242 DEAR HACKER

242 DEAR HACKER

Dear 2600: In 16:3, page 51, you respond to SpeedDRaven about removal of ban-

ner ads from various free web page provider services. I think you’re wrong in saying that it’s not stealing because removal of the messages is the same as fast forwarding over commercials. Rather, in placing a web page with one of these services, you’re entering into a contract that is more similar to the TV station that sells advertising. In order to pay for their costs (and make money, of course), they sell advertising time. The TV station doesn’t ensure that everyone watching their programs will see the advertisements, but they do faithfully broadcast them. Removing Geocities banner ads, no matter how detestable you find them, is the same as if the TV station decided not to play a commercial that an advertiser had paid for—it’s a breach of contract.

On the other hand, there’s great software packages like junkbuster ( www.junkbuster.org ) that will remove ads from the client before your browser ever fetches them. This is the proper action to take if you don’t like seeing the ads. If you don’t like that ads will be on your site, then you should put your web pages at an address that doesn’t require this as part of the contract.

Normally I find 2600 to be morally correct, even when the screwiness of the legal system says that the actions they are endorsing are illegal.

I hope that this was an oversight—it’s a big world out there.

orn This is another instance of corporate logic trying to gain a foothold on individuals.

We are not advertising vessels. While they have the right to remove the pages of those who don’t follow their rules, it goes against human nature to expect people not to try and get around them. It should be noted that many people would have stopped going to Geocities pages altogether were it not for the people who man- aged to keep their annoying ads from popping up.

Dear 2600: This can’t be happening. Eight corporations have united to shut down

2600 once and for all. We have no rights anymore, so you will probably

T H E M A G I C O F T H E C O R P O R AT E W O R L D

lose as the judges are on the side of the big guys, but be assured that hackers everywhere will keep up the fight. What’s next? Will there be

a list of government (i.e., corporate) approved websites that we have to look at? If you look at a nonapproved website, will the FBI drag you away and have you executed? Will we only be able to perform govern- ment approved actions with computers? It’s getting apparent that the big guys want total power, nothing less. They want to control your lives like Pol Pot controlled the lives of Cambodians. The only consolation is that America will probably have a civil war, break up, and become about as stable as Russia. Starving to death amid ruins is not an entic- ing idea, but we can laugh at the corporations who will have to lie in the bed they made. How can I help before I too “disappear” one day and am never seen again? Oh yeah, I’ve decided it’s too dangerous to use my old handle and real email address, so I set up this one.

Mr. Roboto The best way to help is to get the word out to the many millions who only know

what they’ve seen in the mass media. That means virtually anyone you talk to will learn something from you.

Dear 2600: What exactly is the argument? When you buy a DVD (or anything

else for that matter), it’s yours. Therefore, you should be able to do whatever you please with it. You should be able to watch it on a com- puter or see a European DVD on an American player. Why is it that you are being sued for helping people do this?

steve n az (heretic /pogo)

It’s a very good question. The short answer is that they’re trying to change the rules. When you buy something, they want you to be merely buying a license to use it as they decree you should. That means you would have to accept all kinds of conditions, like not having the ability to skip over commercials. (If you figured out a way to do this, you would be in violation of the contract and subject to what we’re facing.) What’s interesting is that the MPAA and the film studios had to deceive