The ‘Terms and Conditions’ Reckoning Is Coming • Hacker News Board

Re: The ‘Terms and Conditions’ Reckoning Is Coming

#121

Post by jkaplowitz » Fri, Apr 20, 2018, 5:26 PM UTC

jstarfish wrote: post #117

CPLX wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Musk is correct in insisting that laws should expire This is a terrible idea. Stability and gradual, generally understandable, evolution in response to real world conditions are positive attributes of the current precedent-based system that has grown out of the common law.

Why? What's so bad about forcing us to re-evaluate the reasons why given laws are on the books? Plenty of laws are relevant only to a specific point in time, but they rarely, if ever, get repealed. Take the US Chicken Tax. It was put in place in the 60s to deal with economic concerns with France and West Germany at the time (which no longer exists as such!). Why shouldn't it have been given an expiration date? Instea…

Some laws, like that one, should be enacted with an expiration date. Some laws even are - e.g. a lot of the post-9/11 surveillance state laws need periodic reauthorization. Plenty of other taxes are enacted as temporary, too, despite how routinely they're extended.

But not all laws should expire. Having, say, the crime of murder expire would be quite unhelpful.

Re: The ‘Terms and Conditions’ Reckoning Is Coming

#122

Post by jkaplowitz » Fri, Apr 20, 2018, 5:32 PM UTC

flother wrote: post #56

dawnerd wrote: 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/m…

As another example, Quebec has similar rules for consumer contract. They also forbid contracting for a different choice of law, and unless through a notarial act (in the civil law sense of notary rather than common law notaries public), also forbid stipulating a different domicile to avoid the jurisdiction of their local courts.

Just like with your European example, none of this applies to business-to-business contracts.

Re: The ‘Terms and Conditions’ Reckoning Is Coming

#123

Post by throwawayjava » Fri, Apr 20, 2018, 5:36 PM UTC

mieseratte wrote: post #85

kbenson wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you think allowing programs to be specified in plain English is a good idea? We have "legalese" for the same reason we have programming languages. Terms have specific, sometimes slightly different or more narrow meanings to promote better understanding of intent in languages meant to specify a set of rules. Specifying laws in "plain English" makes about as much sense to me as programming in English. You'll quickly…

> Do you think allowing programs to be specified in plain English is a good idea? The difference is that one is expected to consent and be beholden to something they could not reasonably understand without paying a large amount of money to a specialist. That I write my code in brainfuck is of no consequence to someone, unless that brainfuck is potentially going to incarcerate them.

> The difference is that one is expected to consent and be beholden to something they could not reasonably understand without paying a large amount of money to a specialist.

I've found that this is generally less true than I imagine it to be. A lot of law is not actually so difficult to understand. Legalese is still English, and Google is great for figuring out the odd meanings of certain terms of art.

Most of the exceptions I've come across (e.g., buying a house) are IMO actually intrinsically complex transactions. I could undestand, but it'd take so long. And the time taken would happen even if we only had the laws we needed and all those laws were written in plain english. In software terms, lots of essential complexity.

Going back to the article, the problem with Facebook's terms and conditions is definitely not understandability -- see https://www.facebook.com/policy.php. The average high schooler could understand. The problem is people caring enough to 1) find, 2) read, and 3) inconviencance themselves if they don't like the policies.

Re: The ‘Terms and Conditions’ Reckoning Is Coming

#124

Post by amarkov » Fri, Apr 20, 2018, 5:39 PM UTC

some_guy_there wrote: post #119

amarkov wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's precisely what the legalese means, and carries connotations which are absolutely nothing like what Imgur intends. They claim unlimited rights not because they don't want to be bothered to restrict them, but because the structure of the Internet makes it impossible to write a simple description of when copies will be made. They could try going into detail: > We can send copies of your image to anyone who, followi…

> which are absolutely nothing like what Imgur intends But how do we know this? If they intend something, they should write that down in the contract. I am having hard time imagining that their lawyers cannot draw a contract which waives only the copyright requirement for the purposes of image hosting and restricts the images from being used for other things. The principle of charitable interpretation tells me to bel…

Again, it'd definitely be possible to write a document more narrowly describing what they need a license to do. But that doesn't solve the problem. The updated version would be more readable for network engineers, less readable for lawyers, and still incomprehensible to the average person who just wants to upload a meme.

Re: The ‘Terms and Conditions’ Reckoning Is Coming

#125

Post by methodover » Fri, Apr 20, 2018, 5:47 PM UTC

Facebook's Privacy Policy, Terms, and Principles are actually written in very clear, plain language. I've read them. They're easy to understand.

I was frustrated by Senator Graham's remarks because he absolutely could understand them, if he bothered to read them. (He said that he didn't understand them.)

The problem though, isn't the Terms. It doesn't matter how plainly written they are. People won't read them.

What matters is designing your product with correct privacy affordances. Put yourself on the shoes of the user, and make sure your app isn't sharing information in a way that would be jarring or unexpected.

For example, Facebook made a mistake with its posting dialogue experience pre 2016. You could say that a post should only be shared "with friends" in a choice box next to your post. However, that post would also be shared with any apps your friend has installed. That's probably not what the posting user would have expected, so it's a poor experience.

If you have inadequate privacy affordances, you shouldn't just hide behind your terms. That's the point.

Edit: I don't understand why I'm being downvoted. If you disagree with something, please let me know. I'm designing our own privacy affordances in our app following the above thinking, after all...

Re: The ‘Terms and Conditions’ Reckoning Is Coming

#126

Post by howard941 » Fri, Apr 20, 2018, 5:47 PM UTC

ben_w wrote: post #115

howard941 wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Curious if you tried to change any of the boilerplate terms and if you did, how did it work out?

A friend of a friend changed the “we will send you advertising” into “we will not send you advertising”, then when the bank sent them advertising anyway they demonstrated that the bank manager had signed the changed document and therefore the bank was in breach of the mortgage contract and technically they could keep the house without paying for it. For whatever reason, they then said it would be fine if the bank nev…

Pity there wasn't a free house but I shouldn't be surprised. Thank you for sharing both stories.

That Argakov one is particularly spooky with the viable death fear. From the first hit I could find: “Our lawyers don’t think [Agarkov] will get 24 million rubles, but four years in prison for fraud. Now it’s a matter of principle for @tcsbank,” Tinkov added. ( from https://www.rt.com/business/tinkoff-bank-agarkov-credit-299/ )(empasis mine)

Oh boy. When the fight become principled it's time to fire the client xxxxx refer the client out to someone else

Re: The ‘Terms and Conditions’ Reckoning Is Coming

#127

Post by hshehehjdjdjd » Fri, Apr 20, 2018, 5:49 PM UTC

doomslice wrote: post #64

hshehehjdjdjd wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> People suing if a bug in my software causes them to lose access to their account or coins Everything else sounds pretty reasonable, but this doesn’t. If you cause someone harm, you should expect that they will attempt to recover damages from you, regardless of what your T&C says. I cannot fathom why you think you should be protected against this eventuality. Buy insurance instead. Regarding your question, notwithst…

Fair enough. I guess this is why I should get a lawyer involved! I was assuming there was some distinction between accidental negligence and fraud as far as what could be protected against.

Is this a standard you would like to be subjected to from someone who is responsible for your money? For example, if your bank, through an accidental, non-fraudulent error, allowed a criminal to extract your account’s entire value as cash, do you think they ought to be able to defend themselves by saying they did not commit fraud?

Re: The ‘Terms and Conditions’ Reckoning Is Coming

#128

Post by torstenvl » Fri, Apr 20, 2018, 5:54 PM UTC

nordsieck wrote: post #76

Letmesleep69 wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It makes no sense that we should be subject to a volume of law that we could never even read, let alone understand Why does that not make sense? The law must cover everything from "dont kill certain species" to "don't commit this very specific type of fraud". Society is so advanced we need more laws. Of course Hamurabi's code was short because it didn't need to stop investment bankers committing fraud or voting law…

The garbage part is not that there is a large volume of law, but that the law is made even larger implicitly through a system of historical precedent without being explicitly updated to reflect those changes. As an easy example, the commerce clause in the US constitution has come to mean something that no layman would ascribe to it.

As an easy example, the commerce clause in the US constitution has come to mean something that no layman would ascribe to it.

Any support for that statement?

Re: The ‘Terms and Conditions’ Reckoning Is Coming

#129

Post by some_guy_there » Fri, Apr 20, 2018, 5:54 PM UTC

amarkov wrote: post #124

some_guy_there wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> which are absolutely nothing like what Imgur intends But how do we know this? If they intend something, they should write that down in the contract. I am having hard time imagining that their lawyers cannot draw a contract which waives only the copyright requirement for the purposes of image hosting and restricts the images from being used for other things. The principle of charitable interpretation tells me to bel…

Again, it'd definitely be possible to write a document more narrowly describing what they need a license to do. But that doesn't solve the problem. The updated version would be more readable for network engineers, less readable for lawyers, and still incomprehensible to the average person who just wants to upload a meme.

I agree with you. Though I do think that this is not an unsolvable problem with the right incentives. As I noted, the people at company X might be the best people at heart, but the current legal system does not encourages drafting of a contract that precisely (and easily) describes the terms being agreed between the two parties. This is not even a unique feature of contract law, the same to true to various extend for all branches of the law.

My gut feeling (of which I have no proof) is that the current legal system is costing more money to the society than is necessary. For one thing, it is decreasing the trust in the legal system, since people now (correctly) assume that in many facets of modern life, they are agreeing to things they don't understand, that they are giving up more rights than they should, and that there is no reasonable solution to this problem yet.

Some complication in the law is necessary since the world is a complex creature, but I think that the common person (say at least half of the population) should have reasonable understanding of the legal language. One way to approach it is to have a requirement for simpler contract, but I don't know if it is _the_ way to deal with this problem. I am not a lawyer after all. All I know is that something is broken, and if not fixed, will lead to more problem down the line. A system like this where no-one trusts nobody is clearly not sustainable. It's just not a good way to organize as a society.

Re: The ‘Terms and Conditions’ Reckoning Is Coming

#130

Post by Jasper_ » Fri, Apr 20, 2018, 5:58 PM UTC

amarkov wrote: post #124

some_guy_there wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> which are absolutely nothing like what Imgur intends But how do we know this? If they intend something, they should write that down in the contract. I am having hard time imagining that their lawyers cannot draw a contract which waives only the copyright requirement for the purposes of image hosting and restricts the images from being used for other things. The principle of charitable interpretation tells me to bel…

Again, it'd definitely be possible to write a document more narrowly describing what they need a license to do. But that doesn't solve the problem. The updated version would be more readable for network engineers, less readable for lawyers, and still incomprehensible to the average person who just wants to upload a meme.

"Hi. When you upload an image to imgur, we need the legal right to distribute it to other people. We also process your image to look right on different devices, which requires the legal right to modify your image. We promise not to distribute or modify your image beyond what we do here at imgur.com, and won't sell it to other people"

Seems easy enough to write.