| > Entering into a contract in bad faith or breaching a contract is both a legal and moral issue. I believe it is a moral issue, but depending on whether it's a legal contract, or observed legally, I'm not sure it's a legal issue (not sure as in don't know the specifics of contract law and what is considered a contract). > When the terms of a contract are repulsive to me, I have no moral problem breaking them or lying about my intentions. I have no problem breaking a contract where it's been misrepresented to me. But when the terms are up-front and clear, but I don't believe they are fair, I don't believe I have a right to enter into that contract with the intention of breaking it. What's worse, trying to get someone to sign a contract with (up-front but) unfair terms, or lying about your intention to fulfill your side? Does it matter which is worse, if they are both bad? > The second thing is ownership of the property that's used to view the content. The argument here is that since it's my computer, I can control what my computer displays to me. I know that you have the copyright on the content and the ads, but copyright doesn't stop me from doing what I want with my own private copy so long as I don't distribute it. I'm not trying to make a case about having to display content, I'm trying to make a case about obligation to display content when you want to display other content. The medium is irrelevant. I would make the same case with paper. Having an assistant cut out the ads from a magazine (or removing and reprinting without them) before presenting it to you is equivalent in my eyes, and the same problem. The magazine is clearly offered with the advertisements as part of the package, to offset what would be the true consumer cost. That you are capable of having someone take scissors to it is not the issue; whether that breaks an implicit or explicit agreement based on the purchase of the magazine would be (and in this specific case the magazine would have a foreword saying it should not be altered from the form it was presented in, as that was part of the purchase price). > So in the end, if you distribute content to me without verifying that I've viewed the ads first, you're putting yourself at risk for breach of contract on my part, and since I find ads repulsive it's a really high risk because it's my computer and I'm going to program it the way I want. Every contract entered requiring something from both parties puts at least one party at risk the other will breach, and sometimes both are at risk. The other party putting themself at risk is not a justification for breaching the contract in itself, otherwise libraries would have a very hard time functioning. Again, this line of reasoning only even makes sense if you believe there is a contract. If you do, then you either accept it or you don't, and you either fulfill your side or you don't. I know what I believe are the right choices of those available (where "right" means society perpetuating, not society breaking, when extended to all people). |
I don't think you can argue the terms of ads on the web are upfront and clear. It takes serious reading to learn about all the different methods they use to track you now. They often give people malware. Is that part of this inherent "contract"?
> I'm not trying to make a case about having to display content, I'm trying to make a case about obligation to display content when you want to display other content. The medium is irrelevant. I would make the same case with paper. Having an assistant cut out the ads from a magazine (or removing and reprinting without them) before presenting it to you is equivalent in my eyes, and the same problem.
So you're saying that even though I paid for the magazine, I own the magazine and can do what I want with it, I don't have a right to use the paper it's made of as I please? Sorry, but that's utterly ridiculous. And I think most people would find it so too.
It'd be different if I borrowed the magazine, but since I own it I'd say it's fully within my right to cut out ads, chop it in half, fold it into planes, use it as toilet paper, what have you. That's my right as an owner of the magazine.