terms of service.
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Why should 3rd parties be allowed to make unauthorized api requests? Additionally, some apps are only monetized through advertisement, and 3rd party apps don't display them. How do you expect the 1st party to stay in business? I don't align with Meta on a lot of issues, but they should be able to control what apps interact with their platform. Don't like it, don't use it.
> Additionally, some apps are only monetized through advertisement, and 3rd party apps don't display them. How do you expect the 1st party to stay in business? Ad blockers are already a thing. Should they be forbidden?
Now, one could argue that by displaying ads in the first place, using an adblock is circumventing something therefore it isn't okay (basically remove one layer of abstraction from the previous sentence). That's also a fair position, but not mine because of entirely selfish reasons (it's inconvenient to me and non-adblock users are subsidizing my use of those websites).
One could argue that allowing adblock users is a strategic decision in hopes they can spread the use of the website and payoff their "debt" that way. I operate web games and I allow adblock users for that reason.
Oh wow, this app got pulled from everything because it's an unofficial 3rd party client for Instagram? I'll say it again, companies should be legally forbidden from blocking 3rd party clients. They don't have to explicitly support them, but taking action to explicitly thwart them (and writing ToS that forbids them) should be outlawed. There's no reason I should have to be subjected to untold tracking, snooping and ad…
Why should 3rd parties be allowed to make unauthorized api requests? Additionally, some apps are only monetized through advertisement, and 3rd party apps don't display them. How do you expect the 1st party to stay in business? I don't align with Meta on a lot of issues, but they should be able to control what apps interact with their platform. Don't like it, don't use it.
This logic really bends over backwards to support FB's and similar business models.
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Without control of the client, it gets much harder to fight abuse.
Meta isn't some utility people can't live without. It's optional. If you're worried about abuse, then don't use it.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why should 3rd parties be allowed to make unauthorized api requests? Additionally, some apps are only monetized through advertisement, and 3rd party apps don't display them. How do you expect the 1st party to stay in business? I don't align with Meta on a lot of issues, but they should be able to control what apps interact with their platform. Don't like it, don't use it.
While I mostly agree with you, banning the personal accounts from their *team* is a bit much. Specially considering how that also includes access to Instagram, and WhatsApp, WhatsApp being the biggest issue here since in many countries that is considered a way of conducting business.
Absolutely the best reason why businesses should move to Signal. Imagine if your business gets cut off from Meta products, or if at any moment some of your customers get cut off.
Facebook is an extremely limited and poor platform for representing a business, and it too should be avoided for the same reasons (and for being such a garbage fire in general).
Oh wow, this app got pulled from everything because it's an unofficial 3rd party client for Instagram? I'll say it again, companies should be legally forbidden from blocking 3rd party clients. They don't have to explicitly support them, but taking action to explicitly thwart them (and writing ToS that forbids them) should be outlawed. There's no reason I should have to be subjected to untold tracking, snooping and ad…
Why should 3rd parties be allowed to make unauthorized api requests? Additionally, some apps are only monetized through advertisement, and 3rd party apps don't display them. How do you expect the 1st party to stay in business? I don't align with Meta on a lot of issues, but they should be able to control what apps interact with their platform. Don't like it, don't use it.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
This wasn’t competition though. This was straight up theft of resources/services. What? “extra-legal”? Don’t mix this with other behaviors Meta/Facebook/Instagram engage in, I hate them for all the bullsht they get away with too. However, this isn’t that, this is someone trying to build a platform on top of someone else’s platform explicitly against their terms of service and without reimbursing them.
> This was straight up theft of resources/services. Are you claiming that building and/or using adblocking software is theft?
Years ago there was an effort to allow users to pay a monthly fee to avoid ads. The idea was that this specific ad network would distribute those funds to the sites you visited in place of ad revenue, and the users would instead see a placeholder of their choice (like a grey block, cat pictures, etc).
I signed up for it, unfortunately they could never achieve market penetration compared to google Adsense, eventually the product died.
Unfortunately there is more money in collecting your behaviors, habits, and using that for targeted advertising than most people are willing to pay for content in aggregate.
YouTube and other platforms have seem some success in ad free options, but only on those targeted platforms where the value-add is clearer to the consumer.
Many folks on here might be too young to remember, but there was an era where cable companies served premium channels with a scrambled signal to all customers, and sold access by way of attaching the appropriate filter. In fact, all channels were protected in this way, with your cable box holding the necessary filters. Albeit, some were merely hidden by a band pass filter and not scrambled. Anyhow, those arguing that…
Even more esoteric, there was an over-the-air company, IIRC called Vu, that broadcast an analog encrypted signal that required a box to decode properly. Tuning in without it resulted in a signal that was not in-sync so the h&v blanking floated across the screen. In my area, it was a UHF channel that would switch to the premium encrypted signal at 7pm. The decoder was about the size of an Atari 2600 console.
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What if you make me sign some sort of NDA/ToS?
To be clear, I'm not saying that there should be no consequences if you distribute a message that I didn't want you to. I'm just saying that I shouldn't be able to stop you from doing so. If you signed a contract saying you wouldn't, and then you do, I should still be able to sue for that, but the existence of such a contract shouldn't let me control your technology to prevent you from breaking it in the first place.