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Proposed new error code - "Unavailable For Legal Reasons"
06-23-2012, 10:36 PM
Folks at Google have notices that the WWW error code 403, "Forbidden", has started to be used in cases where it isn't user permissions on a system that forbid the serving of a resource. To remove the ambiguity of why something is forbidden, they've proposed an extension to the 400-series codes: "Unavailable For Legal Reasons"
The number they've suggested? Three digits, starts with a 4, brings to mind government control of ideas... (Yes, they acknowledge where they got the number from.)
http://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-t ... ude_text=1]Here's the current draft of the proposed error code, with the number listed for those who haven't figured it out yet.
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Rob Kelk
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Quote:This request may not be serviced in the Roman Province of
Judea due to Lex3515, the Legem Ne Subversionem Act of AUC755,
which disallows access to resources hosted on servers deemed
to be operated by the Judean Liberation Front
Oh, but if they're from the Liberation Front of Judea, it'll be no problem....
I for one, wholly support this. Because 'Not available in your country' is something I see every second link someone sends me over chat. It's bloody annoying.
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CattyNebulart
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I hope it gains traction. It seems like it would be useful for all the bans that governments are currently imposing.
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I like the code, but the fact that it's in the 400s implies that the user made an error. Clearly, it's the government that generated the error by blocking the resource, in more ways than one.
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I do support the idea of having a specific code that shows that it's a "copyright violation". Hopefully it will inspire more pressure on such fronts to loosen the controls, rather than continuing to try to tighten it like a noose around the internet.
@vorticity: I usually interpret the 400 series errors to merely be some variant of "file unavailable"... in many cases, the error is not made by the user of the browser, but instead by some link in between, usually the "referring page". For instance, we all have to go through our bookmarks, because some of them no longer point to anywhere, instead now being 404 because a site administrator did some cleaning up or moving around of pages.
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@JFerio: If a site administrator does some cleaning up of pages, they should return either 300 Multiple Choices, 301 Moved Permanently, or 410 Gone. Of course, no one actually does this, leaving us with the familiar 404 Not Found (and the occasional 302 Found, which is also wrong).
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If anything, it should be a 500-series code. The server knows it's incapable of doing as requested; the reason is because the content is being (unreasonably) legally contested.
Now we just have to figure out a meaningful 5xx number for it.
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vorticity Wrote:@JFerio: If a site administrator does some cleaning up of pages, they should return either 300 Multiple Choices, 301 Moved Permanently, or 410 Gone. Of course, no one actually does this, leaving us with the familiar 404 Not Found (and the occasional 302 Found, which is also wrong). It does seem that it's either not being implemented, or worse, a number of site admins deciding that it's not worth the effort to tag the pages individually so that the server knows when it's not a simple case of "file not found".
The best ones, oddly, will go far on the other side and set a redirect for a page they've moved or removed.
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"You know how parents tell you everything's going to fine, but you know they're lying to make you feel better? Everything's going to be fine." - The Doctor
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