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US Court nullifies FTC requirement for click-to-cancel

arstechnica.com

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Re: US Court nullifies FTC requirement for click-to-cancel

#491

Post by CWuestefeld »

hobs wrote: post #287
rayiner wrote: post #262

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The non-Federalist Society folks think that “emanations from penumbras” is constitutional law. How can right wing judges even compete with that? I think we may have drastically different understandings of what “the law” is.

Yes of course, bringing up a whataboutism while the supreme court runs roughshod over current law is totally the point right? We need these stout champions of conservatism because the left is so crazy that we need to check them, that's why we need to rewrite the constitution to fit whatever trump is doing this week, right? Bringing up the boogieman of the left while the right is literally doing their best to bring th…

While I, too, think that Trump has gone off the rails, pre-Trump history is very different from what you're implying.

Historically, it's been the position of the Left that the Constitution should be treated as a "living document" to be interpreted in context of the needs of the times. It's been the Right who have rejected such interpretations and insisted on "originalist" or "textualist" interpretations of the document.

Now, Trump and other politicians are bags of wind who say whatever is expedient. But if you look at the Courts and what they've done for the past half-century, it should be clear that the work of the Federalist Society and the justices they've cultivated really has been in that originalist/textualist vein, and it's been the Liberal justices who have strained interpretations of the Constitution.

The Left idea that we need to hew to the Constitution is a VERY new change in American politics. And from where I sit it seems rather disingenuously targeted solely at defeating Trump. I'm not seeing anybody on the left saying, "you were right about the 2nd Amendment, and we should all be critical of California and Illinois and NYC for trying repeatedly to circumvent the courts' orders."

Re: US Court nullifies FTC requirement for click-to-cancel

#492

Post by CWuestefeld »

rayiner wrote: post #292
martythemaniak wrote: post #288

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, those crazy woke judges that think that the government should not be able to bust into your bedroom and arrest you because you used a condom.

“The law” as most people understand it allows the government to regulate the sale and use of medical products. There’s a libertarian reading of the constitution under which Griswold makes sense. But under it, the FDA is probably unconstitutional.

Thanks for saying more concisely what I was trying to convey here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44514202

Re: US Court nullifies FTC requirement for click-to-cancel

#493

Post by mindwork »

mrweasel wrote: post #434
mindwork wrote: post #386

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At the same time European laws got whole internet littered with "Accept cookies" banners

The alternative would have been banning tracking and I don't think that would have happend. At least now you're being informed and have at least the perception of an option to opt-out. Had you truly preferred not being informed, not being allowed to opt-out?

thats not the point I was answering.

The point is that it's 2 sides of the coin under regulation vs over regulation. And no system is ideal on both sides of Atlantic

Re: US Court nullifies FTC requirement for click-to-cancel

#494

Post by lisper »

margalabargala wrote: post #481
Buttons840 wrote: post #462

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While the courts, supposedly, focus on what the law actually says, remember that Wickard v Filburn (1942) established that growing a plant on your own property for your own personal use is "interstate commerce". I don't know a lot about law, but I at least know that ruling on what the "actual law is" is selective, and usually selective in a way that is beneficial for the rich and powerful.

So we have some cases where the courts follow the rule of law, and others where the stretch reality to come to insane but convenient conclusions, like in your example. You're right, it's absolutely applied selectively. But, while it would be nice to have an insane, illegal, but convenient conclusion in our favor, that does not mean we should criticize the courts for following the rule of law rather than coming to an…

The problem is that if the courts only follow the rule of law some of the time then one must consider the possibility that these selective applications of the law are in service of some extra-legal agenda, in which case the fact that this agenda occasionally aligns with the law doesn't change the fact that the judges are in fact operating with compete disregard for the law except as it occasionally offers the opportunity to cover up their real motives.

Re: US Court nullifies FTC requirement for click-to-cancel

#495

Post by eli »

ApolloFortyNine wrote: post #346

From the article >"While we certainly do not endorse the use of unfair and deceptive practices in negative option marketing, the procedural deficiencies of the Commission's rulemaking process are fatal here," As with a lot of judge rulings, and what they're always supposed to do, they ruled on what the actual law is and not just on what sounds good. >The FTC is required to conduct a preliminary regulatory analysis wh…

> As with a lot of judge rulings, and what they're always supposed to do, they ruled on what the actual law is and not just on what sounds good.

A "lot" of judicial rulings do indeed follow that pattern. But there have been mulitple high-profile & high-stakes examples recently of just the opposite. To the point where I thought you were making a joke at first.

Re: US Court nullifies FTC requirement for click-to-cancel

#496

Post by mring33621 »

pinkmuffinere wrote: post #407
marricks wrote: post #399

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s a pro business anti consumer supreme court which knows it’d be dangerous to appear that way. Government and court will hamstring their ability to help consumers. My favorite comment on HN was some law student saying his prof said “Scalia is the most complicated supreme court member whose views are always unpredictable” and the commenter said “he’s just a corporate hack who always votes for corporations and backs…

> they rightly commented that if this was allowed to stand, the FTC and every government agency would just always estimate low in these cases. I think you missed this — it isn’t some arbitrary reason to rule in an anti-consumer way. There is good reason to do so. Imo we should keep our checks and balances strong, and this is one small action that does that.

so, small questionable wins for normal people would break the system while big, veeeeerrrrry questionable wins for some subset of the elite are OK?

Re: US Court nullifies FTC requirement for click-to-cancel

#498

Post by mring33621 »

pavon wrote: post #478
gmd63 wrote: post #429

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't buy that argument. The issue is companies deliberately built complexity on top of their existing systems to make it harder to cancel. The added complexity that costs a lot of money to fix is a result of their unfair and deceptive practices. An enormous amount of deadweight loss would be returned to the economy if they simply implemented a much simpler design of click to cancel and avoided the unfair and decep…

That is a decent argument against the law requiring the analysis, but it is not a good argument that judges should let the FTC violate the law.

YEAH!

NO PART OF THE GOVT SHOULD EVER VIOLATE THE LAW!

YOU TELL 'EM, BUDDY!

Re: US Court nullifies FTC requirement for click-to-cancel

#499

Post by supertrope »

unethical_ban wrote: post #88

If we had a Congress who knew what Signal, e-mail, or credit cards were, then we may get actual legislation protecting consumer rights.

It's not a matter of not being tech savvy. It's the lobbyists who schmooze with them and the campaign donors who give them money.

Re: US Court nullifies FTC requirement for click-to-cancel

#500

Post by didibus »

ApolloFortyNine wrote: post #346

From the article >"While we certainly do not endorse the use of unfair and deceptive practices in negative option marketing, the procedural deficiencies of the Commission's rulemaking process are fatal here," As with a lot of judge rulings, and what they're always supposed to do, they ruled on what the actual law is and not just on what sounds good. >The FTC is required to conduct a preliminary regulatory analysis wh…

What's dumb is that no one cares about the 100 million+ that customers lost in paying for extra months of subscriptions they didn't use. I feel there should be counteracting rule, like, if customers impact is X$$ than it doesn't matter what the business loss is, or maybe whichever is higher win, I don't know.
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