For example, do users explicitly consent to myriad shady practices by advertisers and others when using the www simply because they use the www?
Do they "explicitly consent" to all these practices by not objecting?
Can a user "consent" to some practice without knowing it exists? How can she object to it without knowing what "it" is?
Terms of Use only covers the actions of one party. It does not provide assurances that those terms will be upheld by all the third parties that the website is profiting from when it gives those third parties access to the websites visitors.
Opinion: To be adequately informed in order to give "explicit consent", the user would need to see the terms of all the third party ad networks and others who are contracting with the website. Those companies are largely hidden from users. The easiest thing for the user is to just ask not to be subjected to the actions of these third parties.
Every website that opens its users up to an astounding number of third party servers1 can and likely will disclaim any liability from the actions of third parties.2
As others have stated, dealing with this problem on the client side is the viable alternative.3
1 Others have posted casual studies to HN of developers/users observing how many DNS requests or connections are made to third party servers for the "average" website by users with the popular browsers that automatically request resources. I leave it to the astute HN reader to find the web citations.
2 Random example of website terms: "FACEBOOK IS NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR THE ACTIONS, CONTENT, INFORMATION, OR DATA OF THIRD PARTIES, AND YOU RELEASE US, OUR DIRECTORS, OFFICERS, EMPLOYEES, AND AGENTS FROM ANY CLAIMS AND DAMAGES, KNOWN AND UNKNOWN, ARISING OUT OF OR IN ANY WAY CONNECTED WITH ANY CLAIM YOU HAVE AGAINST ANY SUCH THIRD PARTIES."
3 Block access of third parties via client software. The counteraction by the advertisers will be to try to control the client software. Choice of software is important. If the authors of the software earn their quid from advertisers, then what happens? Users may succeed in stopping websites from selling them out, but they also muct succeed in stopping the software they use from selling them out in less obvious ways.
For example, do users explicitly consent to myriad shady practices by advertisers and others when using the www simply because they use the www?
Do they "explicitly consent" to all these practices by not objecting?
Can a user "consent" to some practice without knowing it exists? How can she object to it without knowing what "it" is?
Terms of Use only covers the actions of one party. It does not provide assurances that those terms will be upheld by all the third parties that the website is profiting from when it gives those third parties access to the websites visitors.
Opinion: To be adequately informed in order to give "explicit consent", the user would need to see the terms of all the third party ad networks and others who are contracting with the website. Those companies are largely hidden from users. The easiest thing for the user is to just ask not to be subjected to the actions of these third parties.
Every website that opens its users up to an astounding number of third party servers1 can and likely will disclaim any liability from the actions of third parties.2
As others have stated, dealing with this problem on the client side is the viable alternative.3
1 Others have posted casual studies to HN of developers/users observing how many DNS requests or connections are made to third party servers for the "average" website by users with the popular browsers that automatically request resources. I leave it to the astute HN reader to find the web citations.
2 Random example of website terms: "FACEBOOK IS NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR THE ACTIONS, CONTENT, INFORMATION, OR DATA OF THIRD PARTIES, AND YOU RELEASE US, OUR DIRECTORS, OFFICERS, EMPLOYEES, AND AGENTS FROM ANY CLAIMS AND DAMAGES, KNOWN AND UNKNOWN, ARISING OUT OF OR IN ANY WAY CONNECTED WITH ANY CLAIM YOU HAVE AGAINST ANY SUCH THIRD PARTIES."
3 Block access of third parties via client software. The counteraction by the advertisers will be to try to control the client software. Choice of software is important. If the authors of the software earn their quid from advertisers, then what happens? Users may succeed in stopping websites from selling them out, but they also muct succeed in stopping the software they use from selling them out in less obvious ways.