Re: How to force a page to be into a frame?

On Sun, 09 Oct 2005 12:48:07 -0700, David Ross <nobody@xxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:

>Stephen Poley wrote [in part]:
>>
>> Being able to link directly to any page of a site is an intrinsic part
>> of the concept of the World Wide Web. In my opinion, suggesting that
>> someone needs permission to link to a page is as ridiculous as
>> suggesting that someone needs permission to reference a particular page
>> of a book.
>>
>> Sadly however there are a few benighted companies who think that
>> everyone who visits their site should come through their main entry page
>> - the one with the advertisements on it. There have been some court
>> cases on this, and I believe there have even been one or two
>> ill-informed judges who have ruled against so-called "deep linking".
>> However it is possible that in some of these cases the linker was in
>> fact framing the other site - I haven't tried to disentangle all the
>> rights and wrongs. As more judges themselves start to use computers, the
>> risks of silly rulings on this point are diminishing.
>
>Copyright law gives me control over the dissemination of what I
>created.

Within certain limits, yes. But you do not have the rights to determine
whether other people refer to your material or not.

> Web hosts do indeed block access or even delete Web pages
>that link to other pages in violation of the copyrights on those
>latter pages.

Then they are being silly. But web hosts are not known for understanding
copyright law. There was a test carried out in Holland recently when
someone wrote to about ten different hosts demanding that they remove
copyrighted material. The material was out of copyright, and the
briefest check would have shown it was out of copyright (it was from a
fairly well-known and long-dead author). Horrifyingly, the majority
removed the material without any checks whatever - without even asking
the writer to show that he had any rights in the matter or the
page-author what he thought about it.

>This is not merely a commercial issue restricted to "a few
>benighted companies". I have seen copyright notices specifically
>denying permission to link other than to top-level pages within a
>Web site.

Well, maybe it's a lot of benighted companies then.

>The real issue is that I put time and effort into creating my
>pages. I own them. Thus, I have the right to control them.

But you do *not* have the right to control someone else's reference to
them.

Do you really suppose that if Fred Bloggs publishes a book, he can
prohibit someone else from writing "Fred Bloggs describes widget
manufacture on page 38 of his book 'All About Widgets'"?

Whether the reference to your site takes the form of some text "David
Ross has written on subject X" or the form of an explicit hyperlink
*should* make no difference - in both cases it is just a reference to
your site - though as I mentioned earlier, it appears that some judges
may not understand that point.


> My
>own copyright notice grants permission to link to any of my pages
>-- PROVIDING you do not do so in a manner that displays my pages
>within your frame. When you display one of my pages within your
>frame, you create the false impression that my work is actually
>part of yours, that you now control my property.

Yes, that is a different matter and I'm inclined to agree with you. Will
you be taking legal action against Google?

--
Stephen Poley

http://www.xs4all.nl/~sbpoley/webmatters/
.