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This case is stupidity piled higher and deeper! > Does the IP address actually change when this happens? Some ISPs have their DHCP server assign IPs according

by graycat 13y ago

This case is stupidity piled higher and deeper! > Does the IP address actually change when this happens? Some ISPs have their DHCP server assign IPs according to the MAC address of the cable modem, which of course won't change if power is shut off and then turned on again. My ISP does this. I get a new IP address whenever I cycle power on my cable modem. And sometimes my ISP gives me a new IP address for whatever reason. Maybe their reason is that they want to charge a little more for a fixed IP address. Or maybe they have more paying customers than IP addresses so must dynamically assign IP addresses to users actually connected. Yes, if 3taps was accessing Craigslist from a fixed IP address, then that can be fair, although not really good, evidence that 3taps was continuing to access Craigslist after the C&D letter. If 3taps just admitted continuing to use Craigslist, then they were, just how do I say it, s.t.u.p.i.d, or some such? Or, all a 3taps person had to do was just go home and get the Craigslist data from a home computer with a different IP address. I'm not up on mobile devices, but I have to believe that they also use frequently changing, dynamically assigned IP addresses. Also I don't like the idea that there is screen scraping as something different from ordinary usage; it's not. The Web site sends the data, and the data is nearly always stored on disk by the Web browser. Also the Web browser can write the data to an HTM file and a directory with the JS, CSS, JPG, PNG, GIF, etc. files. Then the user has essentially all the data in simple, plain unencrypted form. Nearly all the data is sent just as simple text. E.g., likely the Craigslist data is sent this way. Then if someone wants to make some new use of that Craigslist data, they can easily remove the HTTP, HTML, CSS, JS, etc. stuff, leave the simple text, analyze it, reformat it, combine it with other data, format it with Word, TeX, PostScript, PDF, etc., wrap it in some new HTML, CSS, and JS, and publish it again. Then it need not be the least bit clear just where the data came from. In this case, with little good evidence that the data came from Craigslist, it would not be fair to search the facilities of 3taps for evidence. Broadly, the Web site offers the data to all anonymous users, as mostly just simple text. In that case, the Web site should basically just shut up about what happens to the data they sent.

pdonis 13y ago
I'm not up on mobile devices, but I have to believe that they also use frequently changing, dynamically assigned IP addresses. I believe that's correct, yes. If they are using wifi, they will appear to be connecting using the wifi router's public IP address, which will certainly be different for each wifi router. If they are using the cell phone network to connect, I'm pretty sure they get assigned a public IP address based on which cell tower they are using to connect, so that will change as well. I don't like the idea that there is screen scraping as something different from ordinary usage; it's not. In terms of the data itself, you're right, screen scraping is just pulling the data, the same as a web browser does. However, since screen scraping can be automated, it can potentially use a lot more bandwidth, since it can request multiple pages from a site much faster than a human driving a browser can. That's why sites are allowed to restrict what automated search bots can do on their sites, for example with a robots.txt file. A service like 3Taps would be expected to respect these types of restrictions just like Google does. That said, I don't think the issue in this case was the screen scraping per se; I think the issue was that Craigslist asserted copyright over their data, so that they had the right to say that 3Taps could not use the data the way they were using it.
- graycat 13y ago
  For screen scraping, it appears that some people want to say that, because some software in effect provided the browser keystrokes or mouse clicks, something was wrong. Once I wrote a little program that gets Web pages from a Web site; if I handled all the details correctly, then there is no way for the Web site to know that it is sending the data to my program instead of a Web browser. Indeed, essentially I wrote a Web browser. That my Web browser just wrote data to files and did not provide a graphical user interface on my screen is none of the business of the Web site. It can't be illegal to write a Web browser, especially a very simple one. For getting pages too fast, just write the software to get the pages more slowly. Done. Or if want to use one computer to get 100 pages from each of 10,000 sites, then then get one page from each of the 10,000 sites, 100 times. Done. > I think the issue was that Craigslist asserted copyright over their data, Fine. But there is an issue: Just how the heck is Craigslist to know who got the data? Not from IP address -- that's terrible evidence. Then how's Craigslist to know just what the heck the data was used for? Even it it's clear that the data was from Craigslist originally, if the person using or misusing the data might have gotten the data from someone else and not directly from Craigslist. So, to me, for Craigslist to run around with lawyers and C&D letters attacking Internet users looks like a bummer. If a user does something obvious and blatant with Craigslist data, or is dumb enough to admit getting the data after a C&D letter, then okay. But mostly the legal effort is a loose cannon on the deck that can hurt a lot of people based on really poor evidence.
  - pdonis 13y ago
    there is no way for the Web site to know that it is sending the data to my program instead of a Web browser. Except through your User-Agent string. Which can, of course, be faked, but if you are actually running a scraper or other automated tool, you're not supposed to use a browser User-Agent string. For getting pages too fast, just write the software to get the pages more slowly. Done. Yes, agreed; all search bots and other automated tools are supposed to do this. But there is an issue: Just how the heck is Craigslist to know who got the data? I don't know how Craigslist found out in this specific case; but the point was moot anyway because 3Taps admitted they had obtained the data; there was no dispute about that. The dispute was entirely over whether what 3Taps was doing with the data once they got it was "authorized". how's Craigslist to know just what the heck the data was used for? Because 3Taps admitted what they were using it for. There was no dispute about that either, only about whether that use was authorized. for Craigslist to run around with lawyers and C&D letters attacking Internet users looks like a bummer. Have they been doing that? In this particular case, as I said above, there was no dispute at all about the facts, only about the legal rights involved. I don't see any evidence that Craigslist is indiscriminately banning people and then suing them based on disputed facts; the only dispute I see is over whether Craigslist should be able to assert the rights it's asserting over its data.

by graycat 13y ago

pdonis 13y ago

I'm not up on mobile devices, but I have to believe that they also use frequently changing, dynamically assigned IP addresses. I believe that's correct, yes. If they are using wifi, they will appear to be connecting using the wifi router's public IP address, which will certainly be different for each wifi router. If they are using the cell phone network to connect, I'm pretty sure they get assigned a public IP address based on which cell tower they are using to connect, so that will change as well. I don't like the idea that there is screen scraping as something different from ordinary usage; it's not. In terms of the data itself, you're right, screen scraping is just pulling the data, the same as a web browser does. However, since screen scraping can be automated, it can potentially use a lot more bandwidth, since it can request multiple pages from a site much faster than a human driving a browser can. That's why sites are allowed to restrict what automated search bots can do on their sites, for example with a robots.txt file. A service like 3Taps would be expected to respect these types of restrictions just like Google does. That said, I don't think the issue in this case was the screen scraping per se; I think the issue was that Craigslist asserted copyright over their data, so that they had the right to say that 3Taps could not use the data the way they were using it.

graycat 13y ago
For screen scraping, it appears that some people want to say that, because some software in effect provided the browser keystrokes or mouse clicks, something was wrong. Once I wrote a little program that gets Web pages from a Web site; if I handled all the details correctly, then there is no way for the Web site to know that it is sending the data to my program instead of a Web browser. Indeed, essentially I wrote a Web browser. That my Web browser just wrote data to files and did not provide a graphical user interface on my screen is none of the business of the Web site. It can't be illegal to write a Web browser, especially a very simple one. For getting pages too fast, just write the software to get the pages more slowly. Done. Or if want to use one computer to get 100 pages from each of 10,000 sites, then then get one page from each of the 10,000 sites, 100 times. Done. > I think the issue was that Craigslist asserted copyright over their data, Fine. But there is an issue: Just how the heck is Craigslist to know who got the data? Not from IP address -- that's terrible evidence. Then how's Craigslist to know just what the heck the data was used for? Even it it's clear that the data was from Craigslist originally, if the person using or misusing the data might have gotten the data from someone else and not directly from Craigslist. So, to me, for Craigslist to run around with lawyers and C&D letters attacking Internet users looks like a bummer. If a user does something obvious and blatant with Craigslist data, or is dumb enough to admit getting the data after a C&D letter, then okay. But mostly the legal effort is a loose cannon on the deck that can hurt a lot of people based on really poor evidence.
- pdonis 13y ago
  there is no way for the Web site to know that it is sending the data to my program instead of a Web browser. Except through your User-Agent string. Which can, of course, be faked, but if you are actually running a scraper or other automated tool, you're not supposed to use a browser User-Agent string. For getting pages too fast, just write the software to get the pages more slowly. Done. Yes, agreed; all search bots and other automated tools are supposed to do this. But there is an issue: Just how the heck is Craigslist to know who got the data? I don't know how Craigslist found out in this specific case; but the point was moot anyway because 3Taps admitted they had obtained the data; there was no dispute about that. The dispute was entirely over whether what 3Taps was doing with the data once they got it was "authorized". how's Craigslist to know just what the heck the data was used for? Because 3Taps admitted what they were using it for. There was no dispute about that either, only about whether that use was authorized. for Craigslist to run around with lawyers and C&D letters attacking Internet users looks like a bummer. Have they been doing that? In this particular case, as I said above, there was no dispute at all about the facts, only about the legal rights involved. I don't see any evidence that Craigslist is indiscriminately banning people and then suing them based on disputed facts; the only dispute I see is over whether Craigslist should be able to assert the rights it's asserting over its data.