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But see _you_ a person is not here. A bot is here, and a bot can't enter a contract.

sam0x17 7y ago
Seriously though. If you honestly think a bot can enter a contract, I'll set up a honeypot right now with a TOS saying that by using this website you agree to pay me $300,000, and then I'll send Google a bill when they index me. You can't have your cake and eat it too -- either it works that way, and we all should set up honeypots right now, or it doesn't work that way, and any bot I write can scrape anything I want as long as it is fully unattended and I never agree to the TOS myself.
kevingadd 7y ago
Bots can purchase and sell shares or futures and perform other financial transactions. Is an agreement to exchange shares for currency not a contract?
crazygringo 7y ago
You wrote and are running the bot, and are entirely legally responsible for its behavior, like it or not. By your logic, if someone shoots a bullet and it kills someone else, it would be the bullet's fault and not the person who pulled the trigger...?
- EGreg 7y ago
  By your logic, the fault is of the bullet maker. If someone uses your open source software to commit a crime, is that your fault?
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
- sam0x17 7y ago
  That's a completely different situation, legally. There are existing laws saying that I am liable for bad things my bot/creation/whatever does, but a TOS works differently -- it is a contract that a human has to read and agree to. They can put in a clause saying that "by reading this document you agree to [TOS]" or "by clicking this link you agree to [TOS]" or my favorite "by using this website you agree to [TOS]". No one is using/reading/accessing anything when the Googlebot crawls a web page, and there is no way you could have a bot agree to a TOS for you. If someone wrote a "honeypot" saying that if you access this URL you owe the author $200,000, there is no way Google would now owe that person $200,000. No human being read and agreed to a contract, so there is nothing to enforce. Now legally if you can prove that the bot author is aware of the TOS, that's a different situation, but there are a variety of situations where it is completely reasonable (search engine bots in particular) where the author will never know about the TOS.
sgentle 7y ago
Your honour, I did not sign this contract. My pen signed it – I merely held the pen.
- sam0x17 7y ago
  This is why for serious things we have notaries. People forge signatures all the time. With a digital signature, you lose a lot of the forensic information (handwriting style, etc) that would aid in proving that you in fact signed something, but I digress. If I write a script that goes to every web page on the internet and fills in all text fields with "jdJdkjl28d", selects a random choice from all drop-downs, checks all check boxes, and hits submit, no one is going to seriously argue that I would be bound by any of those agreements because I didn't read them, and the logic I wrote isn't even aware that they are agreements -- it is just checking checkboxes regardless of what the form says. This is why some companies make you scroll all the way down to "read" the agreement before you can check the box because then it can be argued that you actually read the agreement.

Seriously though. If you honestly think a bot can enter a contract, I'll set up a honeypot right now with a TOS saying that by using this website you agree to pay me $300,000, and then I'll send Google a bill when they index me. You can't have your cake and eat it too -- either it works that way, and we all should set up honeypots right now, or it doesn't work that way, and any bot I write can scrape anything I want as long as it is fully unattended and I never agree to the TOS myself.

kevingadd 7y ago

Bots can purchase and sell shares or futures and perform other financial transactions. Is an agreement to exchange shares for currency not a contract?

crazygringo 7y ago

You wrote and are running the bot, and are entirely legally responsible for its behavior, like it or not. By your logic, if someone shoots a bullet and it kills someone else, it would be the bullet's fault and not the person who pulled the trigger...?

EGreg 7y ago
By your logic, the fault is of the bullet maker. If someone uses your open source software to commit a crime, is that your fault?
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
sam0x17 7y ago
That's a completely different situation, legally. There are existing laws saying that I am liable for bad things my bot/creation/whatever does, but a TOS works differently -- it is a contract that a human has to read and agree to. They can put in a clause saying that "by reading this document you agree to [TOS]" or "by clicking this link you agree to [TOS]" or my favorite "by using this website you agree to [TOS]". No one is using/reading/accessing anything when the Googlebot crawls a web page, and there is no way you could have a bot agree to a TOS for you. If someone wrote a "honeypot" saying that if you access this URL you owe the author $200,000, there is no way Google would now owe that person $200,000. No human being read and agreed to a contract, so there is nothing to enforce. Now legally if you can prove that the bot author is aware of the TOS, that's a different situation, but there are a variety of situations where it is completely reasonable (search engine bots in particular) where the author will never know about the TOS.

sgentle 7y ago

Your honour, I did not sign this contract. My pen signed it – I merely held the pen.

sam0x17 7y ago
This is why for serious things we have notaries. People forge signatures all the time. With a digital signature, you lose a lot of the forensic information (handwriting style, etc) that would aid in proving that you in fact signed something, but I digress. If I write a script that goes to every web page on the internet and fills in all text fields with "jdJdkjl28d", selects a random choice from all drop-downs, checks all check boxes, and hits submit, no one is going to seriously argue that I would be bound by any of those agreements because I didn't read them, and the logic I wrote isn't even aware that they are agreements -- it is just checking checkboxes regardless of what the form says. This is why some companies make you scroll all the way down to "read" the agreement before you can check the box because then it can be argued that you actually read the agreement.