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Ask HN: Is the EULA on my new $30k RED cinema camera legal?

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Re: Ask HN: Is the EULA on my new $30k RED cinema camera legal?

#61
post #18
post #4

1) You misunderstood. The relevant part is "technical, diagnostic, usage and related information". Note it doesn't say 'video' anywhere there, and even it did it wouldn't hold up court.

> but not limited to information about your RED Camera, Camera Module, computer, system and application software, usage, content , and peripherals. Content might be anything stored on the camera in this case. I'm also glossing over the followup clause that states they are in their full right to remove in a future update features you already have.

Information about content is not the content itself. It's metadata as opposed to user data.

I'd be more concerned about the "not limited to" part than the "information about ..." followed by a long list of things they can get information about part. But I think, in my lay (non-lawyer) reading of that that they've set the spirit of the agreement. They don't want to miss some little detail in their list, but they're setting an expectation that their telemetry (if any) and their support department in case the owner asks for support can access metadata.

Re: Ask HN: Is the EULA on my new $30k RED cinema camera legal?

#62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Haven't you ever wondered how many hits you've done? Your accuracy to the center of the face? Could your swing be improved? What's your hits per minute average? How do your stats compare to other contractors, or workers for the same construction company? I bet company owners would be interested to know ;) Coming soon, just sign the EULA and run a firmware update!

A hammer showing you how much force you applied per strike would actually be semi useful.

The more I wrote, the more concerned I got that I was talking about a viable product.

Re: Ask HN: Is the EULA on my new $30k RED cinema camera legal?

#63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, this! The sales person made absolutely no mention of any licensing terms or agreements that I would need to sign off on before my camera became usable as a camera.

I think you're entitled to return it for a full refund. The same would be true if you took some video and didn't like how the camera worked, or just got cold feet on your $30k purchase. I get the feeling that you want more than that (like a custom license agreement, or some punishment for the sales person for not mentioning the EULA), and I don't think you're going to get that. Return it for a refund, RED has to sell…

> I get the feeling that you want more than that

Like the GDPR? I'm not an expert on it, but I think it does forbid a few of the liberties RED has taken with this EULA.

Re: Ask HN: Is the EULA on my new $30k RED cinema camera legal?

#65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> probably worth giving them the benefit of the doubt My lawyer would have a seizure if I showed this to them. If I had a lawyer, of course.

I've hired a few, and they're all well aware that sloppy boilerplate is commonplace. They often suggest you take a realist approach to the situation as a whole, and consider the incentives of those involved.

This is exactly the answer. Why would the manufacturer of a professional-targeted camera take an action that would destroy their business?

Re: Ask HN: Is the EULA on my new $30k RED cinema camera legal?

#66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> EULAs have not really been tested in court In Europe they do not need to be tested in court. They are not part of the contract of sale because you cannot see them before you complete the purchase. They are unenforceable.

On consumer relations that is very clear. Any rule that isn't on the marketing material does not exist. But on business relations, things are way more complex. I wouldn't be surprised if some rules were perfectly enforceable.

It's not part of the contract of sale if it is not possible to read it before agreeing to buy. You can't impose extra conditions on the buyer after the sale.

I suppose I should point out that I'm not a lawyer and that the US situation might be very different. The OP should consult a lawyer or return the camera for a refund if he feels unsure about the meaning of the agreement.

Re: Ask HN: Is the EULA on my new $30k RED cinema camera legal?

#67
post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've hired a few, and they're all well aware that sloppy boilerplate is commonplace. They often suggest you take a realist approach to the situation as a whole, and consider the incentives of those involved.

This is exactly the answer. Why would the manufacturer of a professional-targeted camera take an action that would destroy their business?

Like Kodak?

Re: Ask HN: Is the EULA on my new $30k RED cinema camera legal?

#68
post #5

AFAIK these EULAs are legal. In reality, RED isn't exfiltrating their customers' video (the files are enormous so people would notice) and they would go out of business if they did. Probably every product has some objectionable clause in their EULA which no one reads, so you're better off not reading it and moving on with your life. If you want to be a freedom fighter, go work for the EFF; if you want to make video,…

> and they would go out of business if they did.

That's what this is. This is a step in that process. This post on this forum, with both of us replying to it. You think what? There's a "scandal" and an "outrage" and then...what do you expect? The entire PR industry--a few others as well--is built to undermine scandals and outrage. Oh there's stuff on TV that sounds scandalous sure--every two months or so, in a merry-go-round set of industries...I only watch when there is nowhere in a restaurant I can avoid looking at it, but what are the scandals, steroids in baseball? A corporation that did something disgusting but isn't getting punished at all (as opposed to the many corporations that do get punished for real, TV hates showing those because then people learn what justice actually looks like). Or...some celebrity...some celebrity getting lynched. Or a rogue employee like on a crusade...or a lawsuit that the news wished had lost so they lie about it as much as possible to make the plaintiff look greedy (real easy if you just multiply the settlement by a lot, or report the claim instead of the awards, or lie about the award being reduced to what the plaintiff was asking for, or fucking insult the jury too while you're at it, even insult the judge, it's disgusting, they think they're strictly better than everybody).

They wouldn't go out of business if they did that. They just have to do it in lockstep with the rest of their industry, then they'll be fine.

> if you want to make video, make video.

Now I very much don't want to make video, and frankly lost a lot of respect for digital video in general. And for contracts. And every time I hear the word "consent" I go on full alert, as I said in a previous comment, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31104705 "...no rapey cookie "consent" contract, like those are just disgusting I hate getting asked for consent it means I'm about to get fucked. Every single time you get asked for consent it's because you're about to get fucked."

You know why that is? Because in order to defend the act of fucking you, they have to say you consented. Or they get fucked just as hard as they fucked you. And they live in fear of that, fear of retribution, they know how harmful they are, this is like--justice is often eye for an eye[1], despite striking others blind (or in this case peeking through their eyes), I never want that to happen to me, so I need magic spells because otherwise I would feel the harm I do to others. So I need to get consent with a long disgusting contract, and further I need to get people to sign things as often as possible, for every little thing so they are desensitized to what it means to consent to being struck blind, and they give up on reading contracts.[2]

[1] So justice basically is eye for an eye, historically, normally. These days it is both more and less. So you have on the one hand the Sacklers paying 10 billion instead of 3.4 trillion, that's less than an eye for an eye. The Sacklers are paying with the eyes they stole, and have plenty left. Plenty of eyes to go around! Then in the halfway point you have murderers getting the death penalty for one murder, exactly an eye for an eye. Then, the multiple-eyes-for-an-eye, a convicted rapist will spend...it really depends, but like 10 years is a common one. And due to that conviction, will be targeted by the other inmates, with the guard's approval, to rape that convict as much as they please basically. In movies it's just one rape, one time, in real prisons it's continual. So what you get, is virgins who ipso facto didn't rape anybody getting raped about 3 times a day, for 10 years, so about 10000 times, on the basis they were accused of one rape. So to translate 10000 eyes for an eye, but not even a real eye, like a glass eye.

Oh you didn't like talking about that? Too gross? But it's germane to the subject, we had been talking about consent this whole time!

[2] There's a synergy between abusing people's eyes and getting them to sign contracts, now that I think about it. Blind people can't read contracts, like everybody screams from the pain in their ass when a blind man asks for a contract in braille, like the discrimination is very real. And they lie to them when reading out loud. So in this slightly different case, you could be filming your screen with a RED camera to identify manipulation in a contract--like shitty javascript moving items when you click--with a RED camera, but then RED looks at what you filmed, oh he's filming the signature of a contract, we don't want that, he's using this camera as an eye to READ a CONTRACT, let's add in our update the terms that we get to edit what he recorded so we delete the evidence. Oh wait, that's even more literal! Literal striking an eye blind just when you needed it to preserve evidence! Good synergy.

Re: Ask HN: Is the EULA on my new $30k RED cinema camera legal?

#69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, this! The sales person made absolutely no mention of any licensing terms or agreements that I would need to sign off on before my camera became usable as a camera.

I think you're entitled to return it for a full refund. The same would be true if you took some video and didn't like how the camera worked, or just got cold feet on your $30k purchase. I get the feeling that you want more than that (like a custom license agreement, or some punishment for the sales person for not mentioning the EULA), and I don't think you're going to get that. Return it for a refund, RED has to sell…

Why shouldn't they be entitled to use the product fully without being bound by the EULA? Unconscionability could be at play here.

Re: Ask HN: Is the EULA on my new $30k RED cinema camera legal?

#70
Write to the company and ask for clarification and an option to opt-out.

This has three benefits: 1) they may give you additional information what exactly they are doing 2) they get information that their customers find it suspicious and may clarify it for everyone and 3) they may actually add an option to opt out

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