> This made me angrier than it should have - not because Sqword is a cash cow - we don't run ads on the site and don't make money from it, it's just for fun, but because it was a passion project with friends, something pure and intentionally free to play WITHOUT ads. If the site is for fun and doesn't make money, then how is what these aggregators are doing considered "theft"? Theft of credit for making the app, I gu…
Using Goatse to Stop App Theft
211–220 of 464 posts
Re: Using Goatse to Stop App Theft
#212Earlier quoted context omitted.
The parasitic website is displaying the image. No iframe, no image.
Both legally and morally, intent matters far more than these technical details.
As I understand it, the iframe is set up such that the users browser loads your site inside the frame and the intermediate site outside of the frame. If you serve a file then you are serving it directly to the browser. The intermediate site never sees it?
Re: Using Goatse to Stop App Theft
#213This is hilarious, but I think the most mature thing to do would have been to detect if the site is inside an iframe and if so add a polite link saying "click here to go to sqword.com and play this game ad free".
Re: Using Goatse to Stop App Theft
#214I am absolutely not a lawyer, but I wouldn't do something like this for fear of falling afoul of anti-obscenity laws. For instance, the UK has a cyberflashing law which allots a two year custodial sentence for sending a graphic image (by any means) with intent to cause distress.
So stealing the app is OK but doing something about it is illegal? Sounds like the law all right.
That's not to say that Goatse wasn't the correct option in this case.
Re: Using Goatse to Stop App Theft
#215Ah, I had a similar idea. There were too many bots or vulnerability scanners hitting /wp-admin.php on my blog. It was flooding my access logs with 404s because I don't rock wordpress. Irksome stuff. So I threw up a little 'surprise' for the ahem penetration testers ahem , if you feel brave: https://www.thran.uk/wp-login.php
Re: Using Goatse to Stop App Theft
#216...Yes, it does. What an odd decision. I'd link to the page where he explains it, but it also has a half-page URL.
Re: Using Goatse to Stop App Theft
#217Once, out of the kindness of my foolish heart, I ran a server with a lot of great sound effects for all and sundry to download. Eventually the bandwidth was getting hammered by a huge number of leechers seemingly from some apps that had simply hard-linked to the resources. After replacing said resources [0] they soon ceased but not without a slew of abusive and entitled emails demanding I restore the SFX. Oh fun time…
Oh I love stories like this - great retort! It reminds me of that time that some app (or apps) was hammering an image of a butterfly from Wikimedia because it was part of some sample code that was never removed. I couldn't find the story but it was a fun but upsetting source of abuse from unknowing devs. Edit: It was a picture of a flower. I replied with some links.
Re: Using Goatse to Stop App Theft
#218I am absolutely not a lawyer, but I wouldn't do something like this for fear of falling afoul of anti-obscenity laws. For instance, the UK has a cyberflashing law which allots a two year custodial sentence for sending a graphic image (by any means) with intent to cause distress.
So stealing the app is OK but doing something about it is illegal? Sounds like the law all right.
Re: Using Goatse to Stop App Theft
#219Earlier quoted context omitted.
Came here to say the same thing. Unless you're one of today's "lucky 10,000"[0] who haven't ever encountered goatse before, there's no need to verify this :D [0] - https://xkcd.com/1053/ edit: folks the xkcd lucky 10k reference was a joke, settle down
I'm opening myself up to criticism by saying this, but this is unusually cringeworthy even for XKCD
I've never understood that attitude.
Re: Using Goatse to Stop App Theft
#220Once, out of the kindness of my foolish heart, I ran a server with a lot of great sound effects for all and sundry to download. Eventually the bandwidth was getting hammered by a huge number of leechers seemingly from some apps that had simply hard-linked to the resources. After replacing said resources [0] they soon ceased but not without a slew of abusive and entitled emails demanding I restore the SFX. Oh fun time…