on 08 Feb 2003, [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Henning m�ller-Nielsen) spake thusly: > I do not believe that is the point entirely, and have to agree with > Jan Dubois here: eurotv.com has made the information available for use > in user controlled browsers and they asking, however impolitely, that > we refrain from screenscraping their information. > > As good Internet citizens we should then not do it.
Disagree. As a good citizen of the world, one should feel free to scrape the information FOR ONESELF. The point is the distribution of said gathered materials. When corporations extend their control to this point, then the right to a vital information ecology is threatened. Look at CDs and MP3s and the current battles surrounding that. Should I have the ability to make MP3 tracks out of my CDs? The answer is a resounding yes. Should I be able to ditribute these to my friends or the public? The answer is a resounding no. Should the fact that the second happens mean that control over what I do with information that is given to me should be circumscribed by the media corporations? That is the question, and I answer with a loud No. There is nothing wrong with screen scraping itself, and certainly nothing wrong with writing modules which facilitate that task. The problem comes when content is repurposed and redistributed, which is clearly a wrong. My own internet "Start" page that I created scrapes from a bunch of sites, some through supported feeds, some not. I should retain this ability. To make this available to the public on my site would be the real problem. chris
