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I'm naive on the law around this, but it seems like Amazon.com shouldn't have standing here. What Perplexity does, from my perspective, is essentially the same

I'm naive on the law around this, but it seems like Amazon.com shouldn't have standing here. What Perplexity does, from my perspective, is essentially the same as when I allow Firefox, Chrome, or Safari (or any other browser software) to see my credentials and access Amazon's website on my behalf.

advisedwang 12d ago
Amazon certainly has standing for how YOU access amazon, even if it was in a regular browser.
- eigencoder 12d ago
  What do you mean?
  - dcrazy 12d ago
    Amazon is a party to interactions with their website. That gives them standing to sue over those interactions. Whether they can sue Perplexity specifically is what was being debated in these motions.
    - eigencoder 12d ago
      I think I get it. Like they'd have standing to sue if I tried to hack their website, or change the price of items or something.
    - shimman 11d ago
      Nah, once you have the bits on your device you should be free to do with them whatever you want. Amazon doesn't get to dictate how you consume what they give out for free.
      - dcrazy 11d ago
        What you think you should be able to do with the data you get back from contacting Amazon’s servers doesn’t impact whether Amazon has standing to sue you over how and why you contacted their servers.
        shimman 11d ago
        Sure and what you comment doesn't change that people have opinions about the validity of such cases. Amazon cares more about their bottom line than the health of their workers, we should be highly skeptical of anything they want to do as there is a strong chance that it will hurt + immiserate workers. Not all of us have the same bathroom fetish as Bezos.
        dcrazy 11d ago
        Your opinion about the “validity” of such a case is not really at home in a thread about _legal standing_.
        shimman 11d ago
        Sure it does, you're making a lot of assumptions here. The most egregious one is believing that that I think the legal system means anything to actual justice and not a system that is mostly used to protect the interests of the elite at the expense of the poor.
- hightrix 12d ago
  Access, yes. Display the content delivered from amazon.com, no absolutely not.
  - bitpush 12d ago
    I'm trying to make sense of this and the best analogy I can find is using an example of physical products. 1. I can walk into Apple Store and buy Apple device (this is similar to me opening the browser and accessing amazon.com 2. If I'm busy, I can hire a person to go stand in line and buy the device (me asking Comet to shop on my behalf) The core question is does Apple (Amazon in this case) can block the hired help (Comet browser) from accessing the store. Most reasonable people would say "their store, their rules", so that goes to mean Amazon's website, Amazon's rules.
    - A1kmm 12d ago
      Maybe a better analogy: They can ban you from going through their drive through on a bicycle, but can they sue bicycle manufacturers because bike riders are going through their drive through? In this analogy, it seems the originating court said yes, they can sue the bicycle manufacturer (in the analogy), but on appeal the answer was no, they cannot. That seems like the appeals court got it right to me.
      - hatthew 12d ago
        I'm not familiar with the case, but to me it sounds like the bicycle manufacturer is encouraging people to use bikes in the drive through, maybe even providing specific tools explicitly for that purpose?
        pests 11d ago
        Even if they were, is it illegal to sell something that might violate another companies TOS? There is entire categories of products whose entire intent is to circumvent some other products limitation or rules.
    - 12d ago
hbcdbff 12d ago
It’s quite clearly not the same
- eigencoder 12d ago
  Really, what do you find different about it?
  - hbcdbff 12d ago
    Giving perplexity your credentials to run agentic workflows is not the same as manually controlling the site. It’s literally not the same. I’m not really sure what else to tell you.
    - Max-q 12d ago
      What about giving it to your secretary with a list of what to shop?
      - ndnddmnf 12d ago
        [dead]
      - JumpCrisscross 12d ago
        > What about giving it to your secretary with a list of what to shop? "When a Comet user directs the Assistant to locate an item on Amazon.com, the Assistant takes screenshotsof the browser view, sends those screenshotsfrom the user’s computer to Perplexity’s servers, and receives instructions from Perplexity’s servers on how to navigateAmazon.com. In other words, the Assistant cannot operate wholly independently; it relies on direction from the user and instructions from Perplexity’s servers."
        eigencoder 12d ago
        Obviously all browsers rely on direction from the user. But they also typically rely on instructions from the browser maker's servers. Traditionally, you get all of those instructions in a single download that's been pre-packaged (the browser program itself). But if part of the browser's logic requires more computational resources than most consumers have, what's the problem with "outsourcing" that bit to Perplexity's servers? As a consumer, I don't think it's very prudent to trust a company with that kind of access to your data, but it doesn't seem materially different from the kind of trust you have to give to Chrome.
jubilanti 12d ago
You're not using "standing" correctly, you're using it more to argue about the merits of the case. Standing is about filtering out frivolous lawsuits. One has "standing" to file a lawsuit when there is reason to believe these three questions could be answered in the affirmative, if a trial were to take place: Was the plaintiff harmed? Did the defendant cause that harm? Can the court rectify that harm? It's not about what the answers to those questions are. Those are questions about the merits of the case, to be answered at trial. It's about if it should even go to trial.
- eigencoder 12d ago
  Yeah, in this case I believe I do mean the merits rather than "standing".
  - jojobas 11d ago
    "Leg to stand on"
40four 12d ago
Your feeling turned it to be correct. Amazon lost the case in the appellate court.
- semiquaver 11d ago
  But not on standing grounds. And no, Amazon did not lose the “case”, which usually means “the whole lawsuit”. The current posture is still at the preliminary injunction stage. Amazon was granted a PI by district court (basically “perplexity, stop this now while litigation is ongoing”) and the appeals court overturned. Now the actual case can proceed at the district level.
  - 40four 11d ago
    Oh thanks for the explanation. Shows you how much I know about law!
TZubiri 11d ago
The facts are something like this: 1- Amazon owns servers and serves the client-interface ot interact with their servers. 2- They make public their Terms of Service and they make users (with accounts) agree to them. 3- The terms include a (very standard) "you can only use our service through the interface you provide, you may not automate this interface" clause. 4- Users violate this clause when they use an agent and browser-use. 5- Perplexity provided browser-use features that were used, by design, for users to break this clause. From those facts, as shown to you, do you think Amazon doesn't have a case?

advisedwang 12d ago

Amazon certainly has standing for how YOU access amazon, even if it was in a regular browser.

eigencoder 12d ago
What do you mean?
- dcrazy 12d ago
  Amazon is a party to interactions with their website. That gives them standing to sue over those interactions. Whether they can sue Perplexity specifically is what was being debated in these motions.
  - eigencoder 12d ago
    I think I get it. Like they'd have standing to sue if I tried to hack their website, or change the price of items or something.
  - shimman 11d ago
    Nah, once you have the bits on your device you should be free to do with them whatever you want. Amazon doesn't get to dictate how you consume what they give out for free.
    - dcrazy 11d ago
      What you think you should be able to do with the data you get back from contacting Amazon’s servers doesn’t impact whether Amazon has standing to sue you over how and why you contacted their servers.
      - shimman 11d ago
        Sure and what you comment doesn't change that people have opinions about the validity of such cases. Amazon cares more about their bottom line than the health of their workers, we should be highly skeptical of anything they want to do as there is a strong chance that it will hurt + immiserate workers. Not all of us have the same bathroom fetish as Bezos.
        dcrazy 11d ago
        Your opinion about the “validity” of such a case is not really at home in a thread about _legal standing_.
        shimman 11d ago
        Sure it does, you're making a lot of assumptions here. The most egregious one is believing that that I think the legal system means anything to actual justice and not a system that is mostly used to protect the interests of the elite at the expense of the poor.
hightrix 12d ago
Access, yes. Display the content delivered from amazon.com, no absolutely not.
- bitpush 12d ago
  I'm trying to make sense of this and the best analogy I can find is using an example of physical products. 1. I can walk into Apple Store and buy Apple device (this is similar to me opening the browser and accessing amazon.com 2. If I'm busy, I can hire a person to go stand in line and buy the device (me asking Comet to shop on my behalf) The core question is does Apple (Amazon in this case) can block the hired help (Comet browser) from accessing the store. Most reasonable people would say "their store, their rules", so that goes to mean Amazon's website, Amazon's rules.
  - A1kmm 12d ago
    Maybe a better analogy: They can ban you from going through their drive through on a bicycle, but can they sue bicycle manufacturers because bike riders are going through their drive through? In this analogy, it seems the originating court said yes, they can sue the bicycle manufacturer (in the analogy), but on appeal the answer was no, they cannot. That seems like the appeals court got it right to me.
    - hatthew 12d ago
      I'm not familiar with the case, but to me it sounds like the bicycle manufacturer is encouraging people to use bikes in the drive through, maybe even providing specific tools explicitly for that purpose?
      - pests 11d ago
        Even if they were, is it illegal to sell something that might violate another companies TOS? There is entire categories of products whose entire intent is to circumvent some other products limitation or rules.
  - 12d ago

hbcdbff 12d ago

It’s quite clearly not the same

eigencoder 12d ago
Really, what do you find different about it?
- hbcdbff 12d ago
  Giving perplexity your credentials to run agentic workflows is not the same as manually controlling the site. It’s literally not the same. I’m not really sure what else to tell you.
  - Max-q 12d ago
    What about giving it to your secretary with a list of what to shop?
    - ndnddmnf 12d ago
      [dead]
    - JumpCrisscross 12d ago
      > What about giving it to your secretary with a list of what to shop? "When a Comet user directs the Assistant to locate an item on Amazon.com, the Assistant takes screenshotsof the browser view, sends those screenshotsfrom the user’s computer to Perplexity’s servers, and receives instructions from Perplexity’s servers on how to navigateAmazon.com. In other words, the Assistant cannot operate wholly independently; it relies on direction from the user and instructions from Perplexity’s servers."
      - eigencoder 12d ago
        Obviously all browsers rely on direction from the user. But they also typically rely on instructions from the browser maker's servers. Traditionally, you get all of those instructions in a single download that's been pre-packaged (the browser program itself). But if part of the browser's logic requires more computational resources than most consumers have, what's the problem with "outsourcing" that bit to Perplexity's servers? As a consumer, I don't think it's very prudent to trust a company with that kind of access to your data, but it doesn't seem materially different from the kind of trust you have to give to Chrome.

jubilanti 12d ago

You're not using "standing" correctly, you're using it more to argue about the merits of the case. Standing is about filtering out frivolous lawsuits. One has "standing" to file a lawsuit when there is reason to believe these three questions could be answered in the affirmative, if a trial were to take place: Was the plaintiff harmed? Did the defendant cause that harm? Can the court rectify that harm? It's not about what the answers to those questions are. Those are questions about the merits of the case, to be answered at trial. It's about if it should even go to trial.

eigencoder 12d ago
Yeah, in this case I believe I do mean the merits rather than "standing".
- jojobas 11d ago
  "Leg to stand on"

40four 12d ago

Your feeling turned it to be correct. Amazon lost the case in the appellate court.

semiquaver 11d ago
But not on standing grounds. And no, Amazon did not lose the “case”, which usually means “the whole lawsuit”. The current posture is still at the preliminary injunction stage. Amazon was granted a PI by district court (basically “perplexity, stop this now while litigation is ongoing”) and the appeals court overturned. Now the actual case can proceed at the district level.
- 40four 11d ago
  Oh thanks for the explanation. Shows you how much I know about law!

TZubiri 11d ago

The facts are something like this: 1- Amazon owns servers and serves the client-interface ot interact with their servers. 2- They make public their Terms of Service and they make users (with accounts) agree to them. 3- The terms include a (very standard) "you can only use our service through the interface you provide, you may not automate this interface" clause. 4- Users violate this clause when they use an agent and browser-use. 5- Perplexity provided browser-use features that were used, by design, for users to break this clause. From those facts, as shown to you, do you think Amazon doesn't have a case?