> you can't broadcast facts into the public and expect people not to recall them
That's a straw man, that is not the issue here. LinkedIn is not recalling the data, they asked to stop HiQ from scraping and collating their data and using it for their own business.
This is already in the EULA, so what HiQ is doing may already be breaking the law.
8.2 Don'ts You agree that you will not:
k. Develop, support or use software, devices, scripts, robots, or any other means or processes (including crawlers, browser plugins and add-ons, or any other technology or manual work) to scrape the Services or otherwise copy profiles and other data from the Services;
m. Copy, use, disclose or distribute any information obtained from the Services, whether directly or through third parties (such as search engines), without the consent of LinkedIn;
ae. Use bots or other automated methods to access the Services, add or download contacts, send or redirect messages;
> LinkedIn is not recalling the data, they asked to stop HiQ from scraping and collating their data and using it for their own business.
It's not LinkedIn's right to tell me how to use facts. Just like I can't make LinkedIn liable for my EULA. It doesn't constitute an actual legal agreement.
That said I think the judge is wrong that LI should remove barriers from accessing the information. Information is speech. To mandate information be suppressed or produced is less than ideal.
> It's not LinkedIn's right to tell me how to use facts.
Yes, you're right about that. But it is LinkedIn's right to tell you how to use their service. Lots of people ignore what they say, and they might not be able to sue someone who breaks their rules, but they can state the rules.
They said they don't want bots scraping their site, and that's their right. They wrote software to detect specific bots & IPs, and refuse service. That's also their right, in my opinion.
Sites who want to use LinkedIn's database are free to collect their own facts instead. I don't know if this is what you were suggesting, but LinkedIn's refusal to serve HiQ's bots is not suppressing any speech, in my view.
> That said I think the judge is wrong that LI should remove barriers from accessing the information.
That's a straw man, that is not the issue here. LinkedIn is not recalling the data, they asked to stop HiQ from scraping and collating their data and using it for their own business.
This is already in the EULA, so what HiQ is doing may already be breaking the law.
8.2 Don'ts You agree that you will not:
k. Develop, support or use software, devices, scripts, robots, or any other means or processes (including crawlers, browser plugins and add-ons, or any other technology or manual work) to scrape the Services or otherwise copy profiles and other data from the Services;
m. Copy, use, disclose or distribute any information obtained from the Services, whether directly or through third parties (such as search engines), without the consent of LinkedIn;
ae. Use bots or other automated methods to access the Services, add or download contacts, send or redirect messages;