HughMungus - 2:14 am on Mar 30, 2005 (gmt 0)

So, HughMungus, it doesn't matter if a third party thinks that G is hurting the telephone directory you cite in your example. It is up to the owner of that site to complain to G, block G, or to take the matter to federal court. You are in no position to sue G because you contend that they are hurting the commercial interests of a telephone directory you do not own.

My point (again) is that you can't use the "search engine good, scraper bad" argument because search engines showing snippets (as scraper sites do) is not always good for some types of sites and that it's hypocritical to complain about scrapers without complaining about search engines. In other words, if you put the information out there, you have to expect that others are going to use it in ways that you don't want (and I don't mean wholesale copying of sites; I mean snippets). If "fair use" applies to search engines, it also applies to scraper sites.