> Legally he might not have been in the right but we should be helping him out not uselessly debating and casting judgement.

If he's not "legally not in the right," why should I be helping him (doesn't that imply casting a judgement - that PadMapper is elevated above CraigsList because it's "the best apartment rental interface our there")?

What if the tables were turned and CraigsList was violating PadMapper's TOS? Would you be willing to help CraigsList (they serve more than only apartment listings)?

Should somebody be rewarded, even if (legally) not in the right, just because he/she is a hard worker/smarty pants/exemplifies the True Hacker Spirit?

I often wonder if there is some sort of unwritten clause that You-Must-Pull-For-The-Underdog to join Hacker News? (In the name of Divine Disruption, of course.)

> "If he's not "legally not in the right," why should I be helping him (doesn't that imply casting a judgement - that PadMapper is elevated above CraigsList because it's "the best apartment rental interface our there")?"

Because legal right and moral right sometimes intersect, but not nearly always.

Because once in a blue moon somebody comes along and creates something with such enormous public good that it forces us to reconsider the context of both legal and moral righteousness.

That's all well and good, and I understand the point, but it does't appear to apply to PadMapper.

Personally, while I'm not a big fan of Craiglist's UI, it's stretching it to think that PadMapper would be classified as "such enormous public good" simply because a small subset of total Craigslist (and Internet) users (most likely in a small subset of American cities) are fond of it.