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uBlock Origin GPL code being stolen by team behind Honey browser extension

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Re: uBlock Origin GPL code being stolen by team behind Honey browser extension

#241

Post by asadotzler »

twostorytower wrote: post #92
dmazzoni wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you propose a company like Honey should make a profit without deception and scams? Their product is supposedly: install a FREE extension and you get discount codes applied for you at retailers when you check out. It turns out they were able to be profitable by making themselves the affiliate every time you purchase something, but that's scammy because it's stealing from others who actually generated the referr…

Why do you assume they are always stealing a referral from somebody? Do you think everything people buy comes from a prior affiliate link? Yes, Honey makes money from affiliate commission. That money is funded by the merchants who voluntarily choose to partner with Honey. How is that scammy? In the rare case there is a prior referral, yes last click attribution comes into play. But that's the same for every shopping…

Yet another defense of these practices, it's almost as if you're not sincerely trying to put blame in the right place as you've said in other comments on this story but rather defending the whole evil industry like a shill.

Re: uBlock Origin GPL code being stolen by team behind Honey browser extension

#242

Post by twostorytower »

asadotzler wrote: post #225
twostorytower wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People should also be angry at all these other extensions and companies, they’re complicit and just as bad. But the source of change needs to come from the affiliate networks, who dictate the rules.

I imagine you'd get farther with your arguments if you started with those parts instead of what sounded like a full-throated defense of one bad actor by claiming they're forced to be bad by circumstances. Don't hate the player, hate the game is fine if you say it up front. If you leave it for a comment buried down below you just look like a shill to all the people that read only one or two levels deep.

Hey that's totally fair, appreciate the feedback.

Re: uBlock Origin GPL code being stolen by team behind Honey browser extension

#243

Post by manquer »

chasebank wrote: post #8
slowmovintarget wrote: post #2

If any software ever deserved being sued into non-existence it is the Honey browser extension, and any other scam software they turn out (Pie Adblock in this case). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vc4yL3YTwWk

The founders sold 5 years ago to PayPal. Do they just get to laugh on their way to the bank? Probably.

Your comment implicitly absolves PayPal of responsibility.

One thief sold to another , it is like credit card lists or botnets are sold on the dark web .

PayPal is hardly innocent here , they knew what they were getting into , this is the core business model of not just honey but all of the coupon sites.

Re: uBlock Origin GPL code being stolen by team behind Honey browser extension

#244

Post by notpushkin »

fallingknife wrote: post #236
traverseda wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the "information want to be free" crowd is very consistent. They want the information to be free. They don't want artificial scarcity. Sure they'll use IP as a means to an end, but that doesn't mean they believe IP is a good idea in general. It's just one of few tools that exist to solve it. In an ideal world all software would be forced to be FOSS, and we'd have to come up with ways of funding it that aren't…

They want other people's information to be free for them. I doubt very much that they want their professional work to be free to other people. It takes a certain kind of insanity to think that it's feasible to spend millions of dollars writing software when your customers are all entitled to take it for free.

I’ve heard an argument that people / companies would still pay for custom development, like they do now. It is a pretty weak argument, but I do see the point.

Re: uBlock Origin GPL code being stolen by team behind Honey browser extension

#245

Post by thayne »

iamacyborg wrote: post #207
mathstuf wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One can still want much looser copyright. For example, 14 years by default, pay $$ to extend it, increasing exponentially each time (as compensation for stealing from the public domain). At least I'm willing to call extended copyright terms stealing if we're going to call format shifting and other personal use cases stealing.

> stealing from the public domain How is it stealing from the public domain if it’s intellectual property you’ve created? Do you also believe I should be entitled to a cut of your paycheck?

I don't believe that ideas/intellectual work should be considered property. I will concede that granting a temporary monopoly through copyright or patents can maybe be a means of incentivizing innovation and creative work, but I'm not convinced it is the only means of doing so, and the longer that monopoly lasts, the more it can have the inverse effect of stifling innovation that builds on existing innovations.

Re: uBlock Origin GPL code being stolen by team behind Honey browser extension

#246

Post by fallingknife »

derac wrote: post #175
shwaj wrote: post #94

I know it’s not necessarily the same people, but it feels contradictory for this community to say “copyright infringement isn’t theft” when we’re talking about movies, but use the opposite language when talking about GPL source code.

Individual pirates are rarely profiting from it. I'd wager most people who think pirating a movie is fine aren't cool with printing 1000 bluerays and hawking them at the flea market.

That is hypocrisy on the level of thinking buying drugs is ok but selling them is bad. You can argue about the severity of the behavior, but if you are drawing moral lines in the sand, buyer and seller are always on the same side.

Re: uBlock Origin GPL code being stolen by team behind Honey browser extension

#248

Post by manquer »

twostorytower wrote: post #84
slowmovintarget wrote: post #2

If any software ever deserved being sued into non-existence it is the Honey browser extension, and any other scam software they turn out (Pie Adblock in this case). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vc4yL3YTwWk

This video is just rage bait and weaponizing creators and their fans by singling out Honey and not providing any additional context. Anybody in the affiliate industry knows how last click attribution works. This isn't new or specific to Honey. CapitalOne Shopping, Rakuten, RetailMeNot...they all work the same way. Merchants partner with these shopping extensions knowing how they work, nobody forces them to do so. The…

It is personal to creators because honey paid a lot of them generously over the years to work with .

It is not the industry is shady that made honey standout, it is the fact that they were paying the people to pick from their own pockets is what got YT creators railed up.

It is being singled out, because without that heavy creator promotion they wouldn’t have grown anywhere close to the size they were last month. They have already last 3+ millions on Chrome web store in December .

No other coupon company has been valued or sold at 4 billion honey was, it is by far the largest and most successful. It is not uncommon for largest player to get the most scrutiny even though others do the same

Re: uBlock Origin GPL code being stolen by team behind Honey browser extension

#249

Post by totallynothoney »

ndriscoll wrote: post #223
totallynothoney wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that beyond stealing the affiliate rev, which might matter if you actually like the person (like project farm for me), Honey is in bed with merchants and will give negligible discounts or nothing depending what the store wishes. The whole "scrapping the internet for coupons" is practically speaking a lie. Also even if you don't give a shit, reduced affiliate revenue means that creators are more likely…

Obviously the correct solution is to spread the word about ublock and sponsorblock (and perhaps adnauseum) too. Help contribute to a better society by making advertising a less viable way to make money. If something is worth paying for, pay for it. Push the incentives toward honest practices. Don't white knight when shills play themselves.

Well, 95% of people on HN know about uBlock Origin and Sponsorblock, so why are you telling me to preach to the choir instead of saying my original point? I was making fun of how GP sounds exactly like a PR person, not saying that affiliate marketing is good for society. Even if you're a hardliner against advertising, you can recognize that not literally everyone is a shill (e.g., most metric-based reviewers). And even if it's harmful at a societal level that some random YouTuber discussing a movie also shills dropshipped razors, you wouldn't say that mugging them is actually good.

It's like crypto - it's environmentally harmful and facilitates ransomware with minimal benefits, but I wouldn't be okay with someone showing up in the comments saying it's totally fine to steal someone's shitcoins with malware (though laughing about it is fine). It seems that you wanted to make a point about the post itself and used my comment as a launching point, which is fine, but don't accuse me of white knighting.

Edit: Forgot to check my writing.

Re: uBlock Origin GPL code being stolen by team behind Honey browser extension

#250

Post by fallingknife »

medo-bear wrote: post #186
shwaj wrote: post #94

I know it’s not necessarily the same people, but it feels contradictory for this community to say “copyright infringement isn’t theft” when we’re talking about movies, but use the opposite language when talking about GPL source code.

infringing on copyright is like stealing from the rich infringing on copyleft is like stealing from the poor its the difference between robin hood and government corruption

Said on a forum where 99% of the posters are rich. When I see drivel like this it reminds me to be grateful that I wasn't born with the narcissistic delusion to believe that my behavior is privileged and morally superior to the same by others. The height of insanity is seeing yourself as the moral arbiter of the universe.
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