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May I Have Your EULA Please?
LionsFate asks: "Just like the subject says. I want End User Licence Agreements (EULAs). I'm starting a database of as many EULAs as I can get. I want to know the first EULA that said we can't reverse engineer their software. I want to know the first that said they can watch our activities. I want to know how the NES agreement differs from the GameCube. Did Nintendo lighten, or tighten restrictions? I'm looking to generate a time-line of EULAs and how they have changed. What permissions we have been given, and taken away over that period. What rights did we have in Windows 3.1, compared to Windows XP? How has the MPAA and RIAA changed our 'legal rights' on software as a result of their effort? Watched Napster or other P2P software and seen the changes in their EULAs? I'm starting my EULA database at here and I need as many EULAs as I can get to populate the database. If you can, please email me any/all that you can. I'm hoping within a few weeks to have the site online." Ask Slashdot last tackled the topic of EULAs in this piece. It would be interesting to grab a nice sample of EULAs across the last 2 decades to see what has changed, if anything.
Don't a lot of EULA's have prohibitions against reprinting them in full in settings other than their original form?
Are you a bit worried about the legal ramifications of such a database?
I wish I had a kryptonite cross, because then you could keep Dracula and Superman away.
"...You agree not to post this EULA in a EULA database..."
-- Insert witty one-liner here. --
The eu has just put up a huge (70,000 pages)
site about europian rights
here's the link relating to unfair contracts in the uk
basicly it says you can ignore any shit or non plain language in the contracts, anything thats in contrntion lends to the side of the consumer.
all good stuff
thank God the internet isn't a human right.
Read your EULAs first. I've seen some (though I don't remember where) that forbid the publishing of the EULA.
C.M.Burns
Online Starcraft RPG? At
Dietary fiber is like asynchronous IO-- Non-blocking!
EULAs maybe copyrighted material after all.
Shouldn't there be a database of this already, I mean that there is a big need for this just make sure that it is used for information and not illegal uses and it should be fine. It is just a historical research is it not?
in a few months, EULA's will contain a provision that prohibits the posting of EULAs!
I hate to even think about the potential C&D that would come from unauthorized distrobution of EULAs. Would the responsible (or should that be reprehensible) parties be so embarassed by these documents they would pursue people who share them with others? How about publishing them on a website?
If you really have time, you might want to try to make an English translation of the EULAs so you're not breaking the copyright on them.
I'll have to see if I can dig it up.. It was more of a non-warranty statement, and was from an actual company. It basically gave you the right to do whatever you wanted with the software but copy it and re-sell it, but gave no warranties whatsoever. A computer science teacher (68K assembly language class) gave us copies of this..
This is illegal. A EULA is covered under copyright. And stealing IP from lawyers is just asking for trouble.
One point to watch for would be the first EULA that prohibits publishing performance benchmarks. This is now fairly common for high-end software, and is one of the more evil provisions out there.
Provided you live somewhere civilised, of course, like Europe for example.
Sumbitted the following:
Windows 2000 Advanced Server
Dungeon Siege
Mechwarrior4
Quicktime6 for Windows
SimCoaster
---- El diablo esta en mis pantalones! Mire, mire!
Careful with this project. While it sounds useful, bear in mind that some EULA's may effectively make themselves undistributable to those who don't acquire them by purchasing the product with which they deal.
Also, this may qualify as "aggregation of information with the purpose or potential to circumvent copyright devices," rendering the entire project illegal under the damned DMCA.
IANAL, of course, but can any lawyers out there comment on this?
Karma: Good (despite my invention of the Karma: sig)
No text.
1)By accepting the existence of the internet on your computer, you may not publish any information concerning the contents of EULAs.
Regards,
Your Corporate Masters
XKCD:Xeric Knowledge Comically Dispen
Has anybody counted up how many pages of EULAs you are obligated to read in order to install Windows XP with full updates? I think I'll put a running total on my webpage.
$ cd eulas/ . ../
$ ls -1 | wc -l
412
$ du -h
513M
$ cd
$ tar -czf eulas.tar.gz eulas/
$ ls -lh eulas.tar.gz
2MB eulas.tar.gz
A few of them state you cannot disclose the contents of the EULA, but i suppose if you didnt agree to it in the first place, that doesnt apply?
---- Booth was a patriot ----
ALL current EULA's include this. Usually all in uppercase stating that there is no warranty that the software will work or be of any use to you whatsoever.
If you don't want to repeat the past, stop living in it.
But seriously.... I hope the database has a line for entering the date and the exact product. EULAs change over time, even for the same product, and it'd be interesting to discover changes.
What about EULAs, that state that you can't reveal existance and/or clauses that exist with EULA?
=)
Many of the comments refer to EULA's prohibiting you from copying them. As you can clearly read the EULA without agreeing to it, the EULA itself cannot encumber you with respect to this. Copyright law would be the controlling issue, and I suspect Fair Use would allow you to keep track a DB of them for Consumer Protection reasons. Hey, look at Consumer Reports and how they reprint a number of product-related literature for similar reasons.
I've got the same agreement on everything I use!! The GPL is certainly my favorite. Anybody know the quote from an old singer who said he just wanted to write but anybody can sing it anyway they like? Amen to freedom.
It wasn't the fact that it didn't warrant the software, it was the way it did it. It read like a stand-up comic routine.
In short, for a hobbiest programmer who doesn't want to release his code under an "open" licence, what can they do if EULA's cannot be legally enforced? If this means, that they're going to be held liable if the program breaks then you're getting to the point when you could get in legal hot water.
Secondly, I hate sounding dense but can someone give me a PROPER description of the legality of these EULA's with both purchased products and downloaded items. I've heard so much stuff at the moment about whether or not EULA's are legally enforcable (with different rulings in different countries) that I'm not sure what the hell is going on.
If you have to start your post with IANAL (or similar) then please don't bother replying! It would be nice to have some solid facts instead of comment or guesswork!
Avantslash - View Slashdot cleanly on your mobile phone.
There should be a checklist of rights taken away by a EULA, and then have a client that will check software you're installing. So before you do your shopping, you can check the database with certain checkboxes, and choose from the list of returns. Or maybe do it on a point system (like SpamAssassin for EULAs). If a large enough userbase was formed that sales hurt enough by having an overly restrictive EULA, then it might be able to persuade some companies to change their EULA to something more reasonable. You might even be able to get past any copyright issues about publishing the EULA if you don't publish the text of it, just the checklist.
you had a rating system and a flexible reporting module, such that, for example, one could track the restriction level of Microsoft OS licences across the years or distribution channels, and such...
Blearf. Blearf, I say.
You don't need to read all the EULA's either. Just write a script(PERL comes to mind) that sifts through all the EULA's for text phrases, and dump the results into an appropriate format. Then the results can be put into graphs and the like for easy comparison.
This is an awsome idea. And would make pretty good ammo for first ammendment arguments against EULA's, and how they take away user/citizen freedoms.
P3P told me (email) that they had been working on a standard way to represent the rights that a program is granted when you download and run it... a computer readable EULA just concerned with privacy.
If the EULAs are copyrighted, I don't think it would be too hard to start a database of EULA "elements", specific items within EULAs. (We have the right to install brilliant on your soon-to-be-borg system, etc.) Then all you would have in the database is the list of "elements" that a EULA contained.
Besides, you'd want to do this anyhow, to track when various elements first appeared! True, the building of the EULA elements would be pretty stepp at first, but I'm guessing that after parsing out 10 EULAs, you'd have grabbed and identified most of the common points anyhow. Then you could do fun things like "Elements 5.x, 6.x are standard across all Microsoft Office products after 2001..."
IMHO: You'd want to build it in a parsed format anyhow, regardless of copyright concerns, or it won't be any fun.
All OS softwares should license as easy as this:
You can do whatever you want with this software, including making money and making yourself filthy rich. However, if you modify and improve this software, you must make your modification available to anyone who requests it, including the source code of your modification, and without imposing any extra conditions.
And if you are caught distributing this software, you'll receive a pad on the back for doing the good job.
Ah well, just a simpler version of this
Essentially, Texas (and many other states) passed a building code "by reference." What this means is that they wrote a law saying, "Construction Company Consortium Foo has published a building code called Bar. It is now the law. Ask them for a copy." Builders are now requiored to follow a law they are not legally allowed to view, except by buying it from the industry association that wrote it.
Nope, no sig
I'm pretty sure I once clicked through a EULA where I promised my first born son and regular virgin sacrifices...
The legality of certain portions of the eula are dubious at best. Not to mention that once something like this finally went to court, this sort of compilation of EULAs would be part of the discovery process!
You gotta love lawyers. Especially when one of 'em is your wife.
In the future, I would want to not be isolated from my friends in the Space Station.
http://www.osdn.com/terms.shtml
Tell ya what: gimme an account on yer FTP server and I'll upload them to you - you can do the work :)
ps: How many gigs ya got free?
db
Cig:
ôô
Someone out there wants to market a random EULA generator and they're using /. to make up the data!
Seriously, an EULA DB sounds like an excellent idea, but I have an implementation question. Have you considered marking them up in XML (a huge task, I'm sure) so that they can be searched for certain provisions? Reasoning here being that without good internal markup, you pretty much need to read through the whole EULA to compare it to another. Being able to search through the archive for different examples of specific clauses, specific allowances or provisions would be much more useful than simple searches for IE v.4 vs v.5
Good luck though, this is an excellent idea, and I like the idea of seeing included in a software reviews lines like: "...and the EULA scores a 3.4 of 5 on the standardized EULA Draconian scale..."
What is this? A competition to build the most boring database in the world?
hehe
So close and yet so far from the world's perfect ID number
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Most tech journalists fail to understand this -- evidenced by the ever-popular "New EULA Disclaims Implied Warranty of Merchantability!" articles.
Most EULAs do not contain new, inventive or clever language. After all, they're essentially standard form contracts -- otherwise known as boilerplate -- meaning that one choice of forum/ anti-reverse engineering clause looks pretty much like another.
I spent around a year (while at the Consumer Project on Technology) sifting through EULAs and contract related law, such as UCITA. Occaisionally, I would find an odd clause that appeared particularly draconian. I archived a few of those here.
The EULA clauses I found most fascinating were the ones that: 1. purported to limit benchmarks/criticism of a software title (McAfee), 2. Specified favorable choice of law/forum jurisdictions, 3. attempted to squelch parodies of a software publisher's title (Microsoft).
(yeah, I was the guy that submitted the previous, EULA harvesting Slashdot article). If you want any help dealing w/ EULAs, drop me a line.
Sincerely,
Vergil
Insects and Grafitti Photos
Yes, it is a waste of time to provide evidence to a jury that our rights are being systematically infringed upon. It must also be a waste of time to collect anything that might be of historic interest: Baseball Cards, old movie posters, stamps. Why not toss out other collections: Phone books, libraries, video stores, etc while we're at it.
"I'm not impatient. I just hate waiting." - My Dad
I think it is pretty enforcable, they are copyrighten, hence they just send you the typical piracy letter (piracy of their copyrighten text).
It looks like evrything was of untill 1990, when TVT put in the public performance clause.
then in 1992 the lending clause made it's nasty way in there.
1989 tvt (UK):
"unauthorized duplication is a violarion of applicable laws."
1990 tvt (UK):
nothing except the standard copyright 1990!
1990 tvt (Australia):
"unauthorized public performance, broadcasting, leasing and copying of this disk is prohibitred"
1992 tvt (uk):
"unauthorized copying, hiring, lending, public performance broadcasting of this disk prohibitred"
1994 tvt (uk):
"unauthorized copying, hiring, lending, public performance and broadcasting prohibitred"
source:
a few CD's of my cd rack.
thank God the internet isn't a human right.
I don't know about anyone else, but if you don't capture the EULA text when it shows up on install, I wonder if you can get to them. Do very many products even have a way to view them after the fact?
I just checked my copy of MS Outlook XP and it's actually not to bad (go to Help, then in the contents tab, look for EULA) Yet, when I looked for one on Internet Explorer 5.5, I can't find any mention of the EULA or a license in the help system.
Seems to me the software companies don't go out of their way to call your attention to it once you hurry up and click "ACCEPT" just to get the darn thing installed.
The Digital Sorceress
Hey, fine print was invented for a reason, to screw the EU over.
Ignore the "p2p is theft" trolls, they're just uninformed
One item that I find of particular interest is the EULAs which specifically forbid the end user to do a) performance testing on the software or b) publish any results of a performance test unless the vendor is given prior notification. The vendor reasoning is that there are too many variables in any performance test so any result is skewed. But these types of experiments are important especially when the vendor is make a claim about how great their performance is, and whether certain software will do the job in a given scenario.
I will gather every EULA I can and send it in.
Great idea!
Is this truly the only Earth I can live on?
Texas (and many other states) passed a building code "by reference." What this means is that they wrote a law saying, "Construction Company Consortium Foo has published a building code called Bar. It is now the law. Ask them for a copy." Builders are now requiored to follow a law they are not legally allowed to view, except by buying it from the industry association that wrote it.
There's a challenge to the building code copyright, on the basis that the intent of the model code was for it to be written into law, so writing it into the law is fair use and then copies of the law are then not copyrighted (though the model code, with the identical words, still is).
Of course if that loophole for the building code pans out it won't apply to ELUAs. They were never passed into law by a legislature, so their copyrights (if any) are rock-solid.
They're a CONTRACT. As such they're the work product of one or more lawyers, probably a work-for-hire so the client owns the copyright. Contracts are allowed to be secret. Making a few extra copies of one you have signed or are considering might be fair use. But putting the full text of one in a database and publishing the database almost certainly isn't.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
I would guess that the rundowns of answers should read something like this:
I want to know the first EULA that said we can't reverse engineer their software: I would wager it was one of the first pieces of software when copyright became a concern. Probably one of the first flavors of MAC OS or Windows.
first that said they can watch our activities: Which came first? Gator or WinXP? Maybe a version of IE or Media Player before these?
I want to know how the NES agreement differs from the GameCube: Did the NES even have an agreement? Have fun and enjoy? I can't remember ever having one, of course the box/manuals/instructions went away a long time ago. Did Nintendo lighten, or tighten restrictions? Now, with the potential to rip Gamecube games, I would guess that the Gamecube has much tighter restrictions.
What permissions we have been given, and taken away over that period. What rights did we have in Windows 3.1, compared to Windows XP?: I'd guess that we've been given many additional permissions. Windows 3.1, IIRC, didn't really have much in the EULA regarding the Internet. I don't think it was a huge factor at the onset.
I will try my best to find some of these older EULAs. I'm pretty sure I've got WIN 3.1 sitting around somewhere. I can fire it up and see where it leads.
Really though, as time goes by, I think companies want to protect their product as much as possible. They're more and more concerned with "piracy" (--I'm not raping and pillaging, so how is it piracy?) and the like, which is just another reason to change how users can use their systems. There are certain ways where this doesn't affect the majority, ie the reverse engineering clauses, but when you start to deal with things like privacy invasions, that affects almost all users, excluding those not on the net or with decent firewalls.
MS and Mac have been concerned with things like this from practically their beginnings. Palladium is MS's next step in restricting consumer rights, dictating what you can and cannot put on your own computer.
Just my $.02. I'd write more, but my day is done, and I'm going home from work now. Later.
. . . but there's a clause in the EULA that prohibits that.
CEE5210S The signal SIGHUP was received.
Aren't EULA's copyright?
Just wait till the BSA lawyers show up.
The Fifth Circuit recently overruled that panel opinion, holding that people could not be barred by copyright from reading or copying "the law". See here for more.
-- Openlaw: Fighting for fair use and the public domain
I could see that logic being applied to a negotiated contract; Company X may not want Company Y to know what Company Z's terms are. But EULA's are boiler plate and distributed to anyone who buys the software. They're not exactly secret, and I could be considering accepting the EULA for almost any software product at anytime.
Urm, maybe coming from a state that was one of the first on the UCITA bandwagon has me a little over-cautious, but aren't EULA's copyright? Does this count as fair use? I'm really not trying to be funny or troll, etc. -- I'm genuinely curious.
If you really have time, you might want to try to make an English translation of the EULAs so you're not breaking the copyright on them.
The original Copyright covers translations, too.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
I can see it now, the day after a major software package is released, the site slows to a crawl as everyone scrambles to check out the EULA so they're not left out of the chat around the water cooler!
~Philly
I have zero respect for any law.
I only respect people.
For example, on a traffic red light, I if there is no person trying to cross the street, and no car coming on the crossing, I just go ahead (if there is no cam watching me).
Don't ask if you can do something, you'll receive a NO.
Just do it and see if anyone will try to stop you.
We are $BIG_CORP. You're just an individual. Bend over like the bitch that you are because we have enough money and lawyers to crush any opposition you might present. Have a nice day, and enjoy your limited rights to use $BIG_CORP products.
Collecting and redistributing EULAs be in fact a violation of the terms of the EULA in the first place? Oh the irony...
Just because you can mod me down, doesn't mean you're right. Shoes for industry!
What sort of thought has been given to the "dynamic EULA" that comes about through the successive installation of various security updates, patches, etc. that come down the pipe so frequently these days? Would you be able to watch your fair use rights get wrung out like a wet towel as you progress from the "release" version of WMPXP through the various "fixes" to whatever form it will take in the future? That's something I'd like to see... especially since the advent of "Automatic Updating" as a feature of XP; most people don't ever encounter the EULA's for the updates that their PCs are installing for them...
An oldie but goody...
Comment removed based on user account deletion
I think this project is slightly reminiscent of work done at the Maximegalon Instititue for Slowly and Painfully Working Out the Suprisingly Obvious. Let me save you a little work.
Here, in a nutshell, is the heart of every EULA.
All your base are belong to us.
Steven
-- I have marked myself unwilling to moderate-- I don't have other accounts to artificially inflate the karma of
I think this is a fine idea. I can see many a pleasant evening writing scripts to extract all sorts of correlations. I'd love to see this on the web, and downloadable in one big chunk.
It's not wasting time, I'm educating myself.
All your base are belong to us!
http://kered.org
One more advantage of this site is that it will allow you to read the EULA of a piece of software you are considering without having to download, buy, or un-shrinkwrap it.
You'll get tons of them from people sharing their C: drives to the while world from Windows boxes.
Using the "Find" utility on this NT box yields EULA's for Acrobat, MS Messenger, MS Chat, NetMeeting NT, Microsoft Internet, Winzip, MS Office, and Internet Explorer.
I tried every decent and legal way I could think of to resolve the issue w/the business before I rented the chicken suit
I believe that by default virtually anything that you "create" including things like an EULA are copyrighted, unless that right is specifically waived.
"Politicians are interested in people. Not that this is always a virtue. Fleas are interested in dogs." P.J. O'Rourke
I've thought about this myself. What I wanted to do was "color code" each phrase/sentence in the EULA, and come up with some "EULA-description markup language" for it. There would be a different color for each of these categories:
Redundant text (pink or gray maybe) - anything that repeats copyright law, i.e., "you may not distribute copies"
Dubious text (red) - anything that attempts to limit your rights further than copyright law, i.e., "you may not use this product to disparage microsoft" .. I call it dubious because this is the stuff that shouldn't be binding unless you've signed a contract.
Descriptive text (blue) - anything that describes the behavior of the product or the company, i.e., "if multiple versions of this product are detected, we will drop a bomb on your grandmother's house", or "this product will delete the competitor's product upon installation". This isn't really "license"-related, but describes the product.
Rights-granting text (green) - anything that says you have permission from the copyright holder to do things you're not otherwise allowed to do, i.e., "you may distribute copies verbatim if you include this copyright notice"
Filler text (light green) - this is junk that you should ignore completely, such as any "summaries" (if the license is binding, it's the LICENSE that's binding, not any summary they may have written for your benefit). This also includes the stuff in the GPL about "freedom", which is nice to know, but not necessary.
Imagine having each license color-coded like this, you could even view thumbnails of the licenses to see which one was best, showing the different blocks of color at a glance. For instance, the GPL would probably be all "Filler" and "Rights-granting" and you could visually see that it indeed is more "consumer-friendly" (lots of green) than the average microsoft license (lots of red).
Also note, any license that says "the terms of this license are subject to change" should be treated specially (for instance, all BRIGHT RED), since, for all intents and purposes, it may change *completely* at any time, and could conceivably be 100% Dubious and should be treated as such.
I'd love to see something like this combined with a database of licenses.
All your funny are belong to a year and a half ago!
Someone set up us the dead horse!
You have no chance to be funny make your time!
Karma: Non-Heinous
Such a database could be exempt from US copyright laws if it was operated outside the US. Most European companies, for example, will not allow an EULA to dictate anything (much less anything about its own copyright status).
sm
"Light is faster than sound." - "Is that why people tend to look bright until you hear them speak?"
Last month I was cleaning house, and tossed at least 100 old manuals for computer games. Dating back at least 10 years.
"Politicians are interested in people. Not that this is always a virtue. Fleas are interested in dogs." P.J. O'Rourke
IANAL, but if someone were to discover the first EULA used in a piece of commercial software (that still bore some relevance to current EULAs), bought it from the original owner and decided to defend its patent on the EULA, couldn't this company then claim royalties from all other software companies for using EULAs that were "substantially identical"?
;-)
Better still, don't demand royalties, just prohibit anyone from using anything substantially identical to piss them all off
Code, Hardware, stuff like that.
New revised and shortened EULAs of the future:
Section 1:
You opened the package. We 0wnz y0ur 4ss, 4nd y0 M4mm4's 2.
Section 2:
See Section 1
You say things that offend me and I can deal with it. Can you?
In case there is any doubt about where things are going, here is the Ultimate EULA:
You agree that I can do anything I like, and that you have no power whatsoever.
You agree to say only good things about me.
(I once knew a 3-year-old who said things like this.)
You can't do it; an English translation of the EULA would clearly be a circumvention device. Illegal under the DMCA of course.
Unless they've changed something with the GameCube that I don't know about (I don't have one yet), there are no licensing agreements for the end-users of Nintendo hardware or Nintendo-licensed software. There's a warning in the back of instruction manuals of recent games against copying, but that's all it is: a warning. Heck, we're talking about a company that has historically relied on nothing more than physical incompatibilities bewteen regional consoles (number of pins in NES vs. Famicom, plastic tabs in cartridge slots of SNES, N64, etc.) to separate their markets.
If you want to talk about SDK user and/or game liscencing and such, I can almost guarantee you that those licenses have mellowed dramatically over the years (from "Thou Shalt Not Release Games on non-Nintendo Systems for 4 Years" through a number of lawsuits to "Hey, we're just glad you're coding for our console").
According to folklore in the database world,
Oracle was the first to have the restriction
for publishing performance data.
This is documented in here
--------------
I sig, therefore I was.
I mean the license for the DVD consumer. The contract between MPAA and you.
There must be one. You see, under DMCA, you are violating the law every time you play a CSS-protected DVD, unless you have authorization to bypass the technological device that restricts access. If you have authorization, then bypassing wasn't circumvention. If you don't have authorization, then bypassing was circumvention.
And there is only one possible way that you can have this authorization: if you got it from them, somehow.
You either you got permission from them, and playing the DVD is legal, or you didn't, or you're a DMCA criminal.
Since MPAA attacked DeCSS, we can infer that this authorization is conditional; it doesn't just come with buying the DVD. They don't just say, "Anyone who buys our DVD may watch it." We know it's not that simple. But what the actual conditions are, or any other aspects of this deal is, remain highly mysterious. It might be that people with dark skin are not allowed to watch DVD. Or it may just have descriptions of the type of equipment that you're allowed to play it on, or something like that. Who knows?
The only way to know, is to see the text of the license that states under what conditions the end user is authorized to bypass the access control.
Whatever this license is, it's an interesting one, like the GPL, in that it actually grants you a power that you would otherwise not have (permission to watch the DVD, which would otherwise by prohibited by DMCA), in exchange for taking away other rights. Just as you can't redistribute a GPL program (a power you ordinarily wouldn't have) without either violating copyright law or agreeing to the GPL's terms, you can't watch a DVD without either violating the DMCA law or agreeing to the mystery license.
I think the license must remain secret, because if it were disclosed, it would be blatant evidence of product-tying and trigger Antitrust action. Of course, you shouldn't speak too loudly about the contract possibly having illegal terms in it, because if it's an illegal contract, then it's an invalid contract, and then you don't have authorization to watch DVDs. So if you want to watch the movie, shut your mouth.
To watch DVDs, we must be resigned to having agreed to a secret contract we'll never get to see the terms of. Does MPAA own your house? Are you sure?
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
The only problem I can see is getting the exact dates the EULAs where made, as sometimes they are changed or for websites its sometimes unclear.
Good Luck!
For example, Alltel (though maybe then they were Aliant) would not permit me to retain a copy of the EULA for ADSL service to which I had to agree. Not even a photocopy post-signature.
I'm pretty sure that's not legal. If you've signed a contract, you should have a copy of the terms that you agreed to. That's just common sense. You should have asked a lawyer about that.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
I was just going through a minor program's EULA, and found a funny typo. You know how EULAs have a limited warranty that doesn't warrant anything beyond the physical media? The warranty doesn't ensure "merchantability or fitness for a specific task" or such.
This one doesn't cover "merchant ability or fitness for a particular purpose...." So the warranty does not cover the ability of the MERCHANT to actually anything, or be fit to do anything. What a riot.
I want to know which EULA first said "by using this software you agree to...".
A Government Is a Body of People, Usually Notably Ungoverned
You could apply a similar system to ordinary EULAs. If the license grants you new rights, use a picture of lady liberty. If the license restricts you more than copyright alone, use a picture of lady liberty in hand cuffs. If the license allows spying, use a picture of someone in the shower as seen through binoculars. If the license allows the copyright holder to change the terms, use a picture of the devil holding up the contract.
>Perhaps because you don't want to download all ;)
>the software just to discover that you can't
>accept the EULA terms?
Yeah, it must be a real bother downloading a lot of software and then finding you can't accept the EULA
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
If someone gives me (at work) a machine that already has all software installed, hence I didn't read any EULAs, does it mean that I "agree" with them?
I'm a sysadmin and we use linux...I'm just curious.
I don't have the actual licenses, but I remember a serious controversy when Borland came out with several restrictions for their C++ compilers. You could not compile and distribute any programs that would compete with any Borland product. Precious.
3 c/9453c .htm
See this DDJ article about this:
http://www.ddj.com/documents/s=1006/ddj945
I have some old EULAs from software that's been lying around for years ... the kind where you had to tear through a sticker to get to the diskettes. But I don't have the spare time to key them in for email. Would you like photocopies snail-mailed somewhere?
cbd.
all the EULA's that are copywritten? I bet there is at least one EULA that forbids copying of itself.
Just some food for thought. Start eating...
Welcome to the land of the free...pay toll ahead...no photography...please open your bag...
That's not the issue.
The issue is that the other party owns the right to copy the document, and to license that right to others in the way that, in their opinion, will maximize their return (or otherwise do things to advance their interests). It's THEIRS. They OWN it. YOU can only use it (beyond "fair use") if you BUY the right from them, and only to the extent that they voluntarily licensed you.
Now maybe you're a competitor writing your own ELUA who doesn't want to spend the money on lawyers to craft one for you, but instead intend to take advantage of the text THEY paid THEIR lawyers to write - and then to litigate and set precedent with. Or maybe such people will read the data base and do the same. Or maybe you'll publish articles holding it up for ridicule and copy the WHOLE THING as a sidebar. Doesn't matter. It's theirs. If they don't want you to do something with it that, in THEIR opinion, hurts them (or doesn't help them enough, or doesn't fit their business model), tough luck.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
he said it is not to create a place so we can all read those things we have ignored.
the intention is to mark the evolution of the EULA and see where certain key things started to pop in (like reverse engineering).
as for the legal side or compiling them, i don't know. i don't remember ever readin far enough into one to got to something like that. oops.
I don't remember NES games having an agreement.. Basically it said you may not copy this illegaly.
Bloodthirsty License Agreement
This is where the bloodthirsty license agreement is supposed to go,
explaining that Interactive Easyflow is a copyrighted package licensed
for use by a single person, and sternly warning you not to pirate
copies of it and explaining, in detail, the gory consequences if you
do.
We know that you are an honest person, and are not going to go around
pirating copies of Interactive Easyflow; this is just as well with us
since we worked hard to perfect it and selling copies of it is our only
method of making anything out of all the hard work.
If, on the other hand, you are one of those few people who do go around
pirating copies of software you probably aren't going to pay much
attention to a license agreement, bloodthirsty or not. Just keep your
doors locked and look out for the HavenTree attack shark.
Democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting on lunch.
Here.
The EULA is an astonishing last-ditch attempt by software publishers to fix the meaning and value of their product. In effect, it attempts to retain complete control over preferred reading of the software, while denying the consumer any rights of ownership9, control10 or appropriation11. In return for this, typically, a software publisher only promises that the product "will perform substantially in accordance with the accompanying written materials" for a period of 90 days or so.
Da Blog
Sorry my EULA states I cannot give out the details of my EULA. I may have broken the law just talking about this. I'll have my lawyers check into this...
'mmmmmmmmm.... forbidden donut'
I'll try to find time this week to scan my hard drives for all 'license' and 'EULA' files. I have files dating waaay back to windoze 3.x when these things first started popping up. Question is, did they ever get "retired"???
This is a good idea, if done right it's a great idea. If it turns out to be "bitten off more than could be chewed" then perhaps it'll inspire someone else.
Redundancy is good; triple redundancy is twice as good! - Me.
Heh. One of the first things printed on the console by many early unices in the PDP-11 era was "RESTRICTED RIGHTS". This goes back a lot further than one thinks.
Washington, DC: It's like Hollywood for ugly people.
>I just go ahead (if there is no cam watching me).
ah yes, a true anarchist....
The Welkin: Online Music Reviews
merged with island records
then time warner
thank God the internet isn't a human right.
Could you post a link to the source of that information?
Here is a link to Chapter 2 in the Danish law on copyright. Paragraph 36 and 37 are interesting. Obviously this is written in Danish, it would be interesting with links to similar laws in other European countries.
I'll try to explain to the best of my abilities what this law says:
Paragraph 36 says that if you have the right to use a program, you may also fix bugs, make backupcopies, and run the program to see how it works. Stk 4 says you cannot give up these rights by agreement.
Paragraph 37 says you may make copies and translations of a program if this is necesarry to get the information needed to achieve interoprability between software you develop and other software. Point 1 says it may be done by the licensee or people working for the licensee. Point 2 says it may only be done if the necesary information is not easily available in other ways. Point 3 says you may only translate parts necesarry to achieve the needed information. Stk 2 says the information may not be used for other pusposes than achieving interoprability. Stk 3 says the rights cannot be given up by agreement.
Do you care about the security of your wireless mouse?
bad.
[the product] is sold upon the condition that it shall not be re-sold to or by any unauthorized dealer or used for duplication, and that it shall not be sold, or offered for sale, by the original, or any subsequent purchaser (except by an authorized jobber or factor to an authorized retail dealer) for less than [price] in the united states, nor in other countries for less than the price given in the current [manufacturer] catalogues of the country in which it is sold. Upon any breach of said condition, the license to use and vend this [product], implied from such sale, immediately terminates.
That's off a 1900 Edison blue amberol cylinder record.
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
(Note: I attempted to recreate the actual legibility of the modern EULA with colons, periods and spaces, but the lameness filter quickly identified it as "junk..." hmm...)
"It would be interesting to grab a nice sample of EULAs across the last 2 decades to see what has changed, if anything."
:)
Glad to see i'm not the only one who's never bothered to read one
Now maybe you're a competitor writing your own ELUA[sic] who doesn't want to spend the money on lawyers to craft one for you, but instead intend to take advantage of the text THEY paid THEIR lawyers to write
If they wanted to do this, they could simply buy the competitor's software, and read the EULA. They don't need to get it from a database simply to be able to read it. If this company were then to copy the EULA, that would be wrong, much like copying a book in a library and publishing it as your own is wrong.ceci n'est pas une sig.
GNU GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE
The GPL makes a poor EULA because it is NOT an EULA in the first place. It's a licence for the distribution of copyright works. It specifically does not restrict how you use the software.
It's widely available. Here, for example. Other jurisdictionshave adopted it as a model.
I think it would be interesting to run a program on this database that identifies common phrases. Then you could create a map showing the relationships between the different EULAs. You could easily identify which companies are borrowing language from other companies. You could also show where certain concepts originated.
That's nice, but a EULA is not "the law", it's an agreement between parties.
I'll submit my Sega Saturn EULA!... Unless the other Saturn owner has already submitted?
OT bit: WTF can I find a decent Saturn emulator? If that machine and it's software aren't abandonware, I'll install XP!
Ali
Ph33r m3!!!
Your box will be assimilated! Resistance is futile!
Yours,
$BIG_CORP
Ph33r m3!!!
Anyone ever notice that some EULAs are presented in a non-resizable window about 3" wide and 2" high ??
/Dave
How am I supposed to read the equivalent of two 8.5"x11" sheets of typewritten text in that size of a window?
Madness. I think it's to persuade you into NOT reading the EULA, but agreeing anyways.
Personnally, when I see that kind of EULA window, I click in the text, hit CTRL-A (select all), CTRL-C, and then paste it into a blank Notepad document. Then it's much easier to read and resize.
On a related note, maybe the SlashCode programmers can increase the size of the window I'm typing in now. It's about the same size as the EULA window
FPGA, Wireless, ASIC, Verilog, VHDL, HW, 10yr exp, Team Lead, Ottawa (More? Email above. slashdotusername=dgmartin98 )
Yes, for awhile at least. But when the US passes some sort of draconian IP legislation, the EU quickly scrambles to propose a similar document for passage. Very soon Europe will have it's own DMCA (if it hasn't passed already, I haven't been checking on the progress of it). This is why I find the occasional catcalls of "you silly Americans and your silly laws, I'm glad I live in Canada/Europe/etc where we aren't bothered by that" to be somewhat shortsighted. Bad IP laws spread. Sure, maybe China and Russia might not have them (yet), but things change.