
Now we’re not even allowed to link to the Olympics website? - ColinWright
http://blog.indexoncensorship.org/2012/07/13/london-2012-olympics-fails-internet/
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andymoe
Good. Don't link to them. Don't watch them. I care less and less about the
Olympics every year. It's no longer about the competition if it ever was.

~~~
bluepostit
I agree, I stopped to care during the last winter Olympic in Vancouver.

~~~
zem
i stopped caring in the late 80s, when it was already clear that media rights
were being treated as more important than the actual sports. things have only
gotten worse since then.

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ComputerGuru
I'm pretty sure as far as the law is concerned, they can go screw themselves
silly. Linking to them, even with the most insidious and nasty terms, is 100%
fair use and legal. If it weren't, you can bet things like the Santorum google
bomb would have been stopped in court years ago.

~~~
cstross
You're American, aren't you?

Hint: "fair use" isn't a valid construct under British copyright law; we have
a more restrictive "fair dealing" right. Nor does your First Amendment carry
any weight in British law. There's a somewhat weaker right to free speech in
the Human Rights Act, but it's somewhat hedged around; meanwhile the whole
Olympics mess was enabled by an Act of Parliament that pretty much blows a
hole through our (I'm British) civil rights in the name of holding this
corruption-fest at our public expense. It's quite possible that LOCOG _can_
make this nonsense stick, in court, thanks to the perversion of our legal
framework that they pushed for and two successive governments connived at.

(I am not a fan of the Olympics 2012 arrangements ...)

~~~
DanBC
Here's some further reference to the UK laws:

(<http://www.out-law.com/page-9441>)

(<http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2012/apr/13/olympics-2012-br...>)

> _As well as introducing an additional layer of protection around the word
> "Olympics", the five-rings symbol and the Games' mottoes, the major change
> of the legislation is to outlaw unauthorised "association". This bars non-
> sponsors from employing images or wording that might suggest too close a
> link with the Games._

(<http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/olympics/the-olympic-law-...>)

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eridius
The more I read about the London 2012 olympics, the more I never want to set
foot in the UK. Which is a real shame because I've always wanted to visit, but
it just feels like they're trampling all over basic freedoms to an extent
that, to me as an American, is just utterly shocking.

~~~
srean
> to me as an American, is just utterly shocking

Thats a rather ironic claim to make

~~~
eridius
I realize that. And one of the reasons I look at the UK is because of the
behavior of my country in the past decade. But some of the freedoms that the
UK is trampling on just seem so fundamental to me despite what my own country
is doing.

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vasco
This brings back the doubts I always had about ToS's. How do you even know
what is enforceable and by what laws. I can be in country A using a website by
a company with headquarters in country B, making a request to a bunch of
servers in countries C & D. What about putting silly things on ToS's like "you
need to drop your pants while using the service" and similar?

What about content on other websites? Do I need to comply to Facebook's terms
if a website has an iframe with a like button?

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ewest
The ToS could be open to interpretation...

It's possible the ToS may be saying the link text itself should be nice, etc.

So you could say something like, "The Olympics games are [insert your term
here]", use the link text "Olympics" and you could be in the clear.

Use some derogatory text in place of [insert your term here], resulting in a
visit by the link police who will extradite you for a long 'vacation' to some
island in the northern Caribbean Sea.

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uvdiv
I think `indexoncensorship.org' just violated these ToS, since they linked to
the Olympics' ToS in a "derogatory... manner" (they criticized the contents).

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dt7
Are terms of use legally binding? Do the Twitter guidelines (don't rotate the
bird etc.) count as terms of use?

What is the worst that could happen here? The organisation behind the Olympics
sending a letter to a site owner requesting they remove the link? And what
would happen if they refused?

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stevewillows
When the Olympics were in Vancouver they tried to shut out a Greek restaurant
with 'Olympic' in the name. To me it reads the same -- they don't want People
using anything that might trick people into thinking the Olympics has
partnered with a company, restaurant or blog.

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patrickg
Which (western) countries would make such a link statement effective? I am
pretty sure that here in Germany no sensible court would rule in favor of such
a "don't link" rule.

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jstalin
Anyone can write a terms of service that says "if you link to my site, you
agree to pay me US$1,000,000."

Enforcing it is another thing.

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toemetoch
Part of me wishes this is reverse psychology. The rest of me hopes nobody will
fall for it.

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rprasad
This is a _British_ law. Everyone else in the world can link away.

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davidmp
Their terms are pretty straightforward. You're not allowed to use their logo
in links, since that implies a false association. There's nothing new or
broken here.

You can link with text as much as you want.

~~~
tylermenezes
I'm so sick of people like you on HN. Open the link, look for a tiny snippet
of text which looks like it's contrary to what the submitter's point is, and
then bash them in the comments.

> no such link shall portray us or any other official London 2012
> organisations (or our or their activities, products or services) in a false,
> misleading, derogatory or otherwise objectionable manner

~~~
rprasad
Davidmp must have edited his comment, because your comment is far worse than
his--you make a personal attack against him and provide a citation that is
just as selective as his.

~~~
CodeMage
"Personal attack", as you put it, would be worse only if it was ad hominem,
which it wasn't.

As you can see, davidmp's comment claims that "You can link with text as much
as you want." The "selective" quote by tylermenezes is the smallest quote
sufficient to prove false davidmp's claim.

By reading other comments, you can also see that several other readers called
davidmp out on the exact same behavior as tylermenezes did and used more or
less the same quote.

