[twblalock]

It doesn't really make a difference, because when housing companies use Facebook's targeting options it is still Facebook who accepts the ad and publishes it on facebook.com.

If you do something illegal because someone asked you to do it, it's still illegal.

[vt_throwaway123]

The problem with this reasoning is that assuming the content of the ad is not discriminatory, delivering the ad to some subset of your audience is highly unlikely to be illegal. For example, if you're a publisher that owns two magazines, one of which is popular among blacks and another is popular among whites, I don't think it's still illegal to publish ads on one but not the other, again, provided that the ad itself does not have illegal contents. The onus must be on the advertiser because the full extent of the targeting for the given campaign is not knowable for the publisher. Maybe the advertiser wants to reach men on one publisher and women on another publisher, this isn't something any given publisher can fully determine. Given how advertising works and has worked in the past, it's unlikely that any law would put the responsibility on a publisher for an entire campaign to be free of illegal discrimination on the basis of an audience it reaches.

[sjg007]

In this case the targeting of the ad is discriminatory and illegal. That is the context of the ad which is just as important as the content.

[fjsolwmv]

It's not obvious to me. If I photocopy an ilegal ad at Kinko's, is it Kinko's fault? If I send an illegal ad via first class mail, is it USPS's fault?

[thisiszilff]

I don't think it's the ad, per say, but the agreement for delivery. It's be like you sending housing ads and asking USPS to only deliver them to men. USPS would probably be on the hook then as well.

Back to your point though, it is a new domain because with your paper examples there is no one who can "undo" the illegal ad. You copy it at Kinko's and it's not like Kinko's is out there delivering it with you. With online platforms, they both Target and deliver these ads and are responsible for continually delivering them.

[Broken_Hippo]

Sometimes. They sold it to you.

Example: I worked at a pharmacy with the self-serve digital photo services. A customer brought in a CD and made christmas cards from a family picture.

It turns out the picture was taken by a local photographer the customer had hired. The pharmacy I worked at got the legal notice. Supposedly, we were partly to blame since we profited off of the cards the customer printed. Nevermind the fact that we didn't generally check the customer's pictures, nor could we actually have guessed these were professional vs a good picture.

The customer cropped out the identifying marks. We had all seen pictures that looked professional, both in digital and film form. It seems none of that mattered. It wouldn't be Kinko's fault that you photocopy an illegal ad, but they can be party to the fault by allowing it to be sold.

Now, the USPS probably has completely different laws protecting it. I'm going to guess it is more likely that they try to get you for mail fraud rather than actually hold the USPS responsible.

[SOLAR_FIELDS]

If you get photos printed at Walmart (or at least when I tried a few years ago) they make you either sign an indemnification agreement or refuse to print the photos. I remember one issue in particular - my wife had purchased some logos/prints online from someone on Etsy for a friend's baby shower. They still had the watermark on them and Walmart refused to print them without a signed release from the original artist.

[Broken_Hippo]

That's common on the software from the companies producing the machines (we had it too), and isn't quite enough.

It is pretty ridiculous in these cases, honestly. This particular picture didn't have a "photographer's studio" setup - it was an outdoor picture with the family around a long, metal farm gate and the photographer sold the customer the CD. There wasn't much the store could do to prevent this, and we had to start physically checking a lot of pictures at that store.

[eahman00]

>a pharmacy with the self-serve digital photo services

...Why does a pharmacy print photographies? I've never heard of a pharmacy selling something that isn't drugs.

[Zarel]

In the US and many other countries (I can confirm this is true for Japan), pharmacies are also convenience stores, and sell many other things besides drugs.

https://www.cvs.com/

For instance, here's a US pharmacy chain – notice it mentions photos on the home page.

[EliRivers]

I did once hear that part of it is historical. That in some places, many years ago, because photo developing was a much more manual process using more primitive means, and given that pharmacists of the time were used to handling and storing chemicals, and carefully following chemical processes and so on, that there was a natural link between the two. This would be back before the time of posting your film to Snappy Snaps, or there being a centralised photo-developing laboratory with an associated chain of collection huts that simply acted as the interface to the public. Once an association is created - exposed film goes to the pharmacy to be developed - it tends to linger.

However, I've not been able to find any evidence of this. It could just be a just-so story.

[rmc]

It's very common in UK for pharmacies to print digital photos (and in the past, develop films). German drug stores also have this service.

[jahewson]

What a dumb question. No, of course it’s not.

If you ask USPS to display your illegal ad in their window then it certainly is their fault. That would be an actually comparable situation here.

[mirimir]

Well, there was a criminal case against FedEx for delivering illegal prescriptions from Internet drug stores. But it got tossed.

[fit2rule]

Is FedEx marketing itself to drug distributors as a way to filter out the chaff and get straight to the drug users of highest value?

I think not.