Re: Interesting Twist to BANNER ADVERTISING

From: David McKnight <David_at_McKnight.net>
Date: Wed 19 Jan 2000 08:49:51 -0800

MATT MAGRI WROTE:
> I assume he was saying that there was still a banner
> there and, if it was replacing a rotational ad
> dynamically supplied by an ad network, that the
> original ad was not chosen by the web designer anyway,
> so what's the difference? It's a rationalization, of
> course.

The difference is that while perhaps the person who
designed the page didn't choose the rotational ad, the
copyright owner entered into a contractual agreement
with the advertiser or media company to place a series
of ads in rotation. The HTML is written to pull the ad
into the page per the contract. Modification of the
page to replace that ad with another one violates the
clear intent of the copyright owner. You're right. It's
a rationalization.

> He (Fred) was talking about places that actually filter
> content of webpages based on whatever rules of
> acceptability the site has, so it's apples to apples in
> that regard. There -are- differences, of course, which
> make it a poor example, but I've commented on that in
> another post.

If you are saying the end result is similar (between
blocking spam and filtering content), I don't disagree
with you. But it is NOT apples to apples when you are
talking about the intent of the person on the receiving
end. You didn't ask for the spam -- at all. You did ask
for the page; and even if you don't care to view the
advertising, it is part of the content of the page
served to you. Most schools and libraries block entire
sites they consider objectionable. They don't try to
rebuild the page to make it acceptable. Further, most
library professionals argue that site blocking software
by its very nature is objectionable. I haven't heard
any of them argue in favor of spam.

If you can site a specific court case where it was
found acceptable for a commercial or government body to
strip part of the content of a web site and serve the
balance to a group of users, I'd very much like to see
that reference. I think it might be interesting to
discuss a specific example on the list. But don't tell
me this has been tested in court unless you can show me
the proof.

DAVID MCKNIGHT WROTE:
> In the case of a web page, you go and grab it and all
> that it contains. If it happens to contain advertising,
> by you taking the page you are accepting the
> advertising, again whether or not you consider it
> annoying.

TO WHICH MATT MAGRI RESPONDED:
> This ignores the way that the HTTP protocol works. The
> major web browsers pull down the code, and then go
> through it to identify any other actions that should be
> taken, whether that is running a javascript routine,
> downloading images, running a plugin, whatever. If
> there are other things to download, it can send off
> requests for those items.

You are complicating the issue, Matt, by pulling the
technology into it. The technology is the transport
mechanism by which the created element is delivered. It
is the created element which is protected by copyright.
When we talk about Kinko's refusing to burn 100 copies
of a magazine article, we're not really talking about
the difference between the printing press and a
photocopy machine -- we're talking about Kinko's
refusing to participate in the pirating of the
copyright owner's creative material. It is unnecessary
to complicate the issue by discussing the transport
mechanism.

> The thing is, people can turn off all of that stuff
> right in their web browser's config. It is -not- a
> given that a request for a webpage will grab it and all
> it contains. In fact, there are text-only web browsers,
> like Lynx, that don't do a lot of that stuff -by
> design-. On top of that, there are now a bunch of
> freely-available proxies that folks can set up to block
> certain types of downloads (for example, any urls that
> have the string "/ad_images/" in them, or that are from
> linkexchange.com). What's different in Fred's thought
> experiment is that the ISP would be doing it on an
> ISP-wise basis automagically (IOW, without the custoemr
> having to point their web brower at the ad replacing
> proxy, etc.).

Again, you're complicating the core issue by bringing
in the technology. You may not actually download every
single element called by the HTML, but it is clear what
the HTML was designed to call. Of course people can
turn graphics off. That's why a well designed page will
include alt tags with text descriptions -- and as you
know, that generally includes some text line for a
banner ad. I also believe that as an individual without
profit motive, you are unlikely to have any problem in
stripping content from a web page. I don't think anyone
is going to haul you off to court (well, maybe
McDonald's and Disney would). Once a profit motive
enters the picture, however, you are in jeopardy of a
lawsuit. Take it one step further: you are a commercial
entity receiving money, and in exchange one of the
"free" services you provide is ad blocking (not even
replacement). Because you are doing this as part of a
profit motive, you are likely to have all kinds of
trouble from the companies who aggressively protect
their intellectual property. I'd encourage anyone
considering this to discuss it first with qualified
legal counsel.

> That's the reality of the situation. Convincing Fred
> not to do it at his ISP is nice, but doesn't change the
> fact that there are -already- other places doing it.
> And there will be more, since, unlike the simple
> removal of ads, there's a monetary incentive to replace
> ads with your paid ads.

That's true. I don't disagree that someone will attempt
to do without the copyright owner's approval what Fred
has suggested. They may do it out of misguided
altruism, or because they've made a pact with the
Devil. It doesn't really matter. It doesn't make it
right; and it doesn't make it legal.

> It also doesn't change the fact that advertisers would
> like to have real, geo-targeted ads. I hope that
> legitimate schemes for addressing that will be adopted
> by ad networks and ISPs.

Aha! Here's a point we both agree on!



DAVID

David K. McKnight
TeamMetrx
Groupware That's Simply Addictive

<mailto:David_at_McKnight.net>





Received on Wed Jan 19 2000 - 10:49:51 CST