Deep links may avoid pages on which there is advertising and therefore it could be argued that they damage the interests of the copyright holders. Therefore it is sometimes suggested that permission should be asked before making deep links. Not everyone would agree with this. Tim Berners-Lee, the creator of the World Wide Web, is of the opinion that it is not necessary to ask before making a link to another site . Whether or not to ask permission seems more a matter of etiquette that of law.
Most people are only too pleased to have links from other sites.
That is not always the case but there is no clear legal precedent to show what should be done if a site objects to a link. The Shetland Times took legal action against the Shetland News because the latter included links from its website to stories in its rival's bypassing the front page which contained all the advertisements. Lawyers for the Shetland Times argued that the headlines of its stories were copyrighted. However the case was settled out of court before a precedent could be established one way or the other. Even if there is currently no legal requirement to remove links to a site that objects, it might be the courteous thing to do and could possibly avoid further trouble.