

Ask HN: Why wasn't Rapportive ever sued by Google? - aantix

Their plugin replaces the Google Adwords ads with their own content.  Google released a competing widget; why not just sue?  Wouldn't Google have a case for they are directly interfering with their revenue stream? I am interested in creating my own Gmail plugin but would like to know the legalities behind this first.
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staunch
Google couldn't win a lawsuit against a company that sold pieces of cardboard
that fit over a monitor to block ads. Same thing for Rapportive, which doesn't
remove any ads itself, they simply offer users a tool that happens to do that
as part of its functionality.

Also, Google is simply not a very litigious company. They would be much more
likely to engage in a technical game of cat and mouse (e.g. make it hard to
remove the ads) than sue someone.

I wouldn't be worried about creating something like Rapportive. At worst
you're like a company that sells lock picks. The onus is on your customers to
stay within the bounds of the law (or ToS).

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thefahim
Also a possibility: They did not sue because the cost of litigation is more
than the revenue lost from the widget.

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chrisfarms
I think it's actually the "users" of rapportive who are breaking the terms of
service, not rapportive.

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rollypolly
I'm glad Google doesn't apply RIAA-logic, or Rapportive users would be in
trouble.

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rsiqueira
Paul Buchheit (the creator of Gmail) is investor in Rapportive:
<http://angel.co/buchheit/activity/5dG6n>

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ig1
If Google wanted to block Rapportive they could have just done it with code
trivially.

It just didn't bother Google enough for them to do it.

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petervandijck
It's not worth the bad publicity for them.

Also, I suspect they don't make a lot of money of those ads altogether.

