Researcher wants legal assurances before releasing his Unfollow Everything tool.
Highlights:
Krishnan told Ars that “Meta is trying to have it both ways, but its assertion that Unfollow Everything 2.0 would violate its terms effectively concedes that Zuckerman faces what the company says he does not—a real threat of legal action.”
For users wanting to take a break from endless scrolling, it could potentially meaningfully impact mental health—eliminating temptation to scroll content they did not choose to see, while allowing them to remain connected to their networks and still able to visit individual pages to access content they want to see.
According to Meta, its terms of use prohibit automated access to users’ personal information not just by third parties but by individual users, as a means of protecting user privacy. Meta urged the court to reject Zuckerman’s claim that Meta’s terms violate California privacy laws by making it hard for users to control their data. Instead, Meta said the court should agree with a prior court that “rejected the argument that California law ‘espous[es] a principle of user control of data sufficient to invalidate’ Facebook’s prohibition on automated access.”
This whole thing seems so weird. Why is Meta using the courts to enforce their ToS, anyway? Theoretically, the penalty for a user violating Meta’s terms would be Meta closing that user’s account. Unless the lawsuits are just frivolous scare tactics intended to drain the defendant’s resources…
You are not logged in. However you can subscribe from another Fediverse account, for example Lemmy or Mastodon. To do this, paste the following into the search field of your instance: !technology@beehaw.org
A nice place to discuss rumors, happenings, innovations, and challenges in the technology sphere. We also welcome discussions on the intersections of technology and society. If it’s technological news or discussion of technology, it probably belongs here.
Remember the overriding ethos on Beehaw: Be(e) Nice. Each user you encounter here is a person, and should be treated with kindness (even if they’re wrong, or use a Linux distro you don’t like). Personal attacks will not be tolerated.
This whole thing seems so weird. Why is Meta using the courts to enforce their ToS, anyway? Theoretically, the penalty for a user violating Meta’s terms would be Meta closing that user’s account. Unless the lawsuits are just frivolous scare tactics intended to drain the defendant’s resources…
Closing accounts also means losing users. If the number is high enough, they want enforcement rather than banning.
It’s always profits in the end.