I have received a Cease and Desist letter from Facebook’s lawyers for Feed Filter.
The letter says that Feed Filter is designed to interfere with the proper rendering of Facebook pages in violation of Facebook’s Statement (http://www.facebook.com/terms.php), which says:
- You will not do anything that could disable, overburden, or impair the proper working of Facebook, such as a denial of service attack.
- You will not facilitate or encourage any violations of this Statement.
It also says that Feed Filter “may violate a number of laws, including the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, 18 U.S.C. paragraph 1030; the California Comprehensive Computer Data Access and Fraud Act, CA Penal Code paragraph 502(c); as well as state law prohibiting interference with Facebook’s business expectations and interests.”
I must respond by this Friday, April 30th, 2010, confirming that I will stop offering Feed Filter for download, as well as refrain from developing any browser program in the future that interacts with Facebook.
Since I have neither the resources nor the inclination to fight this, and since they may well be within their rights, I plan on complying with their request.
I will soon remove Feed Filter from my web site as well as from Mozilla’s site for Firefox Add-ons. After that time, I will not release any new versions of Feed Filter.
At the time of this writing, there are almost 8,000 fans of the Feed Filter fan page on Facebook, and there have been close to 100,000 downloads of the Feed Filter add-on. My sincere thanks go out to all the users that have supported my efforts and provided words of encouragement throughout the life of the program. You made all the hard work worthwhile. Thank you!
Russell Gilbert
You have “impaired” fb? LOL If anything, you made it better!!!
Is it possible to save the add on and install it again if you have buy a new computer for instance? Everyone who has it installed now are safe but if you PC crash its gone :-( How do we save it for the future? A backup plan.
I would say I would comply but want to know how your program in any way shape or form burdens there servers.
I see no way how that could even be possible.
“Impared the proper working of Facebook, such as a denial of service attack” They are joking right? I would love to hear their explanation as to how a plugin for a browser even comes close to a denial of service attach. I know they have had some and they should know there is no comparison.
Facebook broke the feed so that it was not usable. I am so sorry that they have done this. Wish it did not have to come to this, but I understand the position they have put you in.
I’m so sad… Thank you for your wonderful work, Russell. Hope to find you somewhere else in the future. Best wishes for all.
Check the violation, it may be in violation of their terms to USE the service. As a matter of fact, the very first cpl of sentences say:
By using or accessing Facebook, you agree to this Statement..
idk… too bad you didn’ have enough people donate for you to get a lawyer. Contact the ACLU, see what they say. They may fight a big battle against FB for free. FB already has bad publicity for their privacy crap.. I bet there are 100s of lawyers willing to go to bat for ya, for free.
If this were my product, I’d call the aclu and check around w/ some lawyers in the field. I’m telling ya… they’d eat this case up.
I still think it sounds like an infractin against their acceptable use policy and not a threat against yoru product or suing you.. Probably a threat to cancel your fb accnt. Idk…
I am also sad that you won’t be permitted to continue providing this wonderful addon. Honestly, your addon is the only thing that makes Facebook tolerable to use. No surprise they want to stop you; they want everyone to have to see all the useless stuff that your program manages to block.
You could write back and ask them exactly how it impairs FB
For the first time I am actually seeing all the posts!
Please make the add on available to download for cough, safekeeping :D
It made playing apps with my friends so much better. I’ll miss it. Thanks for all your hard work and bringing enjoyment back to Fb. I hate their feed the way they have it. Hugs & Kisses Russell! xoxo
Sooo, FB goes & s***s up again! Wat a sad sorry story!
Russ, a BIG thks fr all yr hard work & ingenuity u hav afforded us all! We will miss u & FF fr sure! FB needs to find brilliant people like u to show them who’s Boss! lol
Thks again partner fr all yr support, time, effort & help to us all! R.I.P ;-))
Considering it’s something that’s local to each workstation and is not sending any data back to the FB servers, I’m positive they wouldn’t have a case. But I can understand your not wanting to take them on.
It’s just sad that they feel so embarrassed by their inability to meet their users’ needs that they felt they had to attack you in this way. Absolutely pathetic.
Russell, First I would like to thank you again for a brilliant piece of software that has become integral in to the way that I use Facebook. Secondly I do not think it is fair of facebook to be so callus about how we choose to view our posts. I feel this is more to do with the fact that the software blocks adverts(if selected) and also possably that they themselves could not come up with a good filter system for the news-feed. Thankyou for your work, I shall be making an offical complaint about this. Best of luck for the future JoZ
BTW… I totally agree with Schmit’s post… U need to look into this further Russ. I agree to that there will be many many other lawyers willing to do this fr free.. it is surely worth a go…
Is this a joke??? Every since I’ve had the filter I’ve been able to actually enjoy facebook again…It was a brilliant feature and I can’t see how free choice is violating anything or anybody…I should be able to choose what I want to see when I open up my facebook page!!!!
I agree with the others. There has to be someone out there than can assist with this. I don’t see how it is any different than your average pop-up blocker software you can purchase at any retail store. It almost makes me wonder if in another scenario there is a company that would take on your design if they were to make a profit or have an advertising edge to gain from it. Perhaps you have an area there as well for the work you put into this and we would still have an option with an entity who may have the resources to “fight the man”.
Either way, it’s really been appreciated with the work and time you chose to create this wonderful application. It’s by all means made using “FB” a greater user experience all around. Whatever the outcome may be, thanks again for creating this for all of us to use! Good luck!
I completely agree with Schmit, and not only on the level of principle, but also on the level of practicality.
If you were to go up against Facebook along with the possible assistance of pro bono legal representation, via not only the ACLU, but also possibly the Electronic Frontier Foundation (and many others), this would raise your profile and could go leaps and bounds to help any software programming prospects you have. Seriously, give it some thought. :)
I can’t believe them saying this its helped people, face book are not prepared to listen to us to see what we want.
They make improvements but they dont improve it they just make it worse, i had two lists mafia war friends and my friends lists now they are all jumbled up this happened about a week ago how is that improving things i can’t see what posts my friends have put.
I’ve really appreciated what you did for us and it did make fb a better experience
Good luck
I’m serious Russ… FB is getting some bad bad publicity right now because of their privacy issues. Now is the time to jump on this. It’s so simple, I’ll help ya. you know who I am, ur first donor. email me, I’ll help you. ACLU, CNN, FOX, that congressmen in NY that’s up in arms about it, and the list goes on. I’ll help ya. Email me.
Look man, it may be about YOUR usage on FB.. not your product. Why is adblock still working? Why does noscript still work? Contact the other developers, they can point you in te right direction too.
I’m sick of big business thinking they are all bad and mighty because they got a “lawyer..” Oooh Oooooh, I’m so scared. Let me handle this for you Russ, free of charge. I’ll do some leg work on it tomorrow if you contact me asap.
p.s. my email address on these postings is fake.. you have my email address.
This is really a shame I think you could.
Russell there is one group I can think of at the moment to at least talk to
http://www.eff.org/
Electronic Freedom Foundation. What ever happens thank you. You have great talent and helped us.
p.s.s. cancel your account at FB, then you are not under their terms of service… thus their statements related to their terms are not valid to you any longer
Cancel your fan page bro… you’re in violation of their terms of service… because you are a user.
ask them specifically what the cease and desist is referring to. Your personal account or your fan page. It can’t be on your personal developers website…otherwise they would have used some other legal crap instead of pointing to their terms of service.
I’m pretty sure they are referring to your fan page dude. Ask them if that’s the case… they may just want you to cancel that page. Your personal developer site has no ties to the FB terms of service…
I am so mad at FB!! I will not be using it much if I cannot block all of the garbage that FF has been blocking for me. I LOVE your program and will continue to use it as long as FB doesn’t do anything to stop it. You are very talented. Thanks for helping so many people when you could.
Guys, you can save a copy of it by downloading the .xpi file
http://www.chocolatesoftware.com/firefox/download/feed_filter-1.4.5.xpi
itll likely ask to install instead of overwrite but if you go to view-source:http://www.chocolatesoftware.com/firefox/download/feed_filter-1.4.5.xpi
then file-> save page as you can save it
or download from mediafire http://www.mediafire.com/?doo4mzvjnv5
I think you should change the other / version # and post it under an anonymous name and just keep uploading it if FB gets it deleted from mozaddons.
#@$! facebook, they are turning into Apple…
I am so sorry to hear this. I am absolutely horrified and they WILL alter the html so that your awesome filter will not work quite so well.
I urge you to check out FB purity via greasemonkey and see what the script author has done to side step the FB issues. I was using that before but it comes NOTHING close to what you created.
The part that bothers me the most is I have a blind friend who uses a program to read her pages. She has so enjoyed Farmville but with facebooks new method of lumping posts, for some reason her reading program cannot find the link to see them all. So for her, this has completely ruined the game. She just needs a way to NOT have the posts put all together like that. Your program was the only one we could find that would do that. Facebook is wrong about this .. I can see them not wanting things hidden (no matter what the user prefers) but to ruin a game they have a contract with so you can’t even play it on the game site now is ridiculous. Of course no one can get through to facebook. I suppose they don’t care. All the rest of the junk we can live with – it is the lumping of posts that is creating havoc.
I wonder whether Adblock Plus, Ad-Bye (or any other Firefox anti Ads Add-ons), NoScript, Greasemonkey etc, have also , or are about to, recieved C&D letters.
As they also interfere/change the rendered display of Facebook web pages, it would seem that FB, to be consistent needs to start sending out lots of them…
Shame, but understandable Russell.
Maybe you could Open-Source the plugin, and see whether anyone else runs with it?
This is beyond being a shame, it’s an outrage. We used to worry about Microsoft, then Google, playing Big Brother with our online rights. It seems to me that FB is getting beyond anything they ever did by telling us “how” we can choose to read info!
While I agree it would be great to use lawyers to mount a case for you Russell, I understand why its a big thing to take on.
Another thing to consider is releasing the feed filter code to other developers. 8000 fans on facebook and 100k downloads, I’m sure some of these could continue to update it under another name when facebook updates.
Similar principle to what has happened with p2p. Napster used to be #1, got shut down and several others took its place. whenever another got shut down, others would take over till what we have now with bittorrent.
That way u can comply with cease n desist order and not stress about court cases, users can enjoy facebook, and facebook can continue screwing things up
Please consider contacting EFF. http://www.eff.org/about/contact or information@eff.org Start out with “Facebook sent me a C&D letter for an application I created.” They’ll listen.
As Stan said in SP: “Dude! F@ck FB. Seriously.”
I don’t get the meaning of this… but saved for later. This add-on is great. Ty.
Does fb really and truly want to lose a good portion of their fan base???? They are incredibly obtuse in their dealings with add ons and other helpful programs that brilliant people create to circumvent their disgustingly inadequate server, etc. Why??? Who was it hurting? I think the poster who made reference to the loss of there shitty advertisements is probably spot on!! I am sure many are aware of the Machiavellian schemes used by the CEO of Zynga-by his own admission-to put his Co. to the top—and fb right along with them!! I agree also with those who encourage you to seek legal council. I see fb issues on the news repeatedly. Maybe it’s time they paid the piper. I for one am beginning to loathe them!!
Best of luck and thx for this awesome app…even if it didn’t last!
The guy who made FB Purity http://www.fbpurity.com/ had the same problems not so long ago, he continues to make the script & apparently there is nothing Facebook can do about it, maybe get in contact with him & compare notes on what the legal situation is regarding these type of scripts.
I have used both scripts in the past & started using yours instead of FB Purity, i’d find out where you stand first rather than letting FB bully you into stopping making the script. The reasons they have stated are pathetic, & after all it’s peoples own choice as to whether they install the script into their browsers not FB’s choice.
It’s not harming their servers at all, & to state DNS attacks is a complete joke.
If i were you i’d fight it & keep the script going.
They should have offered you to buy the FF or give you a job… obviously you are more in touch with what works for “the people” than they are… Will be real sorry to see you “go”.
V
[...] not want the users themself to be able to choose what information they want to read. Apparently Facebook have requested that Russel shut down it distribution of the application Feed [...]
what a ########,
if facebook was working correctly It FF would not be needed… they should offer you a job in stead of sending lawyers …
grrrrr
it sucks big time
Gotta defend their ads, I guess.
Utterly ridiculous!!! The feed filter was the only thing making Facebook useable and I fail to see how it disabled, overburdened, or impaired the proper working of Facebook!!!
It’s a script and runs locally!!!
Oh how I wish I had the money to send you to get lawyers to take them to court!
Wow. this is unbelievable. This is one of the add-ons that I find most valuable. I am so sorry to hear this.
Totally sucks. You have only provided a program by which WE, who have downloaded it, can adjust FB so we see only what WE want. YOU did not do anything.
Come on people, someone MUST know an attorney willing to take this on a pro bono!
Not sure if this will work…but any way of putting updated feed filter to file hosting sites or something on that order anonymously and then just having us search for them?
We’ve created a group on Facebook to see if they’ll make changes to the news feed. Join & spread the word. Let’s see if they will (highly doubtful, though).
http://www.facebook.com/#!/group.php?gid=122419071103184
This is puffery. You are not in violation of the cfaa or cal penal code 502 because you are not “unauthorized” under the def applicable to those statutes. I.e., you did not hack into their servers, but are merely in violation of a contract (terms of service) . Their argument is spurious as nest, and maybe legally frivolous. This was the same charge they countersued connectu with. Check out the salestraq case in Nevada, it the lvrc case in the 9 th circuit. Or u.s. V drew for an extensive treatment.
Facebook is quickly becoming a site that I no longer want to visit. I guess they feel posting new friends and joining of groups to the wall is more important than game app posts, which is where they get most of their revenue from.
I am sorry that you have been put through this Russell. You helped many people and Facebook needs a good boot in the butt.
ACLU, hell. Try the EFF.
Okay, reality calling – The US defence department and the CIA love technology because it makes spying easier.
Advertisements are the smallest problem on facebook – for an in depth article on how the CIA funds facebook, read:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/jan/14/facebook
big brother is watching :)
I am not updating it in a long time, until it stops working I guess..
Anyway I got my copy of 1.4.5 from Mediafire, just in case :)
Btw, thanks a lot to the developer, this is a great FB hack.
kinda defeats the whole purpose of the feed filter. thanks facebook. sheesh. the feed filter worked exactly as i needed it too, now there is no point in having it. sorry they messed with your program.
you only made it work better not hinder it at all! us gamers is the ones who pay the money for our games and donated to the Haiti relief fund and so on. Facebook needs to realize this, i’m stumped as to what to do about this and when i try to contact Zynga I cant get a real person anymore.
theres got to b something we can do about this but thanks Russel if thats ur name for a wonderful application that made our games work better for a little!
peace
take care
Jocelyne
Fb has MADE IT A POINT lately to make their site unbelievably annoying. Honestly, I am beginning to wonder if they are not deliberately TRYING to cause their own site’s death by making it so user-UNFRIENDLY. With the CRAP they have done to it recently, I have stopped playing all but one of my games, and I’m sure they will RUIN that one soon too. Honestly, I don’t know anything about this feed filter, although I’m beginning to wish I had known… All I know is that all of us who play the games, the ONLY way to get zynga and/or FB to listen to us now as far as how we like things, is to stop paying them money- for anything- no fv cash, no coins, no nothing, until our demands are met….
Allright, having not directly used FF on my systems, but having seen and used it on friends I’ll make a comment or two here.
First off, with all the options on your addon to allow the users control of what they see is not in violation of anything. Client to user side are two different things. If your addon is firing commands and requests to FB (in loose theory causing a DOS) beyond the users general control then it could be in violation. You are not directly responsible, or controlling what the user sees, you give the client an option. This looks to be a generic mailing and may be in response to recent incidents on FB – second note.
Secondly, since the recent masses of what I call SCAM SPAM, FB pages/applications coming out that put up their adds and money scams, I would wager that FB went and posted a mass mailing to them and included you (FF) in this. These SCAM SPAM are directly in violation of FB TOS (terms of service), and/or EULA (End user lisence agreement). Do not let them push you around, ask them directly as to how or in what form your addon is in violation.. and do not accept any .. ‘it could be, may be considered.. ‘ sort of crap. If they themselves can’t define clearly how you are in violation, then it’ BS. Beyond that, talk to others, and see what is what before pushing on.
“Thought must be the harder, heart the keener
Spirit shall be more – as our might lessens.
There lies our chief all cut down,
Good man on the ground” – Battle of Maldon
I know a lawyer who may take this on for free. If you email me a pdf of the letter, I’ll ask him to take a look at it. FF is everything FB should be.
I just happened upon the filter feed link last month on my facebook Home Page and sine I am a Mozilla Fire Fox user, I downloaded it, and it has been a God send to my gaming until I noticed in the past couple of days that it hasn’t been working right.
I had no idea that facebook had disabled it ~ does this mean that I can no longer use it, even though I have it installed?
This really sucks. Just when I thought I had my game on, its gone right before my eyes. Will facebook ever learn that it is the gamers that keep facebook alive and running? Apparently not. I REALLY, REALLY, LOVE YOUR APP ~ THANK YOU.
Man, what you removed in this last update is exactly WHY I installed it. *sigh*
I am not uninstalling FF. I installed it to overcome the hap hazard and poor programming by FB – that is grouping similar posts. Now, I am back at the drawing board figuring a way to do this. It appears that FB is forcing third parties to use platforms that disengage themselves from FB. That is ok with me…treat your customers poorly and lose the revenue.
I am UNINSTALLING FF…typo previous post.
People make a CONSCIOUS effort to install the filter to make their particular experience BETTER.The lawyers and their mumbo-jumbo of crud!!We the actual users know what we want and nothing was inhibited on our end.Another injustice!!!Even after all the complaints nothing is being done.It should be the other way around…..If you don’t like a particular app.then block it,which strangely enough was ALWAYS AN OPTION.I don’t get it.We the people with the apps. use the platform the most.
The agreement gives the example of a denial of service attack. I can see how a DDoS could be a breach of the user agreement, but a filter which streamline their page?
This just goes to show a few things.
It shows how asinine lawyers are. It shows how greed gets in the way of logic. It shows how Zuckerberg and other liberals think that all the nonsense they spout should be forced upon others, but not applied to them. And it shows how most software people think that using their software should be a violation of the EULA. (Let’s face it, if cars came with an EULA like most software, nobody would be allowed to drive.)
It’s infuriating that elitists can hide behind lawyers who have no legitimate case, but know you have no recourse but to capitulate due to lack of resources.
I’m sorry your wonderful product was so thoroughly trampled before it even had a chance.
I wish I didn’t update to 2.0. I had no idea it was going to ruin what was otherwise the perfect add-on to make Facebook tolerable. Is there anyway to revert to the last version?? Anyone?
This sucks. You had done a great job and now it’s pretty much worthless. :(
[...] non elimina più le attività recenti dalla vostra bacheca. Questo perchè stava per cominciare una disputa legale tra Facebook e l’autore del programma. Il consiglio è quello di tenervi la versione 1.4.5 [...]
face book is related to hoover AKA it sux!!
Wow dude, thats incredible, they really are tryin to make FB as user unfriendly as possible aren’t they?!
Thank you sooooo much for the time n effort you put into creating this add-on, while it lasted it was awesome!
Thank you WordPress for having the foresight to know we do not like attitudes crammed down our throats.
Keep up the good fight against pure greed!
What a bunch of freaks they are. Russell what you did was awesome and I know a lot of us will miss. THEY SUCK!!!!!
I pretty much agree with everything written. The Facebook experience has been ruined for months. No matter how many times I click “offensive” I still get inappropriate ads and it bothers we that advertisers know my age (and what else?) since this info must be provided by Facebook. I’ve gone from over 500 friends down to just family and I guarantee I will not click on any ads. Thus, no ad revenue for Facebook until things change. Thank you for letting me download the old version and installing/opening it with Firefox. Now I just need to remember to not update the add on.
Big brother has spoken. Go away if you impair the making of money from adverts!
Your program has done better than large parts of Facebook!
Oh Crap, Russel,
After all this time, I’m feeling happy for having such a clean Facebook wall, thanks to you. It is kind of tired for having to remove all the newsfeed myself. The Facebook Filter has helped me a lot in protecting my and other Facebook users’ privacy. Nevertheless, thanks for the Mozilla Add-on.
Okay… I have the .xpi file. Now, how to I get it to where it needs to go to run the program properly so my messages are expanded again??
Please!!! i hate the compressed messages.
Just me.
Unbelievable. The whole reason I got this app is because facebook limits what all you can do with (probably for the sake of advertising) and I loved having an app that deleted all my recent news posts.
Facebook was great from the beginning. Now it’s becoming the Microsoft of social networking sites. It’s either their way or the highway. Their privacy sucks and I love how they once had an option to manage your own news feed and with the latest version they completely took away the ability to manage it, forcing you to accept that whenever you post on someone’s wall, everyone else can see it in their news feed.
This is just absurd. Thanks for all that you’ve done, Russell, and I hope that there’s a loophole in there that allows you to continue support later on down the road. Until then, facebook will never be the same.
okay. first of all thank u for writing this plugin.
and its bad that facebook forced u to do this
but feed filter for me is only useful if its removes my comments etc.
Install the FEBE add-on for FF, then create an account at Box.net for FEBE to upload to. It will upload and backup all of your add-ons and you’ll then be able to download and re-install them as often as you like (or as long as they’ll work in that particular version of FF)
Wasn’t fb in the news because of privacy issues? And then they opened up everything so nothing is private. The add-on is great! There is just some stuff I’d rather not go in the feed.
Before FB got crazy with making the privacy not private anymore, I liked that my posts in groups were not made public. Now they are. How is that private?
Thanks for creating the add-on.
well that sucks. i agree; there’s no way it can cause a DOS attack, as it’s purpose being is to reduce the output not increase. They need to give evidence to that account. Zuckerberg is getting too comfortable raking in this money. EVERYONE send a dev message!!!