German tabloid BILD.de hates ad blockers. (In fact in a recent court case their lawyer explained that the main business of the publisher is selling advertising space.)
So they now block their webpage for people who use ad blockers and instead ask them to subscribe to the page if they want no ads. Fair enough.
Shortly after, though, there were many instructions on the webs on how to get around this by e.g. adding new filter commands to ad blockers, because of course.
One guy who had a how-to video on YouTube received a cease and desist letter from the publisher's lawyer, plus a lawyer's fee invoice of EUR 1800.-
The lawyers invoke German copyright law - it's illegal to circumvent effective copy protection measures of protected content, and also illegal to disseminate knowledge on how to do so. Obviously, the law was made with mainly CDs, DVDs or computer games in mind. (I believe other countries have similar laws.)
BILD's lawyers claim that using the adblocker-redirect to a subscription offer is an effective copy protection measure for their online content (and you either have to pay by seeing ads or by paying a fee to BILD).
While I'm not a fan of BILD (and I don't visit their web page), I think they're within their right to not allow people to see their content for free. However, even if copyright law is applicable here, I'm not sure if it can be considered "an effective copy protection" in the sense of the law if a few extra lines can be added to the ad blocker to get around it.
Are there experiences with this in other countries? :unsure:
I would question the "effectiveness" of their paywall if I can circumvent it with an adblocker. I don't alter their original content or their web server configuration by using an ad blocker. I merely change how my computer queries their server and how it processes the received data.
I'm not a lawyer but I like to post.
How do you circumvent effective copy protection measures?
Quote from: The Brain on October 21, 2015, 12:42:04 PM
I'm not a lawyer but I like to post.
How do you circumvent effective copy protection measures?
:lol:
I just had a look at how much ads they have in an article (choosing one about DFB head Niersbach's press conference). The article has ca. 630 words.
Casually scrolling through I see 9 ads that jump out, because they have a different look/feel to the rest of the article. One of them is a video that plays audio when you hover the mouse cursor over it. :bleeding:
Looking more carefully, the number of ads jumps to 15, by having ads between links to other articles that looks similar to those links, but have the word "ANZEIGE" (= advertisement) in a corner.
There are 16 links to actual other articles. However, 4 of them are part of BILD+, meaning you need a 4.99/month subscription.
Example:
(https://languish.org/forums/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fs7.postimg.org%2Fes5t4ktt7%2FBilderstuff.jpg&hash=bfc6d247ebe8c740acee814abacc14e9be91545b)
Top two: articles (though the first one is the one I was looking at ...).
Then two ads. Then a Bild+ story behind a pay wall.
Or at the bottom of the page:
(https://languish.org/forums/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fs29.postimg.org%2F6ljovrerb%2FBilderstuff2.jpg&hash=3dbfd427ca1f65ec40c1946bab46582c105a764a)
Left hand side (More from the Web): ads. Right hand side (More from BILD): articles (with one behind a pay wall).
Their subsription promises "up to 90% fewer ads, and up to 50% less load time." :lol:
In the US this is governed by the DMCA, codified in the US Code as 17 USC 1201-05.
One interesting feature is that it can be illegal to circumvent a copyright protection system even if the underlying work has not been registered for copyright - as long as it is "copyrightable"
This is a tricky area as the case law isn't so well developed and there are various exceptions via rulemaking by the Library of Congress.
I had a meeting earlier today where some folks were bitching about a legal invoicing system we have and how the lawyers don't want to go in to it and do the coding so that their invoices actually get generated properly. I made the joke that lawyers are too busy destroying the world to be bothered with details like being paid correctly. Everyone laughed. I'm awesome. :cool:
Quote from: Caliga on October 22, 2015, 03:24:09 PM
I had a meeting earlier today where some folks were bitching about a legal invoicing system we have and how the lawyers don't want to go in to it and do the coding so that their invoices actually get generated properly. I made the joke that lawyers are too busy destroying the world to be bothered with details like being paid correctly. Everyone laughed. I'm awesome. :cool:
As a lawyer, I take exception to that.
Destroying the world
definitely takes lower priority to being paid correctly. :P
Not all lawyers are Jews though. :)
Quote from: Malthus on October 22, 2015, 05:23:48 PM
As a lawyer, I take exception to that.
Destroying the world definitely takes lower priority to being paid correctly. :P
Not when you're being overpaid. Like lawyers. :contract:
Quote from: Caliga on October 22, 2015, 06:54:57 PM
Not all lawyers are Jews though. :)
We assumed you were talking about
good lawyers.
Quote from: Syt on October 22, 2015, 02:11:54 PM
Their subsription promises "up to 90% fewer ads, and up to 50% less load time." :lol:
This "up to" language you see all the time in ads is a failure of communication. So it could be 10% fewer ads? It could be more ads? I understand they don't want to *guarantee* 90% in case they slip, but surely there must be a better way to say this.
Do you really think lawyers are gonna give out their advice for free?
Quote from: Caliga on October 22, 2015, 06:54:57 PM
Not all lawyers are Jews though. :)
Really? Not so as you'd
notice. ;)
Definitely not all are. For example, when I was a kid there was this store across the street from my house that was run by a dude named Fred Conti. Hardly anyone ever went in there and we were always like "how does that dude stay in business". I used to go there every day after school and buy soda and candy, and half the time Mr. Conti was in the back on the phone speaking Italian when I walked in... he had a little bell on the door so he knew when people came in so he'd know to get off the phone.
Anyway, later we found our Mr. Conti was a mob lawyer and the store was his money laundering front. :)
Quote from: Caliga on October 22, 2015, 03:24:09 PM
I had a meeting earlier today where some folks were bitching about a legal invoicing system we have and how the lawyers don't want to go in to it and do the coding so that their invoices actually get generated properly. I made the joke that lawyers are too busy destroying the world to be bothered with details like being paid correctly. Everyone laughed. I'm awesome. :cool:
While they laughed, did the lawyers exchange meaningful, knowing glances with one another and nodded, and then scribbled something into their notebooks?
Oh, I didn't dare make that comment with any of our lawyers in the room. :lol: After all our CEO and COO are both lawyers. :ph34r:
Quote from: Zanza on October 21, 2015, 11:34:52 AM
I would question the "effectiveness" of their paywall if I can circumvent it with an adblocker. I don't alter their original content or their web server configuration by using an ad blocker. I merely change how my computer queries their server and how it processes the received data.
That's a bit like arguing that you are not breaking and entering into another person's home, if they have a shitty door lock.
Quote from: Martinus on October 25, 2015, 02:07:34 PM
That's a bit like arguing that you are not breaking and entering into another person's home, if they have a shitty door lock.
That analogy makes sense with regards to hacking their server. But adblockers don't do that. They merely interpret the data that a server voluntarily sends a bit different by filtering certain portions out. That happens when the data is already in the memory of the client.
I'm with Marty on this one, and kudos to Marty for his first ever non-super retarded analogy.
The ads are the price you pay for viewing their content. If you don't pay the price you're stealing their property. It's not that different from sneaking into a movie theater or jumping a subway turnstile. In neither of these cases are you putting their property in your pocket and taking it down to the pawn shop to fence, or even damaging it.
Quote from: Martinus on October 25, 2015, 02:07:34 PM
Quote from: Zanza on October 21, 2015, 11:34:52 AM
I would question the "effectiveness" of their paywall if I can circumvent it with an adblocker. I don't alter their original content or their web server configuration by using an ad blocker. I merely change how my computer queries their server and how it processes the received data.
That's a bit like arguing that you are not breaking and entering into another person's home, if they have a shitty door lock.
Wouldn't that require that the law requires "effective" locks for breaking and entering? I don't know German law but I haven't heard about such a requirement.
But it is "effective" in that it stops an average user who is not using special tools from accessing the content. I would in this context interpret "effective" as "working" and not as "state of the art" or "impregnable".
I would say that in this context non-effective would be one that can be circumvented accidentally or without any extra action being needed (in the context of the analogy above, say, someone leaving their door open).
For the record, in most legal systems, breaking and entering does require that the access inside is gained through use of special tools or actions (as opposed to simply walking into someone's open home which can also be a crime but usually one carrying a much more lenient penalty). But even if someone uses a shitty door lock that can be opened with a credit card, doing so would be breaking and entering. The key here is that the owner put an actual (visible) protection against entry and you are intentionally circumventing it.
Hm, in this case it's an ad-blocker that many people use, and video/forum tutorials on how to set them up to avoid such blocks of ad-blocking. The procedure can be done by lay persons within a few minutes without special tools or advanced technical knowledge by following a step by step instruction. (And at least in the beginning it was possible to get around the adblock-block by disabling javascript in Firefox.)
Sounds ineffective to me.
I mean when you use a skeleton key you are also not modifying anything about the lock, no?
Quote from: Syt on October 25, 2015, 05:09:54 PM
Hm, in this case it's an ad-blocker that many people use, and video/forum tutorials on how to set them up to avoid such blocks of ad-blocking. The procedure can be done by lay persons within a few minutes without special tools or advanced technical knowledge by following a step by step instruction. (And at least in the beginning it was possible to get around the adblock-block by disabling javascript in Firefox.)
Sounds ineffective to me.
So imagine that a thief creates a skeleton key to access your home, then creates 10,000 copies of it and mails it, along with your address, to 10,000 people. None of them requires any particular skill to use the skeleton key - it does not mean they can just walk into your home.
And in this story, it's only the guy who created the "skeleton key mailed it to others" who received a lawyer letter. Sounds pretty right to me.
You're playing this analogy to the hilt, I see, despite the problem zanza outlined.
Quote from: Martinus on October 25, 2015, 05:13:39 PM
So imagine that a thief creates a skeleton key to access your home, then creates 10,000 copies of it and mails it, along with your address, to 10,000 people. None of them requires any particular skill to use the skeleton key - it does not mean they can just walk into your home.
:huh:
Quote from: Syt on October 25, 2015, 05:09:54 PM
Hm, in this case it's an ad-blocker that many people use, and video/forum tutorials on how to set them up to avoid such blocks of ad-blocking. The procedure can be done by lay persons within a few minutes without special tools or advanced technical knowledge by following a step by step instruction. (And at least in the beginning it was possible to get around the adblock-block by disabling javascript in Firefox.)
Sounds ineffective to me.
You don't need any special tools or any technical knowledge at all to break into most houses, and most people could do it in a few seconds if they were so inclined.
We're not talking about burglary, though. Bild is arguing that their block is an effective protection in the sense of German copyright law. One criterium for that is how easily or not it can be circumvented. I'm questioning if this is the case if a layperson without specialized tools or hardware can add a few lines to their adblocker to get around it.
I'm not saying that people using such tricks are in the right. If Bild wants to show its content only to subscribers or people viewing ads, then that's ok, and people knowingly going around it are acting in bad faith. I'm mostly not sure if Bild's using the copyright law and its rules against circumventing copy protection is the best way for them to defend against tresspassers.
Quote from: Syt on October 25, 2015, 06:10:30 PM
We're not talking about burglary, though. Bild is arguing that their block is an effective protection in the sense of German copyright law. One criterium for that is how easily or not it can be circumvented. I'm questioning if this is the case if a layperson without specialized tools or hardware can add a few lines to their adblocker to get around it.
I suppose that then it boils down to just how many people know how to add those lines to their adblocker. I'd guess it would be a minority, but I have absolutely no idea what the percentage would be.
Quote from: Martinus on October 25, 2015, 05:04:17 PM
For the record, in most legal systems, breaking and entering does require that the access inside is gained through use of special tools or actions (as opposed to simply walking into someone's open home which can also be a crime but usually one carrying a much more lenient penalty). But even if someone uses a shitty door lock that can be opened with a credit card, doing so would be breaking and entering. The key here is that the owner put an actual (visible) protection against entry and you are intentionally circumventing it.
I'm not convinced that using a different legal situation as an analogy is helpful. Do you want the law to be changed?
If I watch TV and go to the toilet or switch to another channel while they show their ads, do I circumvent their "effective" way to deliver ads and thus don't pay the proper price for their content? What if I use one of those (AFAIK legal) devices that cuts out the ads and watch the show later?
You are not breaking and entering anything - that would be hacking their server. You are merely using "glasses" to view their content as it is delivered to you.
By the way, Bild can and should build a paywall if they think that's the right way to monetize their content. But suggesting that using an adblocker is circumventing an "effective" copy protection is silly.
Quote from: Zanza on October 26, 2015, 02:20:29 AM
By the way, Bild can and should build a paywall if they think that's the right way to monetize their content. But suggesting that using an adblocker is circumventing an "effective" copy protection is silly.
Absolutely agreed. But as they said in a court the other day, selling ads is their primary business concern, not journalism, so ...
Unfortunately Marti is using the wrong analogy - Shocker.
It is a copyright case because copyright includes, it is alleged by the corporation, not to have one's code interfered with. This is a position being forcefully taken in a number of sectors and it will become an even more prevalent issue as the internet of things becomes the norm. The real issue is to what extent can a user change or manipulate code of a product they use to suite their own purposes. If it is left to litigation it seems certain of what the outcome will be because most people making these changes on an individual level cannot afford to fight the ensuing litigation. I think some legislative action is going to be required. But the problem there is educating the politicians to understand this area of tech and why it is important to have the legislative reform.
I'm not even certain what Marty is talking about with "skeleton key". A skeleton key is just a master key. They aren't made for one specific lock.
Can't the sites have a user agreement, and then bring breach of contract civil suits? The state doesn't necessarily have to get more involved than this.
Quote from: The Brain on October 26, 2015, 01:19:15 PM
Can't the sites have a user agreement, and then bring breach of contract civil suits? The state doesn't necessarily have to get more involved than this.
Sure, but the user agreements are essentially contracts of adhesion. The state has always played a role in regulating those sorts of one sided commercial relationships.