Since you talked around my question by falsely equating governmental and private action, let's revisit -- which of:
People deciding what products they want to use and talking about it.
Companies deciding what to do based on what's good for them and their objectives.
Do you object to? (OKCupid's actions, of course, fall under both categories.) The consequences of any action you could take to prevent this type of behavior would be much more dire, chilling-effect-wise, than the occasional troubling instance such as this one.
Companies deciding what to do based on what's good for them and their objectives.
As a long-time user of alternative browsers (e.g. Konqueror) I certainly object to companies deciding to take specific actions on their web sites for web browsers for reasons that are not clearly technical. If for no other reason than as a net neutrality issue.
Again, just because people and companies technically have the legal right to do something doesn't make it a good idea.
Companies can be as powerful as states. Heck, some companies have budgets larger that many states. And historically they have been involved from getting laws passed to their favor, to actually putting their own people in power. Search "banana republic" in wikipedia for some of the most known examples of that.
So I don't see anything better from the state bullying people to a private company doing the same. If anything it's worse, since the state has some democratic controls in place (at least in theory) and the majority elects their policies and representatives. A private company can be the rule and whimses of just one jerk.
Comments
Since you talked around my question by falsely equating governmental and private action, let's revisit -- which of:
People deciding what products they want to use and talking about it. Companies deciding what to do based on what's good for them and their objectives.
Do you object to? (OKCupid's actions, of course, fall under both categories.) The consequences of any action you could take to prevent this type of behavior would be much more dire, chilling-effect-wise, than the occasional troubling instance such as this one.
As a long-time user of alternative browsers (e.g. Konqueror) I certainly object to companies deciding to take specific actions on their web sites for web browsers for reasons that are not clearly technical. If for no other reason than as a net neutrality issue.
Again, just because people and companies technically have the legal right to do something doesn't make it a good idea.
Companies can be as powerful as states. Heck, some companies have budgets larger that many states. And historically they have been involved from getting laws passed to their favor, to actually putting their own people in power. Search "banana republic" in wikipedia for some of the most known examples of that.
So I don't see anything better from the state bullying people to a private company doing the same. If anything it's worse, since the state has some democratic controls in place (at least in theory) and the majority elects their policies and representatives. A private company can be the rule and whimses of just one jerk.