Login Code of Conduct Found Not Binding

SurturZ writes "The Industrial Relations Commission of New South Wales, Australia, has ordered a company to reinstate an employee who downloaded porn onto a work laptop, even though it was in contravention of his workplace's code of conduct. From the article: the IRC said there was an 'air of automatically' about the annual signing off of employees on NCR's code of conduct, 'a degree of mechanical, unthinking routine in employees making a commitment to abide by the code.'" So, I think most of us can agree, porn at work == bad, but recognition that Click EULAs/other agreements are not binding is probably good. The question is — what replaces them?

Comments

Why would porn at work be that bad?

[Sebastian Jansson]

I can see why it would be bad to look at porn, rather than doing work, and in places where you might have customers walking by. But why would watching porn under a break be worse than reading Slashdot?

Memories

[Rob T Firefly]

Slightly OT, but does anyone else from the BBS scene in the 1980s remember the login screens nervous sysops used to use, with disclaimers like "no police are allowed on this board, if you login that means you're not allowed to nark on me k?" Those were funny. I remember reading an interview with a cop who as a hobby collected printouts of those screens encountered during the course of investigations.

Re:Memories

[r3m0t]

I recieved this one from UCAS technical support several times:

This message is confidential. If you are not the intended recipient please notify us immediately. You may not copy this message or use it for any purpose or disclose its contents to any other person or take any action based on them.

E-Mails are susceptible to interference. UCAS accepts no responsibility for information, errors or omissions in this e-mail, nor/or for its use or misuse nor/or for any act committed or omitted in connection with this communication. If in doubt, please verify the authenticity of the contents with the sender. UCAS reserves the right to monitor and intercept communications for lawful business purposes.

Most egregious mistakes in bold.

The conversation was another priceless one. The problem was a contradiction on their website. (Specifically on the "apply" area). I sent a screenshot, explained the problem and gave them my User-Agent string.

First they wanted me to check again, clear my cookies, and send them my ID number. I explained that the cookies weren't the problem, tried again anyway, and sent them my ID.

Then they caught on that I was using Firefox and that they "unfortunately" don't support for Firefox or test with it. (They do support Netscape Navigator 4.08, though). They didn't even log on using my ID to see whether the problem was there. (It only takes a click or two to reproduce). I sent them the same screen taken from Internet Explorer.

Finally they proved unable to see which of the 6-ish pages the problem was on. IT WAS IN THE SCREENSHOT! *sigh*grumble*grumble* Of course, every message was from a different technician. Hum hum.

Re:I Scoff at the TOS/EULA

[Creepy Crawler]

Its easier than that. I did this in small claims..

I bought a game, which didnt work at all. It was Unreal 2 (yeah, quit yer hissing). Damn thing failed on playing, and the patches did the same.

Wal-mart refused to take it back, because it's "Software".

I took Wal-mart to small claims for refusing to take back defective software. Total was 150$ (50 for game and the rest for fees and pain).

After Terry Law (manager of this wal-mart) showed up, they said I was returning it so I would get a free game. I demonstrated with a laptop that it just didnt run. And I also showed the judge thepiratebay.com and said "if I wanted it free, I wouldnt have even went to wal-mart.".

I gave the game back in the judges presence, and got a check in 150$

That's not how it works

[Infonaut]

I'm not sure TOS/EULA was ever really binding. Couldn't someone just claim ignorance.

In contracts of this type, the law isn't concerned about you per se. The test is whether a reasonable person in your circumstance would have seen and understood the terms of the contract.

Consideration & Negotiability?

[Bob9113]

the IRC said there was an 'air of automatically' about the annual signing off of employees on NCR's code of conduct, 'a degree of mechanical, unthinking routine in employees making a commitment to abide by the code.'"
So, I think most of us can agree, porn at work == bad, but recognition that Click EULAs/other agreements are not binding is probably good. The question is -- what replaces them?

How about the things that contracts are always supposed to have: consideration and negotiability. When one side has a team of lawyers and the other is intended to blindly accept the agreement, it is not the basis for good contract law. In the US, it's not even supposed to be valid. In the States, a contract is supposed to require consideration (something exchanged for the rights either side is giving up) and negotiability (the ability to discuss and request alteration of specific terms of the contract).

Beyond the fact that EULA's, AUP's, and employment agreements are rarely negotiable, the negotiability idea implies that both sides must have similar levels of legal understanding or representation. US businesses have been pushing the boundaries on this for years for many reasons, not the least of which is that it enables the side with more laywers to abuse the other side. For a simple example, look at the record industry.

While the law may not uphold the idea of similar representation, it should be obvious to any rational being that enforcing contracts formed without similar representation is bad for society. It cannot help but lead to the abuses we see today. In fact, there are many places in the States where certain contracts cannot be entered without both parties having legal representation - for example home sales in Connecticut (and I'm sure many states). While I don't much care for the idea of giving more money to lawyers, any system of civil law must eventually devolve to a state where lawyers are required for all human interaction of any consequence. This is the situation the US (and much of the world) finds itself in today. As such, one side having lawyers and the other not leads to an inherently tilted playing field. Given also that the world's predominate economic system (the free market) requires a level playing field, it should be apparent that disproportionate representation is an inherently bad idea.

How was that for rambling?