34 ms·

First, let's just ignore the straw man of: >Honestly, is this any different from a company ninety years ago denying service to non-whites because it "could be

by pflats 14y ago

First, let's just ignore the straw man of: >Honestly, is this any different from a company ninety years ago denying service to non-whites because it "could be perceived as encouraging the races to intermarry?" I think we can both agree that it's a hyperbolic statement. Moving beyond that, as a company, I should have every right to decide who can and cannot use my service. Just because I provide a public-facing API doesn't mean I have to allow you do to what you want with it. You're building off of my brand and my infrastructure. If I don't want Initech Inc. to be associated with file sharing, fire arms, or even the Irish, that's entirely within my rights. I'd be far more aghast if companies were forced to take any comers. On this specific issue, scan the headlines: "Pirate’s dream come true: Boxopus pushes torrents to your Dropbox account" "Boxopus Is A Pirate Friend, Drops Torrents Directly Into Dropbox‎" "New App Makes Pirating Movies A One-Click Process" The articles also point out that Boxopus was quickly integrated with a number of torrent sites that host bootleg downloads. The absolute last thing Dropbox wants to be associated with is piracy. The company is in much more danger of going out of business due to piracy issues than to any competitor.

nessus42 14y ago
> If I don't want Initech Inc. to be associated with file sharing, fire arms, or even the Irish, that's entirely within my rights. I'd be far more aghast if companies were forced to take any comers. I'm rather aghast that any companies think this way. You might as well say that it is well within Google's right to shut down my Google Docs account because they don't want to be associated with the bad poetry I write using it. One problem with this attitude is that it doesn't lead to a smoothly functioning economy. If I have to worry that any online service might chose to shut down my access for any arbitrary reason, then I am strongly disincentived from using online services. The strength of any economy is in no small part due to the ease and fluidity with which trusted transactions can take place. Remove the forces that allow us to trust the transactions, and the economy will falter. The only reason that people are mostly willing to overlook this issue is because service providers exercise their putative right to deny service for arbitrary reasons rarely. But if you as a service provider exercise this putative right more liberally, then you are damaging the entire economic system (albeit only to some small degree for an isolated provider). The only silver lining in all this free market rhetoric is that hopefully the free market will step in and put you out of business. Unfortunately, however, this often takes a lot longer than it should once network effects have engaged. P.S. What's with this trend of downvoting people just because someone doesn't happen to agree with what someone else has to say. This is rather rude, if you ask me.
- shard972 14y ago
  > I'm rather aghast that any companies think this way. You might as well say that it is well within Google's right to shut down my Google Docs account because they don't want to be associated with the bad poetry I write using it. What he is saying is that he believes it is Google's right to do that and it is irrelevant to the fact it is stupid. > One problem with this attitude is that it doesn't lead to a smoothly functioning economy. Sure if people just put up with it but I don't think anyone is suggesting we just accept dropbox's position and pretend it never happened.
  - nessus42 14y ago
    > What he is saying is that he believes it is Google's right to do that and it is irrelevant to the fact it is stupid. And what I'm saying is that it is NOT within Google's right to do this. Among other reasons, it is not within Google's right to fsck up the economy that everyone depends on. On the other other hand, I fully acknowledge that the best remedy is not always more government, since that doesn't always lead to the greatest utility either.
    - uxp 14y ago
      No shirt, No shoes, No Piracy, No Service. > it is not within Google's right to fsck up the economy that everyone depends on. I shut down a non-technology brick and mortar store almost a year ago, partly because of dwindling sales due to the economy, and more importantly because I had a single customer that maintained over 60% of my revenue. That customer decided to move the business they were giving me in-house. Negotiations had been ongoing for over 4 years, both to (naively) prevent them from doing so (it wasn't a surprise that they did, they had been talking about it for years), and to suggest that we could merge businesses. Suffice to say, they hired someone else and I was forced to walk away. I went through a period of "Fuck them", but I had known all along that if they walked away from me, I was screwed. Relying on a single 3rd party API is exactly the same thing. It's a contract with another business entity. If they decide to implement your additions into their core product (take for example today's Podcast app release form Apple), or if don't like your hair color, or they just don't like what you are doing, it's not "fuck them" it's "what's phase 2?". Grow up and move on. This is business. No one is entitled to consume another company's API, or else there would be no such thing as an API key.
nl 14y ago
If I don't want Initech Inc. to be associated with file sharing, fire arms, or even the Irish, that's entirely within my rights Regarding the Irish part, I don't think that is within your rights. In the US Title II of the Civil Rights act Outlawed discrimination based on race, color, religion or national origin in hotels, motels, restaurants, theaters, and all other public accommodations engaged in interstate commerce;[1] In other countries article 7 of the UN Declaration on Human Rights (All are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the law. All are entitled to equal protection against any discrimination in violation of this Declaration and against any incitement to such discrimination.)[2] may outlaw that kind of discrimination (depending on your countries international treaty obligations and local laws) [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Rights_Act_of_1964#Title_II http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Rights_Act_of_1964#Title_... [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Declaration_of_Human_Rights#Article_7 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Declaration_of_Human_...
- paulgb 14y ago
  It's against the code to discriminate against national origin, but not country of residence. The Irish can't use Hulu, for example.
  - nl 14y ago
    Oh right. I guess the OP could have meant that (I'm Australian, so quite familiar with that scenario).

by pflats 14y ago

nessus42 14y ago

> If I don't want Initech Inc. to be associated with file sharing, fire arms, or even the Irish, that's entirely within my rights. I'd be far more aghast if companies were forced to take any comers. I'm rather aghast that any companies think this way. You might as well say that it is well within Google's right to shut down my Google Docs account because they don't want to be associated with the bad poetry I write using it. One problem with this attitude is that it doesn't lead to a smoothly functioning economy. If I have to worry that any online service might chose to shut down my access for any arbitrary reason, then I am strongly disincentived from using online services. The strength of any economy is in no small part due to the ease and fluidity with which trusted transactions can take place. Remove the forces that allow us to trust the transactions, and the economy will falter. The only reason that people are mostly willing to overlook this issue is because service providers exercise their putative right to deny service for arbitrary reasons rarely. But if you as a service provider exercise this putative right more liberally, then you are damaging the entire economic system (albeit only to some small degree for an isolated provider). The only silver lining in all this free market rhetoric is that hopefully the free market will step in and put you out of business. Unfortunately, however, this often takes a lot longer than it should once network effects have engaged. P.S. What's with this trend of downvoting people just because someone doesn't happen to agree with what someone else has to say. This is rather rude, if you ask me.

shard972 14y ago
> I'm rather aghast that any companies think this way. You might as well say that it is well within Google's right to shut down my Google Docs account because they don't want to be associated with the bad poetry I write using it. What he is saying is that he believes it is Google's right to do that and it is irrelevant to the fact it is stupid. > One problem with this attitude is that it doesn't lead to a smoothly functioning economy. Sure if people just put up with it but I don't think anyone is suggesting we just accept dropbox's position and pretend it never happened.
- nessus42 14y ago
  > What he is saying is that he believes it is Google's right to do that and it is irrelevant to the fact it is stupid. And what I'm saying is that it is NOT within Google's right to do this. Among other reasons, it is not within Google's right to fsck up the economy that everyone depends on. On the other other hand, I fully acknowledge that the best remedy is not always more government, since that doesn't always lead to the greatest utility either.
  - uxp 14y ago
    No shirt, No shoes, No Piracy, No Service. > it is not within Google's right to fsck up the economy that everyone depends on. I shut down a non-technology brick and mortar store almost a year ago, partly because of dwindling sales due to the economy, and more importantly because I had a single customer that maintained over 60% of my revenue. That customer decided to move the business they were giving me in-house. Negotiations had been ongoing for over 4 years, both to (naively) prevent them from doing so (it wasn't a surprise that they did, they had been talking about it for years), and to suggest that we could merge businesses. Suffice to say, they hired someone else and I was forced to walk away. I went through a period of "Fuck them", but I had known all along that if they walked away from me, I was screwed. Relying on a single 3rd party API is exactly the same thing. It's a contract with another business entity. If they decide to implement your additions into their core product (take for example today's Podcast app release form Apple), or if don't like your hair color, or they just don't like what you are doing, it's not "fuck them" it's "what's phase 2?". Grow up and move on. This is business. No one is entitled to consume another company's API, or else there would be no such thing as an API key.

nl 14y ago

If I don't want Initech Inc. to be associated with file sharing, fire arms, or even the Irish, that's entirely within my rights Regarding the Irish part, I don't think that is within your rights. In the US Title II of the Civil Rights act Outlawed discrimination based on race, color, religion or national origin in hotels, motels, restaurants, theaters, and all other public accommodations engaged in interstate commerce;[1] In other countries article 7 of the UN Declaration on Human Rights (All are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the law. All are entitled to equal protection against any discrimination in violation of this Declaration and against any incitement to such discrimination.)[2] may outlaw that kind of discrimination (depending on your countries international treaty obligations and local laws) [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Rights_Act_of_1964#Title_II http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Rights_Act_of_1964#Title_... [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Declaration_of_Human_Rights#Article_7 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Declaration_of_Human_...

paulgb 14y ago
It's against the code to discriminate against national origin, but not country of residence. The Irish can't use Hulu, for example.
- nl 14y ago
  Oh right. I guess the OP could have meant that (I'm Australian, so quite familiar with that scenario).