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Banning people using an API doesn't sound very free market

The ideas of "Free market" evolved before EULA type bullshit did, I don't think original creators of the idea would approve of them.



"If you're going to be an asshole to my customers, gtfo of my bar" predates the concept of an EULA, and IMO, the freedom of association is a necessary component of a free market.


To the contrary -- the "free" in "free market" refers to freedom. So if a service wants to ban a user, then that's pretty much the definition of a free market.

Similarly, a user is free to try to get around the ban by using a different IP address, etc.

Both sides here would be free to do what they want without the law taking sides. But at a technical level, because anti-scraping measures aren't that hard to defeat, it means that users and competitors will be the primary beneficiaries here.


So I am ok to use my 'freedom' and pay someone to cut your supply of cement, so that you can't compete with me in construction? Where is the boundary between 'free market' and narket manipulation, and how do you prove the latter?

This happens all the time, Intel, paid computer manufacturers not to use AMD chips.

As for the bans and circumvention idea - I would like a stable and reliable system that's guaranteed to work, not a constant game of cat and mouse.


> I would like a stable and reliable system that's guaranteed to work, not a constant game of cat and mouse.

I'd love if the internet wasn't a neverending cat and mouse game... but what about spam?




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