Can Interpol arrest me for server abuse?
Needing an updated set of spectral data for my dissertation research, I found a nearly perfect source in the BaSeL Interactive Server. Since getting the data set I wanted would require filling out the form several hundred times, I wrapped my brain around WWW::Mechanize and wrote a nice Perl script to do the tedious stuff for me. Whee, worked like a charm.
Poking around the site, I found in it its usage statistics that in the few hours that I grabbed data, I hit the server more than it had been in the previous eleven months combined:
Well, I’m pretty sure that the author put the server out there so people like me could use it. I’ll make sure to give him a nice acknowledgement in my dissertation when I finally finish the damn thing.
<!—<font style=”size: 70%”>Note (16 August): Hmm, the server is now down, hope I didn’t kill it. In any case, I’ve removed the image link for the time being to prevent browsers from spinning and causing further havoc over across the Atlantic.</font> —>