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Worst Terms of Service Ever
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.)
...this guy's got a LOT of time on his hands.
Put it this way: the only original work on the site is the TOS.
And in a hundred years there will be a Web site (or whatever passes for Web sites in the next century) dedicated to the rise and fall of the American Empire. Exhibit A will be that TOS agreement, exemplifying the self-inflicted legal quagmire that brought America to its' knees.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
That actually is a legitimate business. The problem is getting access to the original document. Mueseums typically do not allow you to take a Van Gogh off the wall to scan it.
Ever buy a print at the store? A reproduction of a work is a copyrightable work in of itself.
Conformity is the jailer of freedom and enemy of growth. -JFK
Ever buy a print at the store? A reproduction of a work is a copyrightable work in of itself.
No, it's not, not in the US. BRIDGEMAN ART LIBRARY, LTD. v. COREL CORP says that a reproduction of a work does not get a new copyright, because copyright is given for creative works, and reproduction, especially an accurate one, isn't creative; it's merely a reproduction.
The courts have held repeatedly that there is a "right to link" without the permission of the target. Whether agreed to or not, their license agreement cannot prevent anyone from linking to their domain. The overreaching hyperbole that permeates these terms of service is so extreme that I would imagine a court would hold the entire agreement invalid.
I am a geek attorney, but not your geek attorney unless you've already retained me. This is not legal advice.
It's not a joke. Look at the text you pointed to: It is very expensive and time consuming to acquire and artistically ./'ers are ranting for on the other stories about unsolicited faxes and unsolicited emails? I may not agree with all of the TOS of that site, but I can at least see the necessity for this from their point of view. They're allowing amateurs to look at these wonderful photos which they've cleaned up, but THEY'RE NOT RELEASING THEM under a BSDish license which would let someone else profit from their work, and they're making it clear that everyone visiting the site is made aware of this.
restore historic photographs, and we wanted to share thousands of
these wonderful images by placing them online for free viewing by the
public without inadvertently giving away the publication rights which
need to be retained to make our and other museums financially viable.
They have in fact done more than simply scan public domain images. They have scanned and cleaned up public domain images: this cleaning up and de-noising is what constitutes the "creative" aspect of their work. They want to retain their copy-rights (see what the word means now?) to be able to reproduce these pictures possibly in book format and sell them to recoup their expenses and perhaps also for profit.
If they didn't have TOS that said DON'T COPY THESE, THESE ARE OURS, someone else could come along and take their photograph clean-up work and profit from them giving none of the benefits of the work to those who produced their work. Now I agree that I can't claim to know how much work they did unless I could also see what the photos' scans looked like before the clean up.
And as for their phone number call charge, it's effectively the way to stop people from spamming their phone number. They're saying: Listen, we're NOT offering licenses to reproduce these images in any other medium to anyone else, DON'T BOTHER calling us to ask for this. IF YOU WASTE MY TIME by calling me at this number, I'll CHARGE YOU.
Isn't this exactly what most
Relax, please.
.KIDS.US domain because by including censorship provisions in the Dot Kids Implementation and Efficiency Act of 2002, Public Law No. 107-317, "to prohibit hyperlinks in the new domain that take new domain users outside of the new domain," Congress made it illegal to link, for example, to the Library of Congress or the National Archives website, etc. from any .KIDS.US website.)
WE REGRET THAT DUE TO THE COPPA LAW, CHILDREN UNDER THE AGE OF 13 YEARS ARE PROHIBITED FROM CONTACTING THE CPRR MUSEUM BY E-MAIL OR OTHERWISE, AND REQUESTS FOR HOMEWORK HELP OR OTHER INFORMATION ON BEHALF OF SUCH CHILDREN MUST COME FROM THE CHILD'S PARENT OR LEGAL GUARDIAN. (While we're on the subject of dumb laws, we should point out that we are unable to utilize the child safe
Based on for example that snippet (2nd word REGRET has this link) one might conclude that it isn't that serious.
From the Register article... "We're assured that because Orkut runs on Microsoft(R) Windows(TM), there will be no security issues."
But seriously... Why trust google? Trust the current owners? Maybe. The Google Corporation? No.
(Check with me in 10 years. Then tell me how silly my tinfoil hat is!)
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."
i know the parent was just joking, but it's amazing how many people think that getting around a contract is just that simple.
{sigh} when will some Slashdotters learn to recognize a joke. Grow a sense of humor for crying out loud: not everyone is trying to make a profound statement or gain Karma. I already have an Excellent rating so I don't need to whore. Frankly, I'm surprised that I got modded "Insightful" for that comment since I was only trying to be funny. But there is more than a little truth to what I said: America is bogging down under a mass of conflicting and Draconian law.
America isn't a particularly imperialistic state, not in the sense that Russia or Britain were. Mainly because empires are expensive operations to run and we don't like the taxes. I mean, unlike a number of other historically major powers we haven't sent our armies around the world annexing other coutries. We'll eventually leave Iraq to its' own devices, and only history will show if that proves better or worse for the Iraqi people. But our time will eventually come, and whether that end is catastrophic (as in a major war in which we are the losers) or as you say, a slide to third-worldom is hard to predict. The world is a dangerous place and there are a lot of people that would like to see the United States glow in the dark for a few thousand years. Given the number of people in distant parts of the world that we feed, and the amount of foreign aid we supply, I expect that many of those same people will regret it when we are gone, but that's the way the cookie crumbles.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
No one suggested that making a print of a Van Gogh would give you a copyright to the original painting. But a derivative work can be copyrighted. Go to your local book store and take a look inside the cover of a brand new copy of Shakespeare's complete works. You will see a copyright notice. This does not mean that the publisher owns a copyright to Shakespeare's original works. It simply means that they own a copyright to this edition, to prevent others from profiting off of the hard work that went into editing it.
This is why Project Gutenberg takes nearly all of their material from pre-1923 editions.
As I always say... the trick is getting the CD out of the box without opening the shrinkwrap package...
how long until
I have a method for identifying legaleze, or for that matter, anything written by a lawyer: count the number of times the document uses "in the event that" and compare to the number of times it uses "if". "In the event that" is pure, useless verbiage which can in all circumstances be replaced with "if". It's simply poor writing and is not more "clear" or "exact" than "if", but I guess it's ingrained in lawyer culture, so they continue to use it.
This document uses "in the event that" ten times, but uses "if" over eighty times. Looks like wannabe legaleze to me.
Indeed, if you look at the bottom of the document, you'll find this:
I guess my point is that this isn't as funny as you would think: if it were an actual lawyer writing this, it would show just how bad things have become around here, but it's not some lawyer, just some random loony.Another possibility is that this man has just pulled off the most masterful troll in the history of the Internet by fooling thousands of Slashdot readers into rightful indignation. However, the document seems serious about some of the provisions about copying images, so this might not be the case. On the other hand, these more plausible sections may have been added specifically to ward off trollbusters.
In any case, take it with a grain of salt. You might end up looking foolish if you say that this signals the end of American civilization.