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This breaks the social contract of the web. If you publish on the web (over HTTP) using HTML (with or without css+js) then you respect the concept of a User-Age

This breaks the social contract of the web. If you publish on the web (over HTTP) using HTML (with or without css+js) then you respect the concept of a User-Agent that renders the content on behalf of the user. If you wish to get around this then create another file format and protocol and application/plugin to do so — one that enforces the DRM for the owner. Don’t take agency away from User-Agent.

shaki-dora 8y ago
Would you make the same point for an extension that allows users to easily participate in DDOS attacks? Edit: the link, for the willfully dense, is that some protocol specification does not imply its users’ acceptance of any and all (ab)uses possible. It’s completely different only in that you like one but not the other.
- JoshuaAshton 8y ago
  That's completely and utterly unrelated to what the guy said. He is talking about user-agents and the way you interpret the data you receive from a http(s) request. You're talking about DDOS attacks. There is no logical link here.
- giornogiovanna 8y ago
  Uh... yes? It's not very relevant, but I guess if someone was making some kind of hacktivist extension that did something like that, I wouldn't just take it down from the marketplace.
Angostura 8y ago
Alternatively, the add-ons break the social contract, whereby content creators request payment for their content. If you visit stuff on the web, you respect the concept of a social contract between you and the provide. Don’t try to circumvent their wishes.
- pedrocr 8y ago
  > Alternatively, the add-ons break the social contract, whereby content creators request payment for their content. The site is free to not emit any content before payment is assured. The reason these add-ons are possible is that these sites are trying to have their cake and eat it to. They want to implement the paywall in the user agent so they can still get their content in Google. At the same time some of them are trying to argue for payments from Google for linking to their content. The situation is a mess but it's not about social contracts at all.
- betterunix2 8y ago
  Sure...except that the page content is loaded before any payment is made or confirmed. Websites probably want this to happen so that some user agents will not be blocked by the paywall e.g. search engine crawlers. Basically it sounds like some publishers want to rewrite the rules of the web to neatly and conveniently serve their interests.
- Zak 8y ago
  These are competing and potentially incompatible social contracts. As a hacker type who's been on the web a good while, I prefer the former: the client decides how to render content, and the server should not send content it doesn't want rendered. This doesn't necessarily prohibit the use of paywalls: the paywalled site just has to be designed so that it only sends content to clients that have provided evidence of payment rather than relying on the content being rendered in a way that prevents the reader from reading all of it. Much as I'm for standards-compliant HTML rendering, I don't want any specific rendering encoded into law.
- giornogiovanna 8y ago
  Anybody who tries to show me ads clearly respects neither my time nor my money, so why would I respect theirs? Anyway, getting angry at ad-blocking is pretty silly - it's as if someone threw a pamphlet at me while I was talking to them, and then yelled at me because I didn't read it.
- nothis 8y ago
  "We're sending data to your computer but you mustn't look! Promise!" I'm not sure how the addon worked, if there's some trickery going on, but I'm long waiting for a lawsuit against ad blockers that could get heated.
matt4077 8y ago
There’s also a social contract about respect for the law. It’s arguably much older. It involves aspects like “following the spirit of the law”. Also “technical ability is not the same as permission”. It’s why the old shopkeeper’s waning ability to see is no license for you from the produce displayed outside. (This is mostly to show that I, too, can argue with invented “contracts”).
- wpietri 8y ago
  There's also a social contract with government, such that laws are supposed to be thoughtfully written to achieve societal optimums, and rebalanced when that's not the case. In practice, American legislators have to raise large amounts of money just to say in office. So it's unsurprising that they listen mainly to the concerns of people with money: https://www.vox.com/2014/4/18/5624310/martin-gilens-testing-theories-of-american-politics-explained https://www.vox.com/2014/4/18/5624310/martin-gilens-testing-... We are in an age where information distribution is approximately free. And where the costs of producing information-based products has declined drastically. Paywalls are not any sort of law; they're an attempt by information producers to have their cake and eat it too. They want the abundance of the new, computer-driven world. But they want artificial scarcity, so that they can charge like they did in 1970. My sympathy is with journalists here. But that doesn't mean I have to roll over and let them break the web. The laws in question here, the DMCA and the CFAA, are both too new and too old to be reflexively bowed to with "OMG spirit of the law!" Too new because they are obviously part of society's attempts to deal with technology, and are equally obviously driven by the interests of people who have piles of money and are trying to protect those piles. And too old because both, but especially the CFAA which was written in 1984, reflect a very early understanding of what computers are, what they're for, and how society should treat them. As far as I'm concerned, this is an ongoing negotiation. We need to find ways for journalists to get paid. We need to find ways to have a much more informed populace. We need to preserve as much as possible of the freedom computers and networks have given to every individual. If we want paywalls to be a part of law, then we should have a national debate about whether publishers deserve a special protection so they make all of their content available, let it be downloaded to any computer in the world, and then have that computer enforce any restrictions they think are good ones. We are not obliged to just concede that debate right at the beginning just because you think reading an infinitely replicable article already on your computer is exactly the same thing as stealing a unique piece of fruit from a blind man's store.
solatic 8y ago
Precisely this. Website operators who wish to establish effective paywalls with publicly indexed content need a way to cryptographically authenticate web crawlers. That means working with search engines to establish a standard for registering and authenticating authorized crawlers. If Google isn't interested in such a standard (because it reduces the quality of open search results) then that's the publishers' problem, not Google's or users'.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]

shaki-dora 8y ago

Would you make the same point for an extension that allows users to easily participate in DDOS attacks? Edit: the link, for the willfully dense, is that some protocol specification does not imply its users’ acceptance of any and all (ab)uses possible. It’s completely different only in that you like one but not the other.

JoshuaAshton 8y ago
That's completely and utterly unrelated to what the guy said. He is talking about user-agents and the way you interpret the data you receive from a http(s) request. You're talking about DDOS attacks. There is no logical link here.
giornogiovanna 8y ago
Uh... yes? It's not very relevant, but I guess if someone was making some kind of hacktivist extension that did something like that, I wouldn't just take it down from the marketplace.

Angostura 8y ago

Alternatively, the add-ons break the social contract, whereby content creators request payment for their content. If you visit stuff on the web, you respect the concept of a social contract between you and the provide. Don’t try to circumvent their wishes.

pedrocr 8y ago
> Alternatively, the add-ons break the social contract, whereby content creators request payment for their content. The site is free to not emit any content before payment is assured. The reason these add-ons are possible is that these sites are trying to have their cake and eat it to. They want to implement the paywall in the user agent so they can still get their content in Google. At the same time some of them are trying to argue for payments from Google for linking to their content. The situation is a mess but it's not about social contracts at all.
betterunix2 8y ago
Sure...except that the page content is loaded before any payment is made or confirmed. Websites probably want this to happen so that some user agents will not be blocked by the paywall e.g. search engine crawlers. Basically it sounds like some publishers want to rewrite the rules of the web to neatly and conveniently serve their interests.
Zak 8y ago
These are competing and potentially incompatible social contracts. As a hacker type who's been on the web a good while, I prefer the former: the client decides how to render content, and the server should not send content it doesn't want rendered. This doesn't necessarily prohibit the use of paywalls: the paywalled site just has to be designed so that it only sends content to clients that have provided evidence of payment rather than relying on the content being rendered in a way that prevents the reader from reading all of it. Much as I'm for standards-compliant HTML rendering, I don't want any specific rendering encoded into law.
giornogiovanna 8y ago
Anybody who tries to show me ads clearly respects neither my time nor my money, so why would I respect theirs? Anyway, getting angry at ad-blocking is pretty silly - it's as if someone threw a pamphlet at me while I was talking to them, and then yelled at me because I didn't read it.
nothis 8y ago
"We're sending data to your computer but you mustn't look! Promise!" I'm not sure how the addon worked, if there's some trickery going on, but I'm long waiting for a lawsuit against ad blockers that could get heated.

matt4077 8y ago

There’s also a social contract about respect for the law. It’s arguably much older. It involves aspects like “following the spirit of the law”. Also “technical ability is not the same as permission”. It’s why the old shopkeeper’s waning ability to see is no license for you from the produce displayed outside. (This is mostly to show that I, too, can argue with invented “contracts”).

wpietri 8y ago
There's also a social contract with government, such that laws are supposed to be thoughtfully written to achieve societal optimums, and rebalanced when that's not the case. In practice, American legislators have to raise large amounts of money just to say in office. So it's unsurprising that they listen mainly to the concerns of people with money: https://www.vox.com/2014/4/18/5624310/martin-gilens-testing-theories-of-american-politics-explained https://www.vox.com/2014/4/18/5624310/martin-gilens-testing-... We are in an age where information distribution is approximately free. And where the costs of producing information-based products has declined drastically. Paywalls are not any sort of law; they're an attempt by information producers to have their cake and eat it too. They want the abundance of the new, computer-driven world. But they want artificial scarcity, so that they can charge like they did in 1970. My sympathy is with journalists here. But that doesn't mean I have to roll over and let them break the web. The laws in question here, the DMCA and the CFAA, are both too new and too old to be reflexively bowed to with "OMG spirit of the law!" Too new because they are obviously part of society's attempts to deal with technology, and are equally obviously driven by the interests of people who have piles of money and are trying to protect those piles. And too old because both, but especially the CFAA which was written in 1984, reflect a very early understanding of what computers are, what they're for, and how society should treat them. As far as I'm concerned, this is an ongoing negotiation. We need to find ways for journalists to get paid. We need to find ways to have a much more informed populace. We need to preserve as much as possible of the freedom computers and networks have given to every individual. If we want paywalls to be a part of law, then we should have a national debate about whether publishers deserve a special protection so they make all of their content available, let it be downloaded to any computer in the world, and then have that computer enforce any restrictions they think are good ones. We are not obliged to just concede that debate right at the beginning just because you think reading an infinitely replicable article already on your computer is exactly the same thing as stealing a unique piece of fruit from a blind man's store.

solatic 8y ago

Precisely this. Website operators who wish to establish effective paywalls with publicly indexed content need a way to cryptographically authenticate web crawlers. That means working with search engines to establish a standard for registering and authenticating authorized crawlers. If Google isn't interested in such a standard (because it reduces the quality of open search results) then that's the publishers' problem, not Google's or users'.

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]