You're totally missing the point. The author points the fact that issuing "GET /interesting-article.html" should NOT have any side-effect. This is the GET that

You're totally missing the point. The author points the fact that issuing "GET /interesting-article.html" should NOT have any side-effect. This is the GET that should not have any side-effect. The other GET or POST or whatever it is is the side-effect. The author goes as far as criticizing other side-effects already in place; an example of which is ads. Because you see when you browse an article about Herpes, then you encounter ads about Herpes drugs on every website. I got hit by this while looking for paid webmails. After a few searches on Google, I started to see ads for atmail on every single page. There are people who believe it's a violation and I'm one of them. EDIT: please don't point at Do Not Track or other work-arounds because that's all they are.