https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tortious_interference
This would mostly mean that you cannot start interfering with webscraping you previously allowed merely because you learned that they're making money with the scraped data.
This would mostly mean that you cannot start interfering with webscraping you previously allowed merely because you learned that they're making money with the scraped data.
It does, in the US. You're likely making an inconsistent comparison.
Property ownership has nothing to do with visual access. You cannot legally be barred from casually (involuntarily) perceiving something. It's reasonable to put up physical barriers to reduce what is casually perceived. It's a very good analogy.
It's also not a great analogy for this case because another party is given continued easy access to view my backyard while the first party is denied - and the analogy breaks down here because, as a neighbor, I have no inherent right to view your private life at least as much as any of your other neighbors.
Try building that fence into the stratosphere. A regulatory body will prevent that.
> I have no inherent right to view your private life at least as much as any of your other neighbors.
That's a different analogy, not a violation of the first.
It's not necessary for every part of the analogy to hold, being an analogy.
Or perhaps slightly less contrived:
If I publish a monthly lowlights reel of my favourite sports team as a podcast discussion on where they can improve in all their lost games, and then they suddenly go on a winning streak for >1month so my USP is gone and I have nothing to talk about..?
In this case, it was rules that the public data is available. It was a good faith contract on the part of HiQ to assume they could collect public data from a public website.
It would not be a good faith contract to assume you could control the paint colors on a property you don't own.
It seems to me that the interference ruling was wholly independent on deciding that what hiq was doing is legal.
If the question is could someone win, potentially. The argument would basically have to be that the removal of that open source project is akin to other cases of negligent interference.
If this is a specific concern, consult a lawyer - 'cause I'm not one.
Maybe if leftpad somehow tried to block only some users from using their publically available plugin.
How far does this go?