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The ‘Terms and Conditions’ Reckoning Is Coming

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Re: The ‘Terms and Conditions’ Reckoning Is Coming

#51

I've been thinking of writing my own Terms of Service for my cryptocurrency-related web startup -- with plain and clear language that the average person should be able to understand. Several people have advised me that this is a horrible idea and that I should enlist the help of a lawyer to write it instead. Some things I want to protect myself against: - People suing if they lose their private keys and are no longer…

You should never write a contract yourself unless you are a lawyer. There's a case law which usually involved, and if aren't careful, you might have big problems.

Re: The ‘Terms and Conditions’ Reckoning Is Coming

#52

Disclaimer: I hate complex / abusive T&C's, and I'm keen to see them abolished. But... It seems to me like we as a public are blaming corporations for our failures. As adults we're responsible for what contracts we enter into, except in cases of coercion. 99% of us were stupid enough to state that we accepted terms that we didn't even read. Especially in cases where the product/service was purely optional (Netflix, C…

> 99% of us were stupid enough to state that we accepted terms that we didn't even read.

It’s not stupid. It’s a smart, savvy practical decision. There’s not much reward for investing the time and effort to read and understand TOS which are not easy to parse. Plus we don’t have much choice. For the nontechnical user there simply isn’t an alternative service in most instances, much less one with a less onerous TOS.

Re: The ‘Terms and Conditions’ Reckoning Is Coming

#53

Disclaimer: I hate complex / abusive T&C's, and I'm keen to see them abolished. But... It seems to me like we as a public are blaming corporations for our failures. As adults we're responsible for what contracts we enter into, except in cases of coercion. 99% of us were stupid enough to state that we accepted terms that we didn't even read. Especially in cases where the product/service was purely optional (Netflix, C…

I think this is using an overly simplistic blame/responsibility model and if we don't want to have more problems on our hands, we really need to change it.

> 99% of us were stupid enough to state that we accepted terms that we didn't even read.

Well, here's the thing, if 99% of people do something, what's going on here? That's an extremely high rate. Surely if this was a normal choice, there would be a large dissent group? 20% at least? This doesn't sound like it was a real choice.

And consider how it plays out. If choosing the right way is a highly unusual action (1%), and you make this a personal responsibility thing, for any given T&C you cannot use the program. Both because they're too long to read and because you can't agree with them. No phone, no internet, no bank accounts, no entertainment. Since choosing this way already makes you highly unusual, this all just effectively cuts you off from society.

People cannot be individually responsible for mass behaviors. It doesn't really work. Mass behaviors are managed by memetics, which is a higher level force that only specific individuals, or groups of individuals, can actually manipulate.

So I disagree with you entirely. If anyone is responsible for the 99% T&C acceptance rate, it's pretty much never going to be individuals. If we do try to select a person or a group of people, it would be people who manage media and marketing, since memetics is their job.

Re: The ‘Terms and Conditions’ Reckoning Is Coming

#54

What I want is a standardized set of icons, which grant or deny specific things, that all websites can agree on, sort of like the ones available for software licensing, here: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/ It would be great if we could "standardize away" the whole T&C fiasco.

You're in luck at least when it comes to privacy in the EU! The GDPR makes various references to the creation and use of standardised icons to give a meaningful overview of the intended data processing. I know, I know, another GDPR reference but I thought it was interesting to note that a piece of regulation is pushing implement precisely what you were talking about, albeit in the field of privacy.

Re: The ‘Terms and Conditions’ Reckoning Is Coming

#55
We need something akin to the Uniform Commercial Code, which solved a similar problem with proliferation of contracts in the B2B realm. And I think there should be a strict limit on the amount of verbiage that a B2C contract can contain to remain enforceable, due to the highly asymmetrical nature of the relationship economically.

Re: The ‘Terms and Conditions’ Reckoning Is Coming

#56
post #27

One thing I’d like to see outlawed is forced arbitration. Waiving someone’s right to a lawsuit is just wrong and only serves to benefit the company.

They're outlawed in some countries, notably in Europe.

EU rules presume pre-dispute arbitration clauses in consumer contracts are invalid. France and Sweden completely prohibit consumer arbitration in certain cases. Germany won't enforce a consumer arbitration clause unless it's in a separate, signed document or part of a fully-notarised contract.

Lots of information available at https://www.hausfeld.com/news-press/mandatory-arbitration-in....

Re: The ‘Terms and Conditions’ Reckoning Is Coming

#57

True of legalese in contracts, but also Law in general has multiplied like Gremlins. Hammurabi's code of laws, was written in common language, and was brief enough every subject could understand them. It makes no sense that we should be subject to a volume of law that we could never even read, let alone understand. Musk is correct in insisting that laws should expire, and it should be easier to remove a law than add…

> Hammurabi's code of laws, was written in common language, and was brief enough every subject could understand them.

While laws being written in common language sounds like a good idea, common language is open to lots of ambiguity and loopholes. Shouldn't our laws, in general, be written to be as precise and narrowly defined as possible?

Re: The ‘Terms and Conditions’ Reckoning Is Coming

#58

Disclaimer: I hate complex / abusive T&C's, and I'm keen to see them abolished. But... It seems to me like we as a public are blaming corporations for our failures. As adults we're responsible for what contracts we enter into, except in cases of coercion. 99% of us were stupid enough to state that we accepted terms that we didn't even read. Especially in cases where the product/service was purely optional (Netflix, C…

There supposedly exists an ideal human, one whom every demagogue on the internet imagines must exist anytime any of a number of subjects is talked about. This ideal human: - Reads every terms and conditions agreement, and understands it, for every service they intend to use -- online and in meatspace -- or chooses not to use that service; - Never drives even a couple of miles an hour over the speed limit or commits a…

This is much like the illusory rational economic actor, or the imaginary private property rights that libertarians insist must exist without a government with laws (and weapons) or [insert alternative that possesses weapons and you hope is benevolent]. All of these ideas share a common theme of seeking an easy intellectual shorthand, an oversimplification, and being unwilling to engage in the messy chaos of reality and humanity.

Re: The ‘Terms and Conditions’ Reckoning Is Coming

#59
post #15
post #8

> If a typical user wouldn’t understand the documents, the consent that companies rely on for their business activities would be legally invalid. I like that standard, seems to comport to the "meeting of the minds" requirement for a valid legal agreement/contract.

I totally agree. The terms and conditions, or some offering of them, should be available in the same way that quick start or full guides are - in a form that adds to the usability of the service. E.g. "when you upload a photo, ____ owns the photo, for _____ period, and may do a, b, c, and d with it"

The problem is that legal terminology doesn't always match conventional descriptions of what's happening.

Copyright is actually a perfect example of this. In order to send my photo over the Internet to other people who want to view it, you need much more than the legal right to display my picture. Sending a picture over the Internet involves copying, distributing, and sublicensing the image countless numbers of times. So any site with user-uploaded content will have something very close to (Imgur's for reference):

> With regard to any file or content you upload to the public portions of our site, you grant Imgur a non-exclusive, royalty-free, perpetual, irrevocable worldwide license (with sublicense and assignment rights) to use, to display online and in any present or future media, to create derivative works of, to allow downloads of, and/or distribute any such file or content.

There's no way the typical user will understand this, but that's not because it's obfuscated. The typical user just doesn't have the background to understand what all these rights are or why Imgur requires them. It would be severely misleading to write the literal meaning in layperson's terms:

> When you upload pictures, you have to give us the right to make as many copies of the pictures as we want, modify them however we'd like, and send those copies to whoever we want anywhere in the world.

Re: The ‘Terms and Conditions’ Reckoning Is Coming

#60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

250 hours: that is the number of hours required to actually read all the adhesion contracts the typical American is exposed to in a year. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/mar/03/terms-of-... 250 hours is a full man-month of time. Do you have a free month in your calendar to read contracts and do very little else? Nobody I know has that sort of free time. So calling people or their behaviors "failures" for…

Access to Facebook, Spotify, or Netflix is not a human right. These are private services offered by private companies who are free to offer those services on any terms they choose. It’s fine and completely understandable that you may not have time or cannot understand the agreements under which they may choose to offer you access. Your remedy for that is to not use the services in question. Your remedy isn’t to lie t…

Don’t hate the human.
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