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Court Rules Against AT&T's Service Agreement
The Seattle Post-Intelligencer is running a story about a recent ruling from the Washington State Supreme Court, which decided that AT&T's service agreement was not capable of waiving a customer's right to file a lawsuit against the company. The full opinion (PDF) is also available. From the conclusion:
"AT&T's Consumer Services Agreement is substantively unconscionable and therefore unenforceable to the extent that it purports to waive the right to class actions, require confidentiality, shorten the Washington Consumer Protection Act statute of limitations, and limit availability of attorney fees. ... Courts will not be easily deceived by attempts to unilaterally strip away consumer protections and remedies by efforts to cloak the waiver of important rights under an arbitration clause."
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Isn't AT&T's service agreement just as silly? The judge in the case appears to think so.
I'm a big tall mofo.
These arbitration clauses are also widely-overturned. This is hardly news--courts have been striking them down left and right for a decade now. Binding arbitration agreements are among the most common provisions stricken from agreements, including EULAs (in fact, it's the most common violation stricken down in software licenses).
The basic premise is that choosing ADR should be preserved as an option, but waiving your rights to contest actions in order to get service is wrong. It is. It has little to do with class actions--it's about litigating your individual grievances with the company.
Contrary to the editorializing in the summary, however, it has nothing to do with anything other than the fact that binding arbitration is disfavored as a lopsided provision offering no advantage to the customer.
Arbitration was designed to be used between businesses; when it's done that way it can actually be a superior alternative to court. It's when it's applied to adhesion contracts with consumers that it get unfair.
Because they are far more draconian than At&T's ever was.
Just saying, most Game Company EULAs actually state that you don't even get a service in return for your payments and that your payments are non-refundable and you have no expectations of privacy and your computer is for all intents and purposes the property of the gaming company for as long as their software resides on your computer...
I wish I was making this up but as you can see here (the most popular online game in the world):
http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/legal/eula.html
http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/legal/termsofuse.shtml
I'm not. And as an even more negative note this EULA actually stood up in court of law.
http://virtuallyblind.com/2008/07/14/blizzard-wins-sj-mdy/
Your RAM is actually Blizzards. You have no right to sue. You have no right to a refund. You have no right to class action. You have no right to communicate to anyone about what Blizzard communicates to you. Because, it is all copyright. That is a huge legal determination.
This brings us back to the topic at hand, AT&T. Because in all honesty, "waive the right to class actions, require confidentiality, shorten the Washington Consumer Protection Act statute of limitations, and limit availability of attorney fees." these things have already been ruled as legal in several gaming company cases and RIAA cases (which for brevity I did not touch on).
To tell AT&T (and every other company on the planet)that they are breaking the law because they are not using copyright as the rational for their arguments makes absolutely no legal sense whatsoever.
Because the end result is that all company claims against their consumers will be twisted in to copyright claims and therefore automatically upheld...
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