Worst Terms of Service Ever

Popageorgio writes "Yale's Lawmeme features the most oppressive, paranoid web site TOS ever, found at the Central Pacific Railroad Photographic History Museum. 'Additionally, in the event that your actions in violation of this User Agreement result in our being deprived of our exclusive rights . . . you agree to pay us liquidated damages in the amount of five million U.S. dollars . . . . You agree to use only the provided permissions e-mail address (or other e-mail links on this website, as appropriate) and not to telephone us or content contributors with permissions or other requests, nor to attempt to circumvent the provisions of this agreement, and telephone calls placed in disregard of the foregoing will be charged at two hundred fifty dollars per telephone call.'(Emphasis theirs)." The museum acknowledges this is crazy, too -- read on for more.

The legal birdseed here (appropriately and manically illustrated in the manner of The Secret Guide to Computers) makes the copy on Dr. Bronner's Soap look sane; the user agreement ("Click on any link or image to indicate "I ACCEPT" the USER Agreement.") begins with a little blurb about why it's necessary, and asks you not to be put off by the legalese. That might seem disingenuous at first, but buried in the text is this note, too: "[Yes, we know that you think that all this legalese is completely ridiculous, and we think so too, but we also believe that current law unfortunately requires that it be done this way; So if you know of a better, simpler 'legally correct' way, do tell us how!]"

(Besides this amusing legal stuff, the site is actually very interesting, at least if you enjoy U.S. history and trains.)

Comments

Oh, The Temptation

[The Dobber]

Think I'll call em from a pay phone, just for shits and giggles

Re:Oh, The Temptation

[DigiShaman]

Better yet, call them from the SCO office. I would LOVE to see the fallout from this!

Re:Oh, The Temptation

[Gothic_Walrus]

No...you're doing it all wrong.

Want to call? Call collect from a pay phone. Now that would be fun...

:)

Re:Oh, The Temptation

[identity0]

No no no, don't pay the bills yourself - have someone else do it!

Call up SCO, and tell them "I want to tip you off that there is a large number of unlicensed SCO/Linux boxes at the Central Pacific Railroad Photographic History Museum. Call (phone #), and ask them for licenses - in fact call them repeatedly, they may pretend to not know what you're talking about."

Hilarity ensues.

Hrmmm...

[Ooter]

Are you sure this isn't the SCO Museum (which is hopefully soon to come)?

COLLECT

[MonkeysKickAss]

how about 1800collect or 1800 callatt

My Favorite:

[Anonymous Coward]

Do Not download or copy any images from this site.
Fortunately I didn't violate this part as I use lynx
for all www browsing. Others who use MSIE, Netscape/Mozilla,
Opera, ICab, etc. can't say the same though.

But...

[iammaxus]

telephone calls placed in disregard of the foregoing will be charged at two hundred fifty dollars per telephone call.
...
So if you know of a better, simpler 'legally correct' way, do tell us how!"


So I'm going to have to pay $250 to try to help them?

Re:But...

[chunkwhite86]

telephone calls placed in disregard of the foregoing will be charged at two hundred fifty dollars per telephone call.

I wonder if I could place this note next to my name in the phone book.

Go ahead and violate the terms of my EULA you telemarketing bastards! ;-)

Oh shit...

[gt25500]

Do not download or copy images from this website!<--- In CAPS too :o

Can anyone recomend a good lawyer?

That TOS is WEAK!

[Flavius Stilicho]

There's nothing in the TOS about slashdotting the site. If they really cared, it'd be in there.

Reporting Errors

[osmodion]

"You agree to immediately notify CPRR.org by e-mail of any errors, ... or any other defects or deficiencies which you discover on this website . . . ."

Should I tell them about the TOS?

Too much time on their hands

[tscholz]

That is the longest TOS page I have ever seen. Looks like they have used more time on the TOS, than on the rest of the site.

I should be racking up money....

[Prince Vegeta SSJ4]

since all of you unsuspecting /. ers have agreed to my license terms muhahaha

Re:Hold up

[Anonymous Coward]

I always "Tab" to the "Click Here to Accept" link and then press "spacebar", thus passing by the whole "clicking" issue altogether.

As of 8:16PM EST on 2.7.04....

[Flavius Stilicho]

There were 724,970 Visitors since 2.15.99.

As of 8:16PM EST on 2.8.04... they're going to need a bigger hit counter.

The TOS covers everything

[jdkane]

... except re-posting some of the TOS on other sites like Slashdot.

Too long...

[Da Weave]

With a TOS that long, who has time to check out the rest of site?
and no, I didn't RTFTOS, not completely at least.

Re:Hold up

[jonfromspace]

I don't click links anymore, I type them into IE!

Sorry /troll

Johnny Cochran

[Anonymous Coward]

The chewbacca defense r0x0rz y0ur b0x0rz

Re:Hold up

[crabpeople]

cleaver, but your still clicking keys.

i just say 'tab, tab, tab, tab, space' into my voice recognition software and viola!

Re:Your Soul

[Mod Me God]

and by clicking agree, you agree with full knowledge that you give up your mind, body, soul, finances and all property wether physical or intellectual, to the owner of (insert product or website) to do with as he/she pleases

don't you have to sign that to enrole at most universities?

Re:Hold up

[yourmom16]

But your speech is a superposition of clicking noises, as any continuous sound wave(that is one that does not involve teleporting particles, or infinite forces) can be expressed as a superposition of sound waves that on their own would be clicking sounds.

Re:Hold up

[bluGill]

Maybe, but my Atari400 with that membrane keyboard finaly has one good point: it doesn't click. (of course I had to void my warrintee by disconnecting the speaker to get it to stop clicking, but now there is now noise. I suppose the 90 days for a computer manufactured in 1981 is long gone though)

Now I just need to hook it up to the web... Doable, but many web pages are more bigger than my ram.

Re:Parody

[PacoTaco]

Sometimes I think our entire legal system is a functional parody.

A Shorter TOS

[woluwedal]

Your f*cked if you've read this! (under 13's friendly version)

Re:Hold up

[Anonymous Coward]

What? Your voice reocognition software plays a stringed musical instrument?

Re:Hold up

[kisielk]

I think he means that he speaks in to his viola. Definitely a strange way to interface with a computer.

Oh YEAH?!

[Hwatzu]

I'm going to change my hostname to "you_agree_to_let_me_take_any_image_from_your_site .by_including_this_host_in_your_logs_and_permittin g_me_to_connect". If it shows up in their logs, it's conclusive proof that they wanted me to take things from their site.

Re:Hold up

[Anonymous Coward]

But if I don't accept the agreement, then I also am not accepting that clause that says clicking on a link accepts said agreement.

Re:Hold up

[dekashizl]

i just have my thai hooker click ACCEPT for me. she's under 18 and not even a citizen, so i'm pretty much in the clear.

Re:Hold up

[nomel]

what if he left his keyboard out in the rain. Then it would be an "act of God".

"In the news, the Central Pacific Railroad Photographic History Museum is sueing God for a breach of contract."

Click on the link to see the agreement...

[fireman sam]

I thought by forcing a user to agree to an agreement that could not have been viewed before agreement would cause the agreement to be void.

In this case it states "Click on any LINK or image to indicate "I ACCEPT" the USER Agreement." Where User Agreement is in fact a link. Hence, you have agreed to an agreement which you were unable to view before agreement.

This is the same as placing stickers on CD/DVD roms stating "by opening this packet you agree to the enclosed User Agreement". The user agreement then would go on to say "...You are to sacrifice a virgin on every full moon (or in the case of /. users, themself on the first full moon)"

Re:Hold up

[Paradise Pete]

my Atari400 with that membrane keyboard finaly has one good point: it doesn't click. (of course I had to void my warrintee by disconnecting the speaker to get it to stop clicking

Oh man, just POKE 65, 0

Commercial licensing of images.

[jms]

The best part is the parts that talk about how you can license images from them for commercial purposes:

By submitting your request for permission or permissions inquiry, you are obligating yourself and your organization(s), if any, to license, immediately pay for, and to actually make use of the image(s) or other content requested in the manner as set forth in your application, should permission be granted.
...
Abandoned application fee: There is no application fee, but you will be charged a one hundred U.S. dollar non-refundable abandoned application fee per e-mail for EACH AND EVERY E-MAILed "Request for License to Reproduce Still Images," permissions inquiry, follow-up, or other permissions related e-mail that we receive from you that fails to ultimately result in your licensing at least one image or other requested content, including but not limited to e-mails related to image selection, questions, billing, and collection of fees, except that no abandoned application fee will apply if you submit a complete application in your first e-mail but none of the images that you request are available for licensing. Also, we may, at our sole discretion, deem your application to have been abandoned and charge the abandoned application fee if you fail to respond to each of our e-mails within 72 hours, if you reject a license which we approve in response to your request, fail to make timely payment as required herein, or tell us that you do not want a license.

Ok, that's obnoxious and draconian. But here's the real kicker. The part that made me almost keel over with laughter

If a requested image is of lesser quality than another similar available image, we may, in our sole discretion, substitute the better quality image.

Translation: If you even ask us about licensing an image, you are obligated to pay us for the image. Then feel free to sit back, cross your fingers and hope that we decide to give you the image you paid for, instead of another image that you don't want or need.

I mean, holy freaking shit!

Re:Hold up

[Grey Ninja]

Soo... umm.... just for the sake of advancing my own knowledge of course... whereabouts do you find these underage thai hookers?

Re:Hold up

[DNS-and-BIND]

Thailand maybe? Just a guess.

Re:Hold up

[tsa]

Wow, there should be a '+5, nerd' option for the moderators!

Re:Hold up

[fucksl4shd0t]

If you add on line 3,567 in comments.pl the following line:

#@*&^ if $#KDjk^es '+5, Nerd'

Then you'll have it!

Re:Hold up

[Planx_Constant]

Only on /. could a post stating that Thai hookers come from Thailand get rated "+1 informative".

Although I do think the sarcasm is funny.

alrighty then

[sacrilicious]

i just have my thai hooker click ACCEPT for me. she's under 18 and not even a citizen, so i'm pretty much in the clear.

not so. she's an agent to whom you have given actual authority. you--as the principal--are therefore responsible for any contracts that she enters on your behalf by clicking "accept."

Ok, then I have my cat walk on the keyboard. My cat is definitely not a citizen, and I'm pretty sure he's under 18 (at least he LOOKS under 18), and he's never been to law school so I'm willing to bet he couldn't be formally have authority as principal conferred on him in a way that I couldn't somehow contest. Of course if the cat decides to roll over and testify against me it could get ugly. I'd probably give him a good spraying with the hose.

Re:Hold up

[grammar fascist]

If you add on line 3,567 in comments.pl the following line:

#@*&^ if $#KDjk^es '+5, Nerd'

Then you'll have it!

And what do you call that language? "Cuss"? "Programming With Expletives"?

Oh, wait. That's perl.

Re:Gratitude

[Kredal]

AAAHHHH! You sent them an unsolicited email! You could be liable for thousands of dollars in damages! Quick! Hire a lawyer!

Re:stupid terms of service and the court

[caluml]

if someone had a contract that required an illegal activity (like human slavery or prostitution)

Damnit - lucky for me the chains won't let her get to the computer to read Slashdot...

Re:Hold up

[dar]

hmm, would that make God your agent?

No. God is my co-pilot.