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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?"
Security is not a feature.
Security is a reasonable expectation.
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!!
you purchase a car with a 70,000 mile warranty, but when you take it into the shop they automatically "upgrade" you to a 60,000 warranty because you recieved "consideration" in form of warranty service? In a court of law that would never hold for automobiles.. and yes, they've tried it.. it's amazing those cases aren't applied to software just as easily.
I think it's just on products that you already bought where the EULAs' validity is questionable. The reasoning was that the terms of the transaction were already finalized... you paid money and got your product. The EULA tries to add on additional terms on top of that, when the transaction was already finalized WITHOUT those terms, or so they say (IANAL and all that). Add onto this the fact that many places won't let you return opened software, and you can see that anyone who CAN'T agree to an EULA for whatever reason is in an unfair position.
But the service packs are free, so this wouldn't apply there.
"And now you see how our "culture" has gotten where it is and how the next generation will accept that which the parent will find abhorent."
EXACTLY!
just look at the unreasonable crap they cram into EULAs.
When companies tried this in the old days american workers were willing to stand up and strike, even in the face of direct threat to their familie's lives
This generation is one of mindlessness, cowardice, and greed.
This is because of the way our schools and news are used to bombard us as citizens and our children, to teach us to be "good little consumers", to teach us that anyone who questions what the news outlets say is a "tinfoil hatted nut-job", and to persuade us not to act on the mountain of evidence that a wealthy few are impeding and keeping down the lower 95% of us by pounding in this false message that "you too can become rich if you work hard and play by our rules"....bullshit. The people whom these eula's represent are above the laws, they write the damn laws, and they write them with the specic aim of making sure they never have to share their power or money with we the peeons.
VLC FOR MAC IS DYING! IF YOU DEVELOP, PLEASE SAVE IT!!
What if the EULA allowed Microsoft to require spyware on your machine. Actualy, the HIPPA crowd had a huge issue with a change a few years ago when MS added the ability with WGA to inspect your machine and documents and phone home at will... that's not in the original EULA of Windows XP. For the HIPPA people that addition could mean non-compliance with the law... by installing a security update? That's taking advantage of the customer needing their product to work in order to better their own position....that's wrong.