Sarah

> > I think you missed the point. She doesn't want other people to "copy" her
> > links and replace their affiliate key in place of hers.
> 
> If someone else has their own affiliate key (for Amazon.com for 
> instance), why would they need to copy her links? And if they really 
> wanted to do this, "masking" the link by "hiding" the url from the 
> status bar isn't going to stop them from copying the link.

It's not access to the eventual URL that's necessarily the bothersome thing - it's the ability to _automate_ the process of harvesting meaningful URLs. I think that Rob's client doesn't have a full understanding of how harvesting her links would benefit a competitor, but there remains some merit to the principle. If one has software for download, then one could mask the links to the actual download. This would ensure that when users forward the link to the download, the recipient will still be obliged to pass through a registration process prior to downloading the software.

If one were in fact not benig paraniod because "they" really are after one, then "they" could duplicate the target website, register many similar domains, and spend some time ensuring that the spoofer appears higher in search engine rankings that the spoofee. If the revenue generated from a considerable number of affiliate links was high, then the spoofer could probably divert substantial revenue from the spoofee.

Regards

Chris Marsh

"Cthulhu for President. Why vote for a lesser evil?" --Cthulhu.org