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The Self-Modifying EULA?
An anonymous reader asks: "Years ago, when I first installed Windows 2000, I accepted its EULA. Despite serious defects in the product, I resisted installing Service Packs because they modify the original EULA. Now even Homeland Security is on my back to upgrade and install a fix. I would be happy to install SP4 and all the security patches BUT ONLY IF IT IS DONE UNDER THE ORIGINAL EULA. Otherwise, Microsoft has made me an unwilling zombie. The clear fact is that Microsoft delivered a defective product- should not allow them to redefine our agreement. I cannot think of any other market that successfully browbeats its customers in this manner. Can this be legal? Has it been tested in court?"
That certain parts of the update required some sort of change to the EULA? Possibly a new feature or option that was not covered by the original?
Then again, you could always just not accept the EULA and not install it... despite what DHS says. That's why there's another option to select.
No one's forcing you to use the product. The product was not defective; it was merely lacking in features. You knew about all of them before purchasing it and accepting its EULA. If you do not want to accept the new EULA then don't use the product. It's that simple. Either stick to SP1, or switch to a better OS altogether.
If you want the software patch, you accept the new licensing agreement. If you don't want the new EULA, no one is forcing you to download anything. Sounds like a perfectly valid contract to me, but IANAL.
Talk to your lawyer. Depending on the circumstances, there's a good chance that those EULAs aren't enforceable anyway, regardless of what Microsoft tells you.
http://outcampaign.org/
...what terms have changed that you object to?
-b
If I wanted a sig I would have filled in that stupid box.
I really think you're splitting hairs here... I wouldn't jeopardize the security of my system by being nit-picky about the fine print of an EULA. In the end, I don't think it amounts to much.
Isn't it kind of a moot point? I mean, has it been held in any court in your (or any) jurisdiction that EULA's are at all binding? Not trolling, actually curious. Are EULA's binding in a court? If they aren't, who cares what it says? I can understand the point of honor here, but I wouldn't let it keep me from getting much-needed upgrades.
Those who anthropomorphize science and/or nature already believe in an intelligent designer.
Well there not really on your back to install the fix. It's just the simplest solution for the vast majority of people. If you are not the vast majority read the freaking website on how to plug up the holes. The DHS does in fact post more than one way to ensure you computer is secure but closing up the holes. Of course with the number of holes you will be bashing your head up against the wall. It depends on your stuberness. Here is an interesting question though. Are then infact changing the EULA or just giving you another one for the patch. Im not hip to the jive of the Microsoft's EULA.
Ooo man the floppy drive is broken. No wait. The computer is just upside down.
The hidden message: I would like to start a flamewar. Is this a good question to ask?
Slashdot - where whining about luck is the new way to make the world you want.
Well submitter, I guess it would be helpful to know what modifications you're complaining about? I can't really find a genuine concern beneath all your rhetoric
Spoken like someone who has never written software of any consequence. All software has bugs. Do you consider every piece of software you own to be defective?
We, geeks, maintain that clicking on a button cannot give Microsoft more rights than those given by copyrights. To help the cause, Slashdot must stop publishing stories that assume that EULAs are valid.
Quit bitching and bend over. You knew what you were getting into when you installed Windows, yet you have the nerve to complain here?
There are some rulings which have held eulas to be invalid primarily because you're forced to exchange the money before youre allowed to actually see the contract, and on other grounds I as someone who is not a lawyer know nothing about.
Other sellout--err judges have held eulas are valid contracts.
To me it seems like they should all be invalidated in their entirety. EULAs as contracts are not negotiated between two parties who have equal latitude. One party has extreme market power, and the other doesn't even have the capacity for negotiation with said entity and has the choice of either accepting unreasonable terms or living in a cave by candle light. (no,that's not an exaggeration; companies are now insisting they still own your electronics even after you buy them --see microsoft tirades against xbox modders--)
VLC FOR MAC IS DYING! IF YOU DEVELOP, PLEASE SAVE IT!!
If you don't want to be a Microsoft zombie, then there is an option which is, in every way more secure from the get go, and gives you the freedom (as in free will) to choose, Linux. Investigate the various distros and choose one that fits your needs. All in all each distro has good and bad about it, but under it all is Linux, and that alone is worth the effort to remove Microsoft from the picture and not be their zombie.
Excuse me for thinking you're missing a few nuts but why the hell do you care what it sais in SP4's EULA? Yes, SP4 EULA has its problems and I would be inclined to give you the benefit of the doubt if it was't for your inexplicable explanation that you need to update your windows now cause DHS sais so... doh! Where have you been for the last three years? SP4 came out on June 26, 2003!!! And as for MS products being defective - this is surely news to everyone here. Reality is a harsh place for those who can't cope with it.
www.tribalnetworks.org - helping tribal people around the world to own their own means of high-tech communications
Look back to your original EULA. Almost every EULA I've ever seen has said something about "The company reserves the right to modify this End User License Agreement at any time, with or without any notice." I'm not sure if the "with or without notice" part will stand in court, but otherwise I don't see any problem with it. If I don't like the new terms, I simply stop using the software and securely erase all copies of it off my hard drive.
"You teach a child to read and he or her will be able to pass a literacy test." - President George W. Bush
Nowhere in there is the word "command", or the words "you will" or any other sort of wording that requires you to install any sort of patch immediately and forthwith.
You're free to run your unpatched system at your and everyone else's peril as long as you want. On the other hand, if you haven't been patching your system, and you're a System Administrator, you're an idiot and should be fired as soon as possible. If this is your home machine, you're just an idiot.
"My God...it's full of trolls!"
Can't you just edit eula.txt in the SP? I think it's just a text file.
"it's amazing those cases aren't applied to software just as easily."
Why the surprise? Slashdot in every copyright story posted has always argued that the digital domain. e.g software, music, etc falls under a different set of rules (from legal to economic) Don't bitch just because they're not working in your favour.
Canthros
Note the complete absence of restrictions on version numbers, other providers and making up one's own mind. And licence-fee auditing. That's how I like it to be. All of the updates come under the same EULA each time.
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
"So what? The question is still valid, why should they be allowed to rewrite the agreement for security updates"
Much like the FSF rewriting the GPL for ideological purposes.
This must be the millionth time I've seen this comment from a smug linux geek...
First of all Linux is what gives me the discomfort and headaches - W2K with SP2 and SR1 is secure and stable thank you very much. Every time I've tried Linux (Debian, Ubuntu and currently Suse) I've faced hardware problems as well as stupid things you need to hack some Make file or the kerner to get it to work. No thanks. W2K just works (and BTW is currently running apache, ssl, vpn etc. - and this is just my home workstation).
Secondly, yes, we all know that OpenBSD and others are up there in the ivory tower but who really gives a shit. Some people actually do work on these stupid machines and have invested years learning one particular operating system. Migrating to Linux would involve a learning curve that only students have time for. And then there is all the software, some of which might be replaceable but in my case not. The closest thing out there is OSX but it has the hardware vendor-lock-in problem with limited support for various things essential to my work. Maybe one day when the world stops supporting W2K.
www.tribalnetworks.org - helping tribal people around the world to own their own means of high-tech communications
...EULA accepts you.
In a market economy (or as close to one as any country gets) you can always decide that a company no longer provides the best option and not use them.
Many alternative OSes (resisting, resisting, LINUX, oops) offer higher security (seems that's a concern of yours) as well as better licencing/EULAs.
-Tim Louden
The originating company has a different problem as they can never say 'that's not our software' where as the end user can always say 'I never clicked on that button, I'm not bound by the contract.'
Of course if you want to see how much companies believe in their EULA call one up and ask for a refund because you don't agree to the EULA. They all say 'If you don't wish to be bound by this agreement, return the product for a full refund.' Which contradicts the return policy of most software outlets by the way, and should be done directly with the company, not the place you bought it from, as it's not their fault. Good luck by the way, I've tried it with Microsoft, Mathworks, and HP. Not one company would issue a refund.
Transport company X has a fleet of brand Y trucks. It is time to replace a portion of them. So they buy a handfull of brand Z trucks, park them at the entrance then invite the sales rep for brand Y to come by for a talk. "Well we have been thinking of upgrading our fleet of trucks. We are looking for offers, by the way have you seen those new Z trucks? Nice aren't they? So what kinda of deal can we expect from you?"
Then ask them wich OS they buy and how they deal with their OS seller. Watch them be confused.
It is sensible business. If you are a fleet manager and you would come to your boss saying, "Hi boss, I completely standarized on brand Y trucks, our repair shops can repair nothing else, our drivers can drive nothing else, our loading stations can accept nothing else, we are now one hundred procent at their mercy of brand Y. Oh hi Mr Sales rep from Brand Y, why are you grinning like that?"
Such a fleet manager would be fired in an instant.
In IT, that is what has been taking place for the last decade. The same trucking companies that do everything to get their trucks with the cheapest discount hand over their IT to companies selling just one solution and totally tie their entire company to just one supplier.
Insanity but when it comes to IT common business rules do seem to apply.
In holland the goverment tries to keep monopolies from happening. Market forces can after all only work if there is more then one player right?
So we get silly stuff like the attempt to run more then one company on the dutch rail system (crowded in a crowded country) or Shell being stopped from owning more highway gas stations. Or even sillier stuff like privatizing stuff like gas and elec even medical insurance. All meant to drive down price and all the price does is skyrocket up.
And what is done about the ultimate monopoly? Shit all. Forget Shell owning 80% of dutch highway gas stations. Try MS owning 9*% of all the worlds desktops.
Face it. IT doesn't follow normal rules. No you would not accept a new EULA (or any EULA at all) when your car company recalls your car to have your brakes fixed. In IT MS owns your ass and they can do whatever they want.
But it easy to buy another brand of truck. For proof, just look at your big local trucking company, they almost always got a handfull of trucks of another manufacturer. Keeps your supplier on its toes and the costs are trivial. Now try doing the same with computers. Oh it used to be done. Only a very BAD IT manager would not make sure that his IBM datacenter did not have a couple of Sun machines installed in plain sight. But when it comes to desktops we have come to accept lock-in (says a linux user and someone who refuses to answer personal ads that accept only .doc cv's) and we all can see the result.
Accept lock-in and get locked in. Yet the old trick does work. Look at munich. MS sales rep fell all over himself when he came into his clients office and saw the linux trucks parked outside. In fact MS wherever there is a rumor that a linux truck is even passing MS sends its sales reps with freebies and special deals. And still, the majority of sales meetings with MS go like this. "Ah thank you for your replying to my outlook email, can we shedule a meeting in outlook, I will get your details from access, to meet up and discuss us buying 100 more licenses, I will send you the details in a Word document, btw what kind of pricecut can we look forward too?"
You can hardly blame MS for it can you? Not their fault that everyone has their head up their ass when it comes to IT.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
W2K with SP2 and SR1 is secure and stable thank you very much.
Not if you use Internet Explorer, any version of Outlook, Windows Media Player, Realplayer, Microsoft Word or Excel.
All of these programs have built into their design, at a low level, in a way that can't be fixed without breaking existing third-party software, mechanisms to allow untrusted documents and objects to execute code with the full rights of the application itself. Because Microsoft decided that sandboxes slowed things down too much.
The clear fact is that Microsoft delivered a defective product- should not allow them to redefine our agreement. I cannot think of any other market that successfully browbeats its customers in this manner. Can this be legal? Has it been tested in court?
Yes, it should not. However, "should" means nothing to Microsoft. As makes sense, given how they flagrantly violated anti-trust law and received no effective punishment despite being convicted.
It's a license, not a contract.
Arguments about single-sided contracts do not apply to licenses.
You just saw GLIBC's summary.
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
Nice scenario, pretend that you've just earned a +1 Insightful. (-:
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
I realize you PR folks get paid good money to try to build up a myth about our illustrious Chairman Gates, and you can call him many names, but not poor or even middle class. Gates is the perfect counter example and puts a bullet in the old Horatio Alger myth. He started rich, so did his parents and his parent's parents. MS was just one of tens of thousands pissant little software companies until his mom hooked him up with IBM, which because of anti-trust remedies was not at the time allowed to produce its own disk operating system for its new line of personal computers. Voilà! Instant monopoly for MS-DOS — piggybacked onto the established IBM monopoly. From then on out, every thing else has been either leveraging that monopoly, buying out and crushing smaller companies or simply stealing their goods and crusing them that way.
So lay off with that Horatio Alger shit. Anyway, turning $100 to $1000 is hard work. Turning $10,000,000 to $100,000,000 is almost innevitable, and turning $10,000,000,000 to $100,000,000,000 is almost a fact of nature.
The parents point about not being able to negotiate a contract is an extremely good one.
In the UK, all contracts MUST be open to negotiation. For a contract to be legally binding, both parties must have had an opportunity to read and edit the contract, and then a final version agreed upon.
So, presumably if I edit EULA.txt to my own liking and then click "I agree", it's legally binding. Well, wishful thinking I guess...
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
In any reasonable market the purchaser has the duty to himself to ensure that the thing he purchases meets his requirements.
Anyone buying Windows, Linux or OSX should be aware that they are buggy, virus prone, and variously liable to collapse at innopportune moments.
Of course, these days the nanny state can be relied on to replace personal responsibility. Waa waa waa the nasty man took my money and gave me a POS. Waa waa waa.
As I recall from business law class years ago that a contract signed under durress is not valid. It would seem that a EULA accepted due to a threat is exactly the same deal that as Nero's firefighting deal which is the analogy they used to teach the concept of durress:
Step 1: thug lights house on fire.
Step 2: Nero's firefighting righ shows up with offer to put out fire for money
Step 3: House either burns down or owner agrees to sell three kids into slavery
That said, I'm no lawyer, but I did stay at a holiday inn express last night.
-- $G
Here's how I imagine this would work: a web site to which anyone can post a EULA they've encountered, and a group of lawyers who volunteer time to analyze each EULA and translate it into language anyone can understand. Inconsistencies, gotchas and other noteworthy problems would be highlighted, and the overall validity of each EULA assessed. Hopefully there would be enough buy-in that a large database of EULA analyses would be built up. One problem: are there enough lawyers out there who would be willing to donate their time and expertise?
I understand that English is a living language, but I object to changes arising merely from repeated errors.
"you too can become rich if you work hard and play by our rules"....bullshit.
I became rich by playing by their rules you insensitive clod!
-Rick (Just kidding!!)
"Most people in the U.S. wouldn't know they live in a tyrannical state if it walked up and grabbed their junk." - MyFirs
It's a real issue, but a lost cause.
The end user controlled Windows 2000. Windows XP is remote-controlled from Redmond, with automatic updates, remote DRM rule changes, and similar intrusiveness. Microsoft can reboot your XP machine by remote control. (Remember last year, when they did, even for users who thought they had that turned off?) They can't do that to Windows 2000 through SP2. Many large companies don't like that, and have stayed with Windows 2000. Yes, supposedly you can turn off all the remote controls in XP, if you can find them and if your end users don't accidentally do something that reactivates them.
Remote control actually started, though, with Windows 2000 SP3, not with with XP. That's what the EULA change reflects. It's when Microsoft added "The Software features described below are enabled by default to connect via the Internet to Microsoft computer systems automatically, without separate notice to you. You consent to the operation of these features, unless you choose to switch them off or not use them. " to the Windows 2000 EULA. That was when Microsoft first officially put a backdoor into your computer.
If you're a law firm, or a bank, or a medical service provider, or a government agency, or a Microsoft competitor, this creates some compliance problems. If you work for any of those, show that EULA to your lawyers and see what they have to say about it.
There are quite a few big companies still running Windows 2000 SP2 because of this. That's why you can still buy a new Windows 2000 system from Dell if you're a corporate customer.
"You're ignoring the fact that the patch exists to fix flaws that are defects in the original product. The patch is released because the original was not as it was supposed to be."
It should be interesting to see what happens when patches for GPLv2 code is released under GPLv3. Our next YRO story.
There have been at least three machines where
everybody on the net got to log in as root.
SE Linux stopped people from messing things up,
despite really having UID 0.
The nicest one is down now, but the FAQ is
an interesting thing to read:
http://www.coker.com.au/selinux/play.html
"Basically, the issue is whether products are required to meet some basic standard of security for some period of time after release. Patches for 10-year-old Windows NT are one thing. Patches for software that was purchased six months ago are something else. Companies should be required to support software with security patches for at least a few years after they sell the last copy."
Good thing F/OSS comes with none of that baggage. If it breaks "you get to keep both pieces".
Oh, did I have to reverse engineer Windows to realise that it was going to be less reliable than a *NIX based OS? No.
I did as you probably did when you buy something that you are not an expert in, and just found out what other people thought, via say magazine reviews if nothing else.
Admittedly this is a little easier than it was back in the days when the Apple fan-boys claimed that their reliability was way ahead of W3.1, yet by personal experience, both OS's needed about the same number of reboots per day (2).
I'd have thought that if a profitable, identifiable, manufacturer had committed fraud there would be no end of private and public cases coming up in court. If not, why not? black helicopters?
Since the uptime on all my machines is greater than 1 week, all I can do is observe that NT4, XP, and Linux 2.4.2 are vastly more reliable than their predecessors from 6-8 years ago. I don't know if NT4 is more reliable now than it was then, my perception is that it is, on the other hand it has had 6 SPs so it ought to be. It probably appreciates having room to breathe as well - Linux certainly does.
I've tried it with Microsoft, Mathworks, and HP. Not one company would issue a refund.
What do you mean, you "tried"? Just a token phone call?
A serious try would be to file suit in Small Claims Court. Rules for Small Claims Court vary from state to state, but the cost is usually minimal (was $12.50 in California last time I checked, admittedly some years ago) and you can represent yourself.
It also costs some of your time in preparation, at a minimum you must check out your local public library, there are several books with the title "Sue the Bastards" and a older one from a more polite era called "Sue the B*st*rds" which I used and which was very good.
And trucks can be very different. To support more then one model (let alone brand) you need more parts. Your mechanics need to know the machines. Drivers will need to get used to different handling.
The fact is that in IT we have allowed that program A only runs on OS Y. In the real world this would not be that acceptable. Not that it doesn't happen offcourse. But it usually leads to trouble.
If you allow lockin then you are locked in. If you are one hundred percent depend on one supplier then they own your ass.
Photoshop is the least of the problems. There are alternatives and its formats can be exported. MS Office is the ultimate lockin. It is almost impossible to get your data out of it again and it only runs on the one OS (Office on mac is hardly something I would bet a company on).
This is similar to having all your logistics tied to one unique pallet system that can only work on one brand of trucks wich can only accept one brand of gas.
It is simply a dangerous tactic.
I am not denying the photoshop problem. No gimp is not an acceptable replacement to many BUT just because the problem for now can't be remedied doesn't mean that we can ignore it.
For that matter if Photoshop itself is that essential perhaps that is a risk as well.
Is it any better to have your business controlled by Adobe then by Microsoft (or for that matter Apple, IBM, Red Hat, Sun, whoever)?
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
Damn, you're a dumbass!
I'm sure you get off on imagining you're living in some kind of Libertarian utopia, but you aren't. In reality, companies in every industry except software are liable for defects in their products. Cars have to pass crash tests. Electric appliances get UL-certified. Unsafe children's toys get recalled.
Somehow, Microsoft has managed to brainwash everyone into believing that it's not responsible for its software's fuck-ups, and that's just not right.
In a truly "reasonable market" Windows would have been recalled, or Micrsoft would have been bankrupted by liability judgements long ago.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
Don't like 'doze and its endless machine-slowing disservice packs? I have a one word answer: Linux.
The parent post has nothing whatsoever to do with EULAs, and is just a generic pro-Windows (or rather, anti-learning since the entire objection is that he's scared of learning something new) rant.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
youve got the right attitude
microsoft did sell you a defective product, grossly defective
and now they are trying to 'change strokes in mid stream' which even the president has said you shouldnt do
but the solution is simple
http://www.ubuntu.com/
Sorry, but what you say is simply not true.
/was/ defective, and after four separate repairs, it is almost certainly still defective. Consumer law entitles us to all those repairs under the original terms of purchase.
The product IS faulty. As evidence, I present Microsoft's own "List of Bugs That Are Fixed in Windows 2000 Service Pack 4", at:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/327194/EN-US/
The product
By us having written this End User License Agreement (EULA), you have agreed to be bound by its terms.
Stop trying to deny that Linux has any problems. A well set up Linux system does work very well, (I use one at work) but I have run into many of the same problems the original poster experienced--hardware incompatibility, having to mess with config or make files, etc. when trying to set up some Linux systems at home.
I have tried several distros from the Linux Format magazine I have a subscription to and some other pieces of software from it. I wanted to try out a program called Phonoripper, that was included on the DVD. The configure/make/make install wouldn't work because the distro was missing the TCL/TK development libraries. I tried to set that up too, and the versions were incompatible, etc. I never could get Phonoripper set up. Most distros still don't detect integrated wireless cards in laptops very well--the newest Knoppix I tried a couple months ago didn't even detect it.
I really like Linux, and I have seen amazing strides in it in the last 5 years or so. I also know that most of the hardware detection problems are due to the headstrong jerks who make the hardware refusing to release any specs for drivers to be written. Aside from all that, you seem to have this irritating attitude I've seen a lot. You have a couple of things going for you: You probably know what you're doing better than most, and you got lucky (or shopped well) on the hardware you are running it on. So you can stroll down the path whistling a happy tune about how your good experience must be what everyone is supposed to have. So when this guy reports some bad hardware support and trying to compile something that has messed up make files and picky dependencies (which are very familiar problems to me), you accuse him of lying. You're giving Linux users a bad name--grow up.
We may experience some slight turbulence and then...explode. -Capt. Mal Reynolds
EULA's are designed to cover their asses...thats it...so WHY would YOU sue microsoft...perhaps, a bug/virus in software eats your harddrive or something...well i say go dl the new hotfix, accept the new eula, and quit your bitchin'...theyre not going to come after you because your running on 4 processors...(which it says you can only run 2)...
"Software publishers, however, face one legal issue that music publishers don't. Software has bugs. Because it's not usually possible to test a program in every feasible way it might be used in the real world, even good software can have bugs. And since bugs can cause customers big problems, software publishers use their license agreements to limit their liability and disclaim warranties."
sounds like theyre covering their asses to me? anybody else?
Have you read every EULA? On every piece of software you've bought? No? Didn't think so.
Well guess what, sunshine, Microsoft ain't the only one throwing garbage like this into its EULAs. De facto "contracts" like this are like the fine print on warranties. The only thing that any of them do is to take away your rights, and promise to do precisely nothing beneficial to you should you be materially harmed.
Seriously, you've probably agreed to have your firstborn impaled on a spike by now in at least ONE of the EULAs you've "agreed" to. Of course, I assume love and care for the firstborn which may not be true, so this may not be the best example.
The one great thing about signing your life away is that you can't materially do it twice. I say, go ahead and install the patches and if all the software companies you've sold your soul to ever try to collect, they'll be engaged in the biggest custody battle in the history of the universe.