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Comment by devcpp | Hacker News Reader

I have always considered websites to be comparable to public shops. Any "client" can enter and profit from a "[web] service" given by a "server", so it seems much more fitting than a private house or office, which would be comparable to the backend, itself off limits in most cases.

And in most cases, in the areas I've lived in, you have no right to refuse service to "certain people". So, yes, this seems just as bad as a baker who would refuse a certain subset of people from even entering his shop.

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Just about any store in the USA can ban customers for non-discriminatory reasons. For example, if you go to a restaurant, start swearing at the servers, throwing your food, and misbehaving, you'll quickly find yourself banned from the location.

I think it varies by state, but as long as the banning isn't because you're part of a protected class[1], a private establishment can refuse service for any reason it sees fit, including none at all.

[1]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protected_class

Ah, yes, that's what I meant by most cases. If you establish rules that do not discard a class of the population, then it's very much acceptable to reject those who infringe them, in my opinion.

In any case, I was just correcting your analogy, not your premise.

Right, and banning a customer from a store is equivalent to a computer denying a request from a remote client. But in this case, the computer didn't deny the request.

No, banning a customer is almost exactly equivalent to sending the sort of C&D letter that Craigslist sent. I'm banned from Walmart for life, and was asked to sign a trespass warning explaining that if I'm found on Walmart property, I'll be charged with trespassing. That's Walmart's right.

Just because the door is open doesn't mean that everyone is welcome to go through it. The same holds true for websites just as it holds true for grocery stores.

In the U.S. you do have the right to arbitrarily refuse service, except on the basis of certain specific classifications: race, religion, ethnicity, etc. Nothing keeps me from closing my shop to people named Joe, people below 5'8", people who like Battlestar Galactica, etc.

The way that works is that someone entering a public shop has implied license to be on the property. But that implied license can be explicitly revoked to exclude specific people.

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