I am genuinely concerned about this because Legal Eagle’s suit is directly tied to manipulating URLs and cookies. The suit, even with its focus on last click attribution, doesn’t make an incredibly specific argument. If Legal Eagle wins, this sets a very dangerous precedent for ad blockers being illegal because ad blockers directly manipulate cookies and URLs. I haven’t read the Gamer’s Nexus one yet.
Please note that I’m not trying to defend Honey at all. They’re actively misleading folks.
If one of the core harms is the removal of income and tracking, ad blockers fall into this category. Ad blockers very explicitly remove these things. The harm is not “Honey stole my income” it’s “Honey removed my tracking and Honey added their tracking.” Read the Legal Eagle case.
It could never apply to ad blockers. You install an ad blocker knowing that it will block stuff… and explicitly WANTING it to do so.
Nobody installed honey knowing that it was manipulating cookies and stuff. The normal layperson who installs it will just think “It’s just chucking in coupon codes into that box!”…
One is predicated on a lie of omission… the other is literally what the user wants. There’s a huge difference…
You’re looking at it from an end user perspective. “I want it to do this, so it’s ok” for an ad blocker, but “I didn’t know it was doing this so it’s bad” for Honey.
But the LE/GN cases are that Honey changed URLs and cost them the sale revenue, no? That’s not the end user experience. Seems like that could easily be pivoted to a website who claims lost revenue was stolen from them because ad blockers are manipulating their site/URLs, end users’ desires be damned.
a. Nationwide Class: All persons and entities in the United States who participated in an affiliate commission program with a United States eCommerce merchant and had commissions diverted to PayPal as a result of Honey.
So yes, they’re suing on behalf of creators.
But they’re using logic of what is promised/advertised to users… alongside the creator side of it all.
Consumers download the PayPal Honey browser extension under the promise that Honey will search the web for the best coupons to ensure consumers pay the lowest prices when checking out with eCommerce merchants […] After this affiliate network partnership is established, on information and belief, Honey deliberately withholds higher-value coupons, directly contradicting Honey’s promise to consumers.
Which we know is inaccurate at this point and honey is lying. Most of the rest will come out in discovery if Honey wants to fight it. And I think it’s safe to say that anything that comes out in discovery will simply hang honey even more than we already know.
I am genuinely concerned about this because Legal Eagle’s suit is directly tied to manipulating URLs and cookies. The suit, even with its focus on last click attribution, doesn’t make an incredibly specific argument. If Legal Eagle wins, this sets a very dangerous precedent for ad blockers being illegal because ad blockers directly manipulate cookies and URLs. I haven’t read the Gamer’s Nexus one yet.
Please note that I’m not trying to defend Honey at all. They’re actively misleading folks.
That’s like saying bank robberies being illegal mean that going to the bank is illegal.
Honey is unlawful because of what they DO by changing those URLs and cookies, e.g enriching themselves at the expense of creators.
Your analogy doesn’t work at all.
If one of the core harms is the removal of income and tracking, ad blockers fall into this category. Ad blockers very explicitly remove these things. The harm is not “Honey stole my income” it’s “Honey removed my tracking and Honey added their tracking.” Read the Legal Eagle case.
I have read the case.
I don’t enrich myself by using an adblocker. And I certainly don’t enrich myself at other’s expense.
The key point they were making is that uBO isn’t adding their own affiliate links and stealing revenue they haven’t earned, unlike Paypal.
But adblockers don’t enable unlawful enrichment. Or do they?
Only paid ones. Theoretically could impact Brave, for instance.
It could never apply to ad blockers. You install an ad blocker knowing that it will block stuff… and explicitly WANTING it to do so.
Nobody installed honey knowing that it was manipulating cookies and stuff. The normal layperson who installs it will just think “It’s just chucking in coupon codes into that box!”…
One is predicated on a lie of omission… the other is literally what the user wants. There’s a huge difference…
I mean it certainly could if it was deemed so broad as “Honey was manipulating affiliate links”, but I don’t think it would.
You’re looking at it from an end user perspective. “I want it to do this, so it’s ok” for an ad blocker, but “I didn’t know it was doing this so it’s bad” for Honey.
But the LE/GN cases are that Honey changed URLs and cost them the sale revenue, no? That’s not the end user experience. Seems like that could easily be pivoted to a website who claims lost revenue was stolen from them because ad blockers are manipulating their site/URLs, end users’ desires be damned.
https://www.cpmlegal.com/assets/htmldocuments/GamersNexus v. Paypal.pdf
So yes, they’re suing on behalf of creators.
But they’re using logic of what is promised/advertised to users… alongside the creator side of it all.
Which we know is inaccurate at this point and honey is lying. Most of the rest will come out in discovery if Honey wants to fight it. And I think it’s safe to say that anything that comes out in discovery will simply hang honey even more than we already know.