they could just implement rate limit and oracle would've been fine. but instead they actually tried to sue -_-
Their lawyers likely didn't know how to implement rate limiting :D
Courts: Violating a Website’s Terms of Service Is Not a Crime
81–90 of 174 posts
Re: Courts: Violating a Website’s Terms of Service Is Not a Crime
#82Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's not that young people grew up with stable rules. It's that young people grew up under the influence of industrial information warfare tactics and propaganda. As someone that was prevented from distributing Linux at high school because the administrators thought that any copying was piracy (thanks to the Software Publishers Association and the friendly local Microsoft rep), this conditioning to get kids (and less…
> As someone that was prevented from distributing Linux at high school because the administrators thought that any copying was piracy I remember having this discussion with in HS and also at work with people who were convinced pirating a PSX game is same as stealing, while not realizing there is no evidence that suggests a pirated copy means a lost sale (people can't afford it in places like Brasil where they still p…
Piracy isn't stealing... and besides, no one can afford the games anyway... besides, you should see what the industry does to the artists in the first place...
The gentleman doth protest too much?
Re: Courts: Violating a Website’s Terms of Service Is Not a Crime
#83Earlier quoted context omitted.
Skype I know is infamously hard, but I'm wondering about the more general case -- are the problems there similar to the problems with Skype, or are they due to something else?
As far as I know, they're a combination of it being hard work and there just not being enough of a qualified developer community around Pidgin etc. to put in the effort required. I think people generally underestimate the sheer amount of work involved in reverse engineering an IM protocol, even one that's not particularly well obfuscated.
But what about other projects? Back in the day there were multiple multi-protocol clients. Pidgin (or rather Gaim back then), Trillian, and others; now there's... maybe Franz, as cosmie mentions? Simply saying "Pidgin kind of died off" doesn't seem like enough of an explanation here; why aren't there more such projects popping up?
Re: Courts: Violating a Website’s Terms of Service Is Not a Crime
#84Earlier quoted context omitted.
> If Twitter did not have an API key, they would spend 2x the money on absorbing & defending against DDoSes and security vulnerabilities. That cost would get passed on to us with frequent outages and many more ads in our feeds. Or a leak of someones DMs. This is complete nonsense. Attackers aren't going to follow your TOS, so what possible benefit could asking your users to do it on little more than the honor system…
API key != TOS
The TOS is the reason that people use API keys instead of just reverse engineering the protocol (which is what an attacker will do).
Re: Courts: Violating a Website’s Terms of Service Is Not a Crime
#85Earlier quoted context omitted.
> If Twitter did not have an API key, they would spend 2x the money on absorbing & defending against DDoSes and security vulnerabilities. That cost would get passed on to us with frequent outages and many more ads in our feeds. Or a leak of someones DMs. This is complete nonsense. Attackers aren't going to follow your TOS, so what possible benefit could asking your users to do it on little more than the honor system…
Stopping a DOS is easier if you can tie whatever expensive operations that are happening to a single user.
Except you can't actually figure out which user it is.
Re: Courts: Violating a Website’s Terms of Service Is Not a Crime
#86Earlier quoted context omitted.
> As someone that was prevented from distributing Linux at high school because the administrators thought that any copying was piracy I remember having this discussion with in HS and also at work with people who were convinced pirating a PSX game is same as stealing, while not realizing there is no evidence that suggests a pirated copy means a lost sale (people can't afford it in places like Brasil where they still p…
A pirated copy doesn’t need to equate to a lost sale in order for it to be stealing. You took something of value that was created or owned by someone else. Whether it’s a physical or nonphysical good is completely beside the point.
> You took something of value that was created or owned by someone else.
A person who creates or owns a piece of information still has it after you "steal" it. That's the difference between a physical and a nonphysical good.
(I'm not saying distributing copies of copyrighted works is automatically OK, just that your justification for it not being OK doesn't hold water).
Re: Courts: Violating a Website’s Terms of Service Is Not a Crime
#87Earlier quoted context omitted.
> As someone that was prevented from distributing Linux at high school because the administrators thought that any copying was piracy I remember having this discussion with in HS and also at work with people who were convinced pirating a PSX game is same as stealing, while not realizing there is no evidence that suggests a pirated copy means a lost sale (people can't afford it in places like Brasil where they still p…
Equating “fair use” of a website to pirating software is a stretch. In the first case the method of access is at issue (not whether you can or not). In the second the company has not given you any _legal_ right to access. I don’t see how affordability (or lack of it) is justification to the game.
Stealing would mean the loss of property, but there are infinite copies of the digital good. Users for the most part do not read EULA agreements or Terms of Service of a website, the expectation is on the software company's side, it's not a a crime unless there is proof of damage (selling it for profit) from either copying that floppy disk or scraping a public website so hard you interfere with their operations.
So basically if you are poor, you deserve not to gain from the same things rich people can, even when no loss of property or damage occurs by having someone who can't afford it in the first place be your loyal fan. This doesn't apply in cases where there is explicit loss of property and damage that occurs as a result.
Mozart also got his ass arrested because he transcribed music he liked onto a medium which he was not authorized to do so. But we all know how ridiculous that was.
Re: Courts: Violating a Website’s Terms of Service Is Not a Crime
#88Earlier quoted context omitted.
A pirated copy doesn’t need to equate to a lost sale in order for it to be stealing. You took something of value that was created or owned by someone else. Whether it’s a physical or nonphysical good is completely beside the point.
Are you asserting that the salient moral property of theft isn't a party removing a thing from another party, but rather a party gaining a thing made by someone else?
Unfortunately, this is what people who claim piracy is evil thinks.
You obviously can't afford Final Fantasy 7 or Megaman Legends so by deriving pleasure from an unauthorized copy, you are a thief and lacking in moral fiber Sir!
Re: Courts: Violating a Website’s Terms of Service Is Not a Crime
#89Earlier quoted context omitted.
Is this system of "API keys" why Pidgin doesn't handle all these new IM protocols, and why there's no other good old-fashioned multi-protocol clients for them (that I'm aware of)?
Franz[1] is the closest thing I’ve found to a client around newer IM protocols. [1] https://meetfranz.com/
[deleted]
Re: Courts: Violating a Website’s Terms of Service Is Not a Crime
#90Earlier quoted context omitted.
Franz[1] is the closest thing I’ve found to a client around newer IM protocols. [1] https://meetfranz.com/
Huh, interesting. Its website isn't very informative though. I can't find a list of protocols, annoyingly.
It has a plugin architecture. Most of the core services it supports are listed in the Franz Plugin repo[1]. Note that it's not just about IM protocols, but rather a one-stop messaging app in general (so supports things like Gmail). And there are quite a few third-party plugins floating around, as well. And a good number that haven't been ported from Franz 4 to Franz 5.