Reply to post: Re: Hanff BadPublisher site closes

Ad-blocker blocking websites face legal peril at hands of privacy bods

Charles 9

Re: Hanff BadPublisher site closes

He didn't really have a legal leg to stand on. Copyright favors the source, so the source can set terms. Second, a vendor can hold power of discretion unless there's a specific prohibition against it. A vendor is not required to sell; there are no buyer's rights, so strike two. Finally, technology and physics favor the source; there's simply no way to fool the server into thinking they're serving an ad without actually serving an ad (which means you use up your bandwidth, which for most people is limited). Because of the way the Internet works, they will know precisely where it's going, how much of it gets sent, and if it was completed, timed out, or aborted. They can make pretty good guesses from that.

So the TL;DR version. Their content, their rules; they don't have to serve you if they don't want to; and if they require you to watch an ad beforehand, they have ways to make sure you pay the piper first. Take It or Leave It, which may well mean leaving the Internet.

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