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Reading Google Chrome's Fine Print
Much ink and many electrons are being spilled over Google's Chrome browser (discussed here twice in recent days): from deep backgrounders to performance benchmarks to its vulnerability to a carpet-bombing flaw. The latest angle to be explored is Chrome's end-user license agreement. It does not look consumer-friendly. "By submitting, posting or displaying the content you give Google a perpetual, irrevocable, worldwide, royalty-free, and non-exclusive license to reproduce, adapt, modify, translate, publish, publicly perform, publicly display and distribute any content which you submit, post or display on or through, the services. This license is for the sole purpose of enabling Google to display, distribute and promote the services and may be revoked for certain services as defined in the additional terms of those services."
Guess they haven't tested the installer on XP64.
How we know is more important than what we know.
funny thing : i can read this with FF but get 404 using chrome
I doubt this has anything to do with Chrome. It's taken straight out of their Google Accounts terms: https://www.google.com/accounts/TOS?hl=en
See point 11.1.
It looks to me like the out-of-context excerpts here all pertain to your use of Google's services with Chrome. All of these services state that you agree to let Google use the data you generate so I perhaps these clauses are present in Chrome's EULA to cover your use of their apps in Gears?
I suggest you use the OpenSource version of Chrome , which is BSD licensed and has no EULA you need to agree to.
I think they made this separation of Chrome and Chromium to keep the "Chrome" brand under their control while still making the browser open source.
Builds:
http://build.chromium.org/buildbot/snapshots/
Info:
http://www.chromium.org
Whilst the auto update feature sort of makes sense (if you discount a malicious user working out how to auto-update an installed copy with their own code), I detest ads, possibly in common with the rest of the world. Ok, it is their revenue, but it's bad enough seeing them on pages, but having them eve more targetted???
Oh yes, and the autoupdate program (googleupdate.exe) still executes at startup even after Chrome is uninstalled. I know it's a beta, but that's just sloppy.
Or is it???
Teamwork is essential. It gives the enemy someone else to shoot at
Burying an agreement to have spyware installed on your machine deep within obscure legalese is not something I'd have expected of Google, and there seems to be no way to disable the associated googleupdate.exe process without registry hacking.
Google lawyers may need to learn a new word that ATT was just taught... Unconscionable
I'm using it right now just to try it out. I'm a huge Firefox fan and have been for several years now. I started using Firefox back when it was just a beta, long before version 1 finally hit. As a web programmer I think I use Firefox more than any other program and I've really come to like it. It does have a few issues that I'd like to see resolved however, and I think Chrome might be going in the right direction. Memory usage in Firefox is nuts and always has been. After browsing for a couple of hours I can close all tabs and still use nearly 400 megs of memory. That's a serious problem. Sure I can restart Firefox at that point and get the memory back, but I shouldn't need to. Also, when Firefox is using more than 300 megs on my machine, it starts to slow down. I had a gig and a half in my computer so I thought maybe I needed more. I bought another gig and brought my total to 2.5 gigs, yet Firefox still begins to crap out around the 300 meg threshold.
.3) and had a number of stability issues I might have given Chrome serious consideration but I only installed it tonight to see what it's all about. When I'm done playing it's back to Firefox I go.
From the comic it seems like Google really wants to take a new approach to how browsers deal with memory and I think Firefox could learn from that. Is that enough to make me switch? No, not at all. I rely on a number of Firefox extensions and unless Google makes Chrome compatible with Firefox extensions, or comes up with their own system and then develops a tool to auto-port Firefox extensions, I don't think a lot of people are going to switch. Back when I was running 1.5.3 (I think it was
How is it that one careless match can start a forest fire, but it takes a whole box to start a campfire?
Coming from a company that had till recently no publicly available privacy policy, I would say consumer-friendlyness is not at the of the agenda.
This said, if they are to compete with the likes of Microsoft, this is not necessarily a bad thing.
Chrome uses WebKit, which is based on the LGPL'ed software KHTML. Shouldn't this make it harder to put weird restrictions on usage?
# cat
Damn, my RAM is full of llamas.
If you don't like the EULA, then compile it yourself from the source
http://code.google.com/chromium/
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
I think you're jumping to conclusions; that is Google's usual "content license", and something they need in order to offer services to you. I don't know how you think it applies to the browser. If you're trying to imply that Google is attempting to claim that everything you do with Chrome belongs to them, you're wrong.
I think... I think he's trying to communicate with us, but I can't quite make out what he's saying.
This thing is lighting up my firewall constantly, during install, operation and uninstall.
Even after uninstall it leaves GoogleUpdate.exe installed and running and pinging google every hour.
I'm sticking with Firefox 3.1's javascript compiler instead:
http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/firefox/nightly/latest-trunk/
Google Chrome is (by default) logging user actions and reporting them back to Google. Check the browser options, the last tab (under the hood)!!
I wonder if they will track the privacy mode, too...
Could someone use the browser and check what information it is actually sending to the Google servers?
Yikes, that is one scary EULA.
I can never understand why so many people are paranoid about giving even the smallest scraps of information to the government yet will happily let companies like Google (world leaders in data-mining and info extraction) have unrestricted access to all their most private data.
Whilst I join most people in laughing at those who foresee government putting barcodes on our foreheads etc., I really doubt it's long before we start seeing a 'Gcode' on people.
Wake up everyone, this is where the real frightening privacy infringements are taking place!
can i run adblock on it??
Replace the g with a $ and show them how you really feel!
But they're not evil! They said so! So it must be all right then.
http://rocknerd.co.uk
Google is a commercial enterprise... 'nuff sed.
Warning: This signature may offend some viewers.
How is Google going to "reproduce, adapt, modify, translate, publish, publicly perform, publicly display and distribute the content you submit, post or display on Chrome"? It sounds boilerplate to me (which is kind of surprising, since you'd think Google would have a crack legal team banging one out before Chrome's release).
The New Book That Could Pay You Back -100 Times Over: www.Economtricks.com
1. Get and compile source
2. Release without an EULA
3. ???
4. Profit!
saying that every information we upload using this software may be used by google means they have to log this data somewhere. and they do ask if you want to send information about the use of the browser but you can refuse. i do believe that they wouldn't collect information using the browser itself since it's a complicated task that will consume alot of web traffic and space. as already said they have much better ways doing so with their other web applications, all the chrome idea is to make ppl trust the web applications better, and make it easier to use hence more ppl use the google web apps ---> more info on google servers ---> more info google can use to do what the hell they want with... p/s/ it is a demonic eula... worst than a mortgage one.
That doesn't even make sense. I'm agreeing to allow them to use what I VIEW in the browser? The browser is for viewing, not uploading. Something's not right.
Google: "We can coexist, but only on my terms. The choice is yours: Obey me and live, or disobey and die."
The only thing new in this world is the history that you don't know.[Harry Truman]
remember then? Anything you sent over their network was available to Microsoft.
They did retract it but I can only remember this being for US customers. Don't remember it being rescinded for non-US customers.
All your (data)base are belong to us.
There are only 10 types of people in the world: Those who understand binary and those who don't.
This is totally awesome and fair! This is the best thing to happen on the internet! GOOGLE IS THE BEST COMPANY EVER!
"Posted with Chrome, edited for content by Google"
Because the LGPL only applies to the library itself.
Since you can take the library and use it under another application which doesn't have this EULA, the LGPL is bypassed.
One reason why the readline libraries are GPL. The authors don't want to help someone who doesn't want to help their customers.
"It's been 35 minutes since you last successfully posted a comment"
I don't hate the cloud. I'm only leery of systems in which the individual loses control of his or her own data, software, and other necessities. When the desktop revolution began, it was all about control--wresting control away from others and keeping it to ourselves. That's the major, overriding trend of modern computing, but it doesn't mean there should be no clouds or networks.
People have to differentiate between the usefulness of cloud computing where there are no alternatives and cloud computing where a desktop alternative exists. A perfect example of this is word processing: It's done better locally.
On top of that, users must evaluate cloud computing in situations calling more for convenience than for control. E-mail is a good example: It's often more convenient to look at it on the remote mail server than continually download it to the local machine, since that process adds complexity and inconvenience.
There are other examples of convenience. I recently downloaded a WordPress plug-in that was in a folder compressed using the gzip app. The file itself was compressed with tar. I have no tools for working with a file of this type and would have to seek out and download some shareware or commercial software. Now this is not in itself impossible, but it does take time and effort. There's an overabundance of crap for sale, and until you try a product you don't know if it even works. This is a bigger hassle than it should be. Finding sites that review utilities is even more painful. So instead I simply use the cloud. WobZIP will take an uploaded compressed file, decompress it, and send it back to you normalized as a ZIP file.
With a cloud-based utility I don't have to deal with nagware, Registry clogging, spyware, or any number of issues that crop up when your system is filled with the useless junk you've downloaded and installed. And, yes, I would use a cloud-based word processor in a pinch. But generally speaking, my take on cloud utilities is that they are best for occasional use, when you need to do some chore only once or twice.
People should be on the lookout for gems like WobZIP. And you should note that this sort of software is no substitute for a local solution if you constantly need to decompress files. Local is always better.
Beyond simple convenience, the other good reason for cloud computing arises when there is no local solution that compares with what you can do on a mainframe in the sky. An example is the specialty systems implemented by NetSuite, for CMS and other functions. Actually NetSuite is like a cloud alternative to SAP in many ways. And it's just not doable on a desktop PC. Neither is SAP, for that matter, although I've often wondered why SAP has not made some sort of training-wheels software that would run standalone on a common PC. But I digress.
Salesforce.com is another example of the cloud making sense. I suspect that when Microsoft finally takes the plunge it will be with products like this, especially Salesforce and other groupware initiatives based on the Lotus Notes proto-cloud software that people still use. Microsoft has the Lotus Notes architect working at the company just for this reason.
But when a cloud solution is offered, you have to ask yourself if you can get a standalone app that will do this as well, or better. And especially consider the performance aspect. I still grind my teeth over the excessive delays that invariably come and go with cloud-based e-mail, due to Net congestion. Combine increasing Net usage and new Internet users with online cloud apps and SaaS and you have a situation that is not likely to improve, ever. There will forever be performance issues.
And, of course, you must always consider the worst-case scenarios. I use the plural because too many things can go wrong. What happens if the company simply folds? Many SaaS initiatives will tell you that you'll get your data. But what about the apps? I know this is unlikely for many of these firms, but exactly how do you continue using a product locally w
Or just press "cancel" at the EULA and get the download anyway, like I did.
c++;
1. BETA..Beta..BETA (although their use of "Beta" is a bit stretched I know).
2. Complain, email, Complain!! - Google DOES listen generally (they may not write back, but people do pay attention)
...for these Google guys to get free access to pr0n accounts. Probably a stunt from the HR guys to attract more nerdy whizzkids. Gives a whole new perspective on "carpet bombing" if you ask me.....
Apparently kids are not allowed to use chrome.
Google tries to prove in their chrome propaganda that the web is where all applications are.
No, computers run applications, not the web, or your fucking company or your fucking browser.
FUCK GOOGLE. We want computers to run our programs not "the web".
Sounds a little evil to me. Hope they fix it.
"God fights on the side with the best artillery." - Napoleon, Marshal of France - speaking truth to power
Has anyone read the EULA in the Google iPhone application? It also says you give up all your rights to let Google use your information for whatever purpose they want. The fact that it even has a EULA while just about every other app on the phone does not at least makes it stand out so that more people might actually read it. I installed it once but deleted it after reading the EULA.
Reading Google Chrome's Fine Print... sounds like that's exactly what they *didn't* do.
I fired up my Linux box and went to the Chrome homepage. It said "Windows only".
So, I wired up my Windows 2000 box and went to the homepage. It now said "XP/Vista only".
Why couldn't they have said that on the Linux version? It would have saved me a frustrating fifteen minutes of crawling around plugging inn video cables.
I've yet to see a browser pull off a decent smooth scrolling feature. I want to use it, but it just doesn't work very well... in that it just winds up making scrolling slower. But, I guess it's like all the kids that want fancy menu animations, whereas I just want the damn menu to open NOW. No, don't "slide" or "fade" open. Just OPEN. NOW!
Preventing Paranoia: When does Google Chrome talk to Google.com?. Please read it carefully.
that had this sort of eula. they applied it to everything
i think it was"we are the borg..."
i dont think this is a sign of world domination, just a company thats conveniently lawyered to the
hilt in light of the fact theyre challenging a microsoft cashcow.
we might need to see that the lawyers sit a little closer to the back of the bus next time, google. your an internet information company, and yes people are reading.
Good people go to bed earlier.
In Soviet America, Google Chrome surfs you!
All your crap are ours (forever)
Travelling forward in time at a rate of 1 second per second.
People have been smacking this down and saying that it's only supposed to apply to code changes.
Myself, i'm not so sure.
I don't care, I love da Goog. Da Goog is good. Live with it. Be with it. Be da Goog, too.
Firefox out performs Chrome. I did some testing last night and i found it histerical that firefox scrolls gmail better, than Google's Chrome :)
Firefox is just a better browser. Chrome is pretty, i like the tabs on top but its just not ready. If it doesnt have any extensions like firefox, it will never be taken seriously.
Adblock Plus is a MUST have feature for all web users. Mouse Gestures are essential to my browsing habits.
Firefox is faster, and is more focused on freedom. Google wants your ad dollars, so expect it to be THE SPAM browser.
I'm concerned that it may have doubleclick stuff built in. Will google track EVERYTHIGN i do now? I get a free browser so Google can spy on me and make money? FireFox does this with a little more dignity.
Its cute, but under the hood... i smell SPAM land. I wouldnt be suprised if they tried to change the entire way advertising and user habits are user tracked. Google has something up their sleave, and its all about making money through ad revenue.
I cant trust that they have my personal freedom in mind.
Really? This is in every EULA. Who cares.
"for the sole purpose of enabling Google to display, distribute and promote the services"
How horrible. The world shall surely come to an end now. They can reuse anything you submit, post, or display to promote further use of the browser. Those bastards. </roll-eyes>
Nothing to see here. Move along.
Very nice article but it doesn't do anything to fix the problem of what they might do in the future. Since the EULA reserves the right to install basically any functionality they want there is nothing preventing future abuse. Certainly it is a matter of trust. A blog like that increases my paranoia because it reads like a paid advertisement.
btw I am not anti-google. I use google to search for everyything, my primary email is gmail.
I also dont think Google or any company can actually do all the crazy things people can imagine when taking a EULA to extremes. EULAS aren't even worth the paper they're written on.
Prepare to be even less impressed and look at the V8 src, they only have codegen for ia32 and arm. Plenty of hardcoded platform specific (windows) guff in the browser codebase too.
This stuff might have been acceptable in 2003 but it's -DEPIC_FAIL for 2008.
There's build instructions for Mac OS X and Linux. Of course, the browser doesn't actually run on *nix yet, but you can't say they're not trying.
kernel: lp0 on fire
it is so they can display the pages on your computer. no other reason. A web host has to have very similar language included in their hosting agreement, so they can display a client's web page. paranoid much?
What font anti-aliasing technology does WebKit (and by extension Google Chrome) use?
I'm curious to know if it is using ClearType under Windows or its own built-in anti-aliasing. Does Windows Safari render text exactly the same as Chrome? I vaguely recall some criticism of Safari for Windows when it came out on this basis.
The last thing on my mind when trying Chrome is the End user agreement. I like a lot of it's features and wish that firefox had them. But where is RSS? I simply cannot live without my syndications.
I was underwhelmed myself...
They've done a BAD job of the installer:
1) It doesn't let you choose where to install the app.
2) It doesn't install it under \Program Files - believe it or not it installs the binaries in the profile directory of the user who did the installation!
Item 2) of course means that for Windows users (like me) who have multiple Windows accounts are absolutely stuck - they can't run the browser except when logged on as that same user who did the installation. For me, because I run as a limited user but login as admin to install software, that means that the limited user account can't access the chrome files, which are stored in the admin profile directory!
Really stupid design mistakes - I've already reported them to Google - I hope they fix it pronto. With that kind of a bug it shouldn't have even made it to beta.
Not only that but when you uninstall it - it _doesn't_ uninstall the google updater that it added during the installation process.
Not impressed.
Mike
Linux fan and Win32 developer
Interesting. Chrome omits the menu bar, much like IE7+; but since it keeps the tabs at the top of its window, when it's run maximised, you get the benefits of a "mile high" tab bar. You can just slam the mouse to the top of the screen to pick a tab, much like the much-touted Mac OS menu bar.
I wonder if this violates any Apple UI patents? I have heard that Apple patents are one of the main reasons why Windows attaches menu bars to windows in the way it does.
It also doesn't bother with a status bar at the bottom; hyperlink destinations get a sort of "slide-up notification" at the bottom, but the space is generally used for rendering the page. Good idea.
All in all, it seems to be a fine product - but I will keep using Firefox until Chrome gets some extensibility, I think. Hopefully Chrome's good ideas will be adopted by Firefox as well!
... especially when they are not written on paper at all :-)
In Soviet Russia, our new overlords are belong to all your base.
This post: How to make Google Chrome even better
for several years, i have been saying that google is the new evil empire, and you all laughed at me
credit where credit is due
why is google the new borg? because by definition, for profits with near monopoly power become abusive - it is in their dna
I could be wrong, google could be trying for the most audacious evil in known history, but I sort of doubt it. Even when applied to Google's services all it is is an attempt to cover their asses legally. In order to have a file on flickr google has to be able to show it to people(because that's what flickr does) and so google has to have a license to do so.
Removing might be harder (but unnecessary) than this, but the following will prevent the service from loading:
Control Panel -> Administrative Tools -> Services
Find the Google Update Service, select Properties from the right-click menu, and Disable.
I want "subtract spam"!
You need JavaScript to download it??? I know where this is going. It's the Crapmium.
Read point 1.2 of the EULA and you will see that 95% of the EULA does NOT apply to Chrome. 1.2 Unless otherwise agreed in writing with Google, your agreement with Google will always include, at a minimum, the terms and conditions set out in this document. These are referred to below as the âoeUniversal Termsâ. Open source software licenses for Google Chrome source code constitute separate written agreements. To the limited extent that the open source software licenses expressly supersede these Universal Terms, the open source licenses govern your agreement with Google for the use of Google Chrome or specific included components of Google Chrome.
All rightly, I am on Linux so I can't download it, why can't anyone post a whole copy of the 'EULA' instead of this out-of-context excerpt (Actually the author of the 'article' seems to be very biased based on all the articles published there, hope not to see a link to that person again here) When I find links to google they definitely don't mention this at all in the ToS or in the privacy policy. So, is this true at all?
Copyright infringement is "piracy" in the same way DRM is "consumer rape"
Chrome is Google's private, closed-source browser. Chromium is the open-source (BSD-licensed) project from which Chrome takes some of its code. Chromium is completely non-operational at this point in time (ie. it doesn't run), as it's very early days on the open-source project. Chrome in contrast is very nicely operational already, since its code is not the same as that being put together by the Chromium folks.
And the key point here is that Chrome and Chromium have completely different licenses, therefore your comment is entirely worthless.
Google's looking into this issue now, thanks to everybody who reported it.
Having watched the video on the chrome page at google, it seems to me that they are blaming the current browsers for effectively holding them and the rest of the web development community back. This is probably fair in a lot of respects, however, google used to do amazing things despite these limitations. Further, there are better ways of doing this (working through standards organizations to push the extensions of specifications which would then be built into mature platforms) as opposed to creating a new platform which will have its own (by design i might add) incompatibilities (or everything else will gain incompatibilities) and require extended maintenance throughout its indefinite browser lifespan. Except for the "we're going to open source it" rhetoric, the launch of this product is being marketed/pitched in the same way that I would imagine microsoft first pushed Internet explorer. Netscape/Java are bad at developing applications/services that run within web browsers that do nifty things. / Come check out our new and improved VBScript, iFrames, and the mother of all "application in a web browser" technologies, ActiveX / Haven't we been through this already and found the results rather hard to swallow?
It's been pointed out that this is kind of the generic Google EULA for their other products; does it apply to Gmail as well? Has it been this way the whole time?
Chrome's code is different to Chromium's, which is at an early stage and doesn't even run yet.
So no, you can't compile Chrome up yourself.
Mod me down, google fans. I think it's time that Google stop the "don't be evil" bullshit. From helping China and other countries repress their citizens to buying doubleclick, now this eula, the "don't be evil" has become a joke.
iGoogle is my home page and they have the best search on the internet, but they're no less evil than any other multinational corporation. I take offense when someone not only lies to me, but knows I know they're lying and keeps lying anyway. My ex-wife used to do that and I hated it.
It's all about the money and nothing else, just like any other corporation.
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
dominating everything in 1998. you should now worry about google dominating everything in 2008
shun chrome. i don't care if its the best thing since sliced bread. the problem is what it represents in terms of power and dominance in the hands of one company. that's bad for everyone
support firefox. let microsoft have the os, google have search, and firefox have the browser. keep a balance of power, or suffer under the boot of one company
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Given the part where he states that sending a hash of a url does not reveal the url to Google (he even goes on to state that Google sends a larger hash of the url back!), read *very* carefully.
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
Yes, they found out slashdot was one of the worst malicious sites out there, as it periodically issued random DDOS attacks to other sites hosting content of scientific import. Once the shlashdot-reading chrome developers discover this, they'll take it off the blacklist (as they too need a daily helping of slashdot) but it'll be layered in warnings and throttled to all-hell. Unfortunately, this will cause paradox leading to the Apocalypse as google will slashdot slashdot just to make the internet work and Chrome function normally. The lucky few will be raptured to Apple, where they will spend the rest eternity amidst pretty, hermetically sealed plastic and user friendly software.
I will make it legal! --Sergey Brin
certainly this is something to worry about. There are, however, alternatives to the google services.
If I read this correctly, if you use google services, they're saying they own everything on their servers, whether or not they actually do.
I just don't think it will hold up in a court of law.
They're using their grammar skills there.
Weight loss supplements!
I installed it last night at home, all I noticed was that it was fast. I didn't play with it for too long but page rendering was quick, and crisp. Based on your observations they might have a hard time creating a Linux port, but the windows version seems to work well (so far).
The grass is only greener, if you don't take care of your own lawn.
Performance drops dramatically if you disable precaching. I run Firefox with precaching disabled and haven't noticed such a big drop in performance, and precaching has some security issues, so it may need some work in that area. (Yeah, I'm paranoid.) All around though, I'm impressed for a first release! Very little bloat, and it still does pretty much everything I need it to.
I also noticed Chrome trying to add Google Updater to my registry to run at logon. That's probably what some people noticed trying to connect to the 'net. I disabled it and Chrome works fine without it.
Delay is preferable to error. (Thomas Jefferson)
Normally these ridiculous EULA's are attached to software you really need, so you don't have much choice but to hope a court will see things your way if there's ever a problem. But even if Chrome was a really amazing browser, which it's not, I don't have a compelling need for it. So they can take their ridiculous "We own everything you bring within a hundred yards of our software" statement and shove it right, straight up their ass.
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
As other posters have pointed out, the Chrome privacy policy seems to make section 11 moot as it implies that Google will not collect information other than what is required to actually run the browser. So while they assert a royalty-free perpetual license to some content, Google states that they are not capturing the content.
Several other web-based services have a similar license agreement. Generally, the reason why Google's standard Terms of Service requires a royalty-free license is so they can syndicate and publish content you decide to distribute using Google's services. This doesn't necessarily seem applicable to using a web browser. However, even if the content in Section 11 should be included, there are a couple of extra phrases that Google has that other companies do not include. And they make a real difference with other services like Picasa Web Albums.
One extra phrase that Google includes in their Terms of Service is "promote." Other companies, like Yahoo and Apple, do not have this clause. To me, this implies that Google can use your content in advertisements for free. Another clause gives Google the right to share your content with business partners for the provision of syndicated services. Again, this could be for promotional reasons; you might end us having your content used in advertisements for Google's business partners, especially as the reasons for sharing the content are not well defined in the Terms of Service.
I wrote a comparison of the Google Picasa Web Terms of Service against similar companies. No other company seems to grab the promotional rights to your material in the same manner that Google does.
Google can fix this problem for Chrome. Other services, like YouTube and Blogger, have much more specific terms of service that ameliorate the problems of Section 11 of the Google TOS. However, the better solution for Google is to fix their TOS in the first place to only grab the rights required to run their products.
--Sam
According to the EULA, I'm not permitted to use Chrome.
2.3 You may not use the Services and may not accept the Terms if (a) you are not of legal age to form a binding contract with Google,
End of story. In fact, I can't use Google Maps, GMail, Chrome, or even google.com since they're all defined as being part of "the Services".
In metrics_service.cc
it sends everything you do in the toolbar to
static const char kMetricsURL[] =
"https://toolbarqueries.google.com/firefox/metrics/collect";
It collects everything and sends it to google servers, on startup and on shutdown.
WHAT THE FUCK. Keep ff ftw.
If your privacy means nothing to you just use Chrome.
I just don't trust anything that bleeds for five days and doesn't die.
The merging of the address bar and search bar gives Google too much control over navigation. It separates companies and website operators from their website addresses and brands. Companies spend heavily to establish and maintain brands. Google has just imposed itself between consumers and businesses. Direct navigation has now become proprietary search, whereby Google uses its discretion to filter out web addresses and domains that it deems less relevant. I object and I hope you do too.
Mmmmmmmmmm....I don't think so.
Somehow what concerned me was what they actually did with the personal data they collect (privacy policy), and more specifically, how long that had to by law, keep the data as I think this varies from country to country. Are they bound by international standards or US standards?
Also, in some countries you are also bound by law to destroy personal data after a certain amount of time. This is not obvious in their privacy policy either.
Don't be apathetic. Procrastinate!
about:plugins
ActiveX Plug-in
File name: activex-shim
ActiveX Plug-in provides a shim to support ActiveX controls
All your base are belong to us
Sigh...
I used to use Opera heavily (still do on occasion). When I zoom in/zoom out, it zooms the whole page, including images, as expected. Very handy, and easy to scale pages for appropriate viewing on a given device, browser windows, etc..
That was always a big beef of mine with Firefox, it never did it. But FireFox 3 added image scaling, whoohooo!
Now Chrome comes along. I love the process separation, Task manager, JavaScript speed. I'm ready to convert. But there's no scaling of images, just a lame-ass IE-ish text-size scaling.
Come on, it's 2008, it's not *that* hard to display an image scaled down (or up). In fact, the API calls you're using will likely do that for you. (And even if they didn't, there's probably a couple of thousand of open source libraries to do it for you; and coding image scaling yourself is fairly trivial...) I just don't get why browser manufacturers leave this out so frequently...
Pleeeeaaasse, Google, add this feature, and I'll convert.
Love many, trust a few, do harm to none.
What does the license say if you compile from source ..
davecb5620@gmail.com
Google designs these applications in order to collect data. That's what they specialize in. All data are useful - doesn't matter what it is, and imagine the information they can collect from people's browser content.
Sounds like a major privacy issue to me. Thanks anyway, I'm staying with Firefox.
MS accounting wants to know where to send your check...
I really don't have time to read the whole thing, but I'm very interested in IP law/semantics.
If, for some reason, I was a writer who just finished the next blockbuster film script and uploaded it, via gmail and chrome, to mail to my publisher, could google claim some form of rights to my work because of this EULA?
Thanks!
Where is it? Having to open a new tab every time I want to go there or having to type it in the address bar is lame.
I've never plooked a chrome-plated magical pig with marital aids stuck all over it, such as yourself before.
I'm assuming this is a standard Google agreement, and wasn't written with Chrome in mind.
Why? Because as written it effectively makes web browsing instantly into fraud.
Reading the EULA literally, it says that simply by visiting a webpage (it includes the word "display" in there, remember) I'm telling Google that I am an agent of the copyright holder and granting rights on the copyright holder's behalf.
Given the nature of the internet, this is likely to be untrue in the region of 99.999% of the time -- and as a major internet infrastructure company, Google knows this better than most.
If Google accepts these rights and exercises them, knowing them to be fraudulent, they are responsible. They cannot argue "good faith" in a case like this.
This is not "OMG! Google do evil!", just "OMG! Google got so tied up in Web2.0 that they forgot to write an EULA for Web."
HAL.
Got them moderator blues I blieve I walk out the do', With these mod-points I been gettin', I 'most never post no mo'
Doesn't install from behind a firewall (which requires authentication), or on Linux. Thus, not acceptable for home, or work.
The same condition appears in the Google account creation EULA which means that all your copyrighted youtube videos, all your blog posts, all your calendar events, all your docs, all your notes, all your pics, all your chat logs are belong them. GOOGLE IS EVIL!
Laith Juwaidah http://www.ljuwaidah.org
Read the last sentence out loud, slowly...
"This license is for the sole purpose of enabling Google to display, distribute and promote the services and may be revoked for certain services as defined in the additional terms of those services."
That means that if they use it for anything other than to help display your material they're violating the license. They're just trying to cover their assess for storing material that belongs to you on their servers. RELAX!
Technically if you saw the EULA or it in any way informed you of it, you're legally bound to it, since it includes an "effective on first use of Services" clause.
It's better to vote for what you want and not get it than to vote for what you don't want and get it.
- E. Debs
I don't suppose a network-based installer or a web browser should make network connections. That'd just be silly!
Charging $300 for the product, then another $100 for calling in to report the bug, then another $200 for the upgrade that enhances performance by releasing resources not needed. Oh, I'm sorry, I was thinking of Sage Software's Act!
Never mind.
Fight Spammers!
They do encourage you to print it out, although they also reserve the right to change the terms with no notice.
From point 1.1, "Services" explicitly DOES refer to "software".
Alexander Peter Kristopeit bought his basement from his mommy for one dollar.
Sorry, it is completely obligatory.
The US government have made it clear that we have no inalienable rights; any we do not defend vigorously will be taken.
Sage doesn't illegally set minimum prices with resellers for old versions like Microsoft and Adobe seem to do.
I bought a copy of Peachtree in its retail package for $30 because it was an end-of-sales product. Sage still let me register for the support, gives me courtesy calls to see what they can do for me, and offers hundreds of dollars in discounts on upgrades. I even told one of the guys on the courtesy call that I don't need the updated tax tables (I don't have employees and sell no taxable products) and that the old copy was priced that low. He said it'd be silly to upgrade if the old copy does what I need and I can buy the new version at that price next year when it's at end-of-sales status.
There is one drawback: Now that it's almost 2009, my copy of Peachtree 2006 that I bought in 2007 is almost out of tech support coverage. Maybe I'll buy 2008 for $43 dollars and get two more years of support availability.
Remember Antitrust the movie with NURV the all powerful Microsoft clone. They used fiber optic cameras to steal code. Who needs cameras when you can capture & own everything done via a browser.
Yeah, and I bet THAT's legally binding.
If you can read this, I forgot to post anonymously.
Maybe it was not what they intended to say in their EULA, but it's there! Until the offending phrase is removed, they can try to legally enforce it. A judge would probably laugh them out of the courtroom and invalidate the clause. At the same time, with all the crazy legal decisions made, why take a chance?
We are Google and we suck monkey testicles!!!
- Posted with Google Chrome -
I'm a software engineer at Google and I can debunk the notion that Google wants the rights to everything you touch in Google Chrome. We don't, and we'll either clarify officially soon or change the Terms of Service to make that very clear. All things considered, there wasn't much FUD surrounding the launch of Google Chrome, but I'm more than happy to put this conspiracy theory to rest.
1.1 Your use of Google's products, software, services and web sites (referred to collectively as the "Services" in this document and excluding any services provided to you by Google under a separate written agreement) is subject to the terms of a legal agreement between you and Google. "Google" means Google Inc., whose principal place of business is at 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA 94043, United States. This document explains how the agreement is made up, and sets out some of the terms of that agreement.
Section 10.2 raises severe doubts about the open source nature of Chrome:
"You may not (and you may not permit anyone else to) copy, modify, create a derivative work of, reverse engineer, decompile or otherwise attempt to extract the source code of the Software or any part thereof, unless this is expressly permitted or required by law, or unless you have been specifically told that you may do so by Google, in writing."
"In order to keep things simple for our users, we try to use the same set of legal terms (our Universal Terms of Service) for many of our products. Sometimes, as in the case of Google Chrome, this means that the legal terms for a specific product may include terms that don't apply well to the use of that product. We are working quickly to remove language from Section 11 of the current Google Chrome terms of service. This change will apply retroactively to all users who have downloaded Google Chrome."
Rebecca Ward, Senior Product Counsel for Google Chrome
As other posters have pointed out, the Chrome privacy policy seems to make section 11 moot as it implies that Google will not collect information other than what is required to actually run the browser.
Google has the right to collect and distribute displayed content using the service. (Section 11, and definition of service which includes the software.)
Suppose... They collect your banking information. However, they are only permitted (by privacy policy) to use the information to help make the browser run.
They are also permitted to update the browser without informing you. (In the ToS.) Now consider this plan:
An update to the browser makes a license fee applicable for the "service". To help your browser run better, they will automatically deduct from the bank account that you gave them the information for.
Oooh, yes, that's beautifully evil. Far-fetched, but valid in their terms of service nonetheless.
One thing I haven't seen mentioned much, is the clause in the ToS where I assert that I have the right to grant my rights (reproduction, distribution, etc.) to Google. This means that if they use stuff from me, but it wasn't mine, they can sue me for fallaciously asserting that I did have such rights.
Google may not be evil, but they have the castle, moat, army and infrastructure in place. Now they're trying to install the pincers; and I'm getting uncomfortable.
Then compile the source yourself. It's BSD licensed, you're free to check it over (and lots of other people are doing so).
Website owners should beware of Chrome. Any web owner, blogger, etc that relies on income from Google adsense should be very concerned about how this software may develop. In fact sites, just like this one!
Currently Google can only display their ads if the website owner has incorporated the actual code into the site. But now......
Think about it.... How easy would it be Google to incorporate ads directly into the browser. A small frame at the beginning of each page and voila! Google ads could then be displayed automatically by the Chrome browser for ANY website, and Google would not have to pay one cent to the Website owner. They still get all the revenue, and don't have to pay out anything to the web owner. Web sites relying on their Google PPC ads etc should beware, the end is neigh.
All website owners, Bloggers, and anyone else etc., really need to kick up about this potential issue and seek assurances from Google that this will not happen. This is where the REAL threat lies.
This is an EXTREMELY clever business move by Google inc. who are, like every other company, in the business of making money.
Way back then, when I used windows frequently, Microsoft Passport EULA (http://slashdot.org/yro/01/04/03/1535244.shtml) kept me from registering a windows messenger account.
This Google EULA is sickening similar to the old MS EULA that got MS so much eat that they had to change it.
IMO, Google just did a fsck job with this EULA and it is completly out of sync with their remaining actions and good will work.
Dudes, take it back, or I'll think to the dark side giving in you are.
http://www.google.com/chrome/eula.html 11. Content license from you 11.1 You retain copyright and any other rights you already hold in Content which you submit, post or display on or through, the Services.
Q.E.D.
read the code and you will see this is driven by a registry key - and you can even change it in option-under the hood-general- uncheck 'help google...'
Here is my problem, I take a few online art classes. These classes are obviously all online, so if I am using "Chrome" to upload my projects then, according to the EULA, they have the right to take those and have a "non-exclusive license to reproduce, adapt, modify, translate, publish, publicly perform, publicly display and distribute". This is way out of line. My school and teacher do not even have this kind of permission.
All your web are belong to us!
The section that people cite explicitly says "by submitting, posting or displaying the content"; this refers to content you submit to Google services, not arbitrary content you submit through the Chrome browser.
Furthermore, later, Google says explicitly that you retain all your rights to your content.
All they need from you is a license to display the stuff that you asked them to display. This is boilerplate and it is justified for the kind of services they offer.
I suppose it could be written a little more clearly so that even total morons understand its scope, but, hey, it's a beta release. Looks like they already clarified it.
I use a Firefox Add-on called http://www.customizegoogle.com/ which blocks some of the methods Google use to profile users. It can also block Google ads (which I never click on anyway). I wonder if Google hasn't realized their vulnerability in not controlling the browser space. I'm guessing there's no room for CustomizeGoogle in their vision of the future?
Hi TheJasper, that's my blog. Sorry if it came across as an advertisement. I knew that people would be interested in what communication happens between the browser and google.com, so I wanted to provide a list of all the communication so that people wouldn't worry. Even if something changed in the future, with an open-source browser people would immediately notice. The fact that Chrome is open-source lets anybody verify the code, and if they don't like it, they can take the code under the BSD license and do something different.
By the way, Google has already changed the language in the EULA that was mentioned in the summary, so people don't need to worry about that, either.
"I think... I think he's trying to communicate with us, but I can't quite make out what he's saying."
I wonder, did your friends make an account for you on slashdot, stupidflanders (1230894)?
First time I saw the word 'guff' used myself here but tell you what I like it and I "get" it like most people here.
"Guff" the adjective smacks of the vomit covered bum whose worn, slitted and torn jeans flake
off tiny bits of urine crystals in a dusty mist as he limps along, The night before his pants soaked
up to full saturation with acidic piss after he had collapsed in a puddle of his own vomit and urine.
More of the same was subsequently added to by a group of teenage boys standing over him and
hosing him down with that urgent piss three six packs in an hour give you. While not detectable under
the assault of that incredible smell of rotten seafood boiled in uric acid, there is a hard and uncomfortable
turd that he can't part with no matter how hard the effort. A plug of feces that protrudes out of and chafes the
sensitive skin of his sweaty rosetta, as he walks down the street and with each step it dabs brown spots on
the remnants of his dripping wet and yellow underpants.
What a fitting adjective to describe anything Microsoft. Kudos to the inventor.
There is now no wording of the claim to license your information in section 11 of the EULA at all.
The entire wording of section 11 is now this:
It hasn't been moved anywhere else in the document, either.
Google's new browser will do everything including making you a cup of tea. This is all paid for by personally-directed text ads in your tea leaves, based on analysing a DNA sample taken when you sip the tea and sending your genetic code back to Google for future targeting.
Not evil!
http://rocknerd.co.uk
Has anyone but me noticed how, dare I say it... Evil Google has been acting?
All those who hate and/or fanboy the Apple/Microsoft camps can fix on a new target. Google controls the vast majority of the search market, they are scanning our university's documents, having students come up with ideas on how google can make money with those documents, tracking our searches, wants to track medical studies, and our personal medical records... and now everything we post...
Sure, from what I've seen, they may have removed it from their EULA now. But all the "Evil" of anyother computer company pales at the weight of this.
Big Brother I guess now is Google....
Check out section 11.1 of the TOS for Gmail.
http://www.google.com/accounts/TOS?hl=en
They've had that for years. Google has not been evil, is not evil, and won't be evil.
In one fell swoop, in one hit, Google has become the most untrusted âweb company, because of their Hitler/Stalin-like EULA clause where the asserted the right to own everything that you type into Chrome
The fact that they corrected it, under pressure, means nothing.
What matters is that they attempted it in the first place.
Don't give me that stuff about copying the EULA from somewhere else.
I prepare contracts. The fact that that clause in the EULA existed somewhere else, means ... it exists in another Google EULA. It means âit's within Google's mode of operation to do that sort of thing.
In my mind, you are now THE MOST UNTRUSTED web company. Seriously, who âelse is there that would be more untrustworthy?
Microsoft? They haven't done anything that I know of to steal MY data. âApple, nothing in this area so far. Sure, Microsoft does detestable âthings with their OS, but that has not extended to stealing my data.
Google can give explanations that the EULA was copied from another EULA, but that in itself says that the clause exists in another Google âEULA. So explain that, Google.
I mean the only reason that the TOS says all that crap because its taken straight out of their google eula. Sure its stupid of them to not tweak the eula considering its a application that isn't directly related to google. Obviously its acceptable for them to say for google services since it is their service.
I'm using chrome and I think its a pretty slick browser. Didn't take much getting used to and its fast and minimalist. I have a lightweight ultra portable laptop with a small screen so I prefer minimalism.
Sure it might not be the next super popular browser that overtakes FF. But its competition against IE and goes in a completely different direction than FF.
Thats why though none of us may use opera or safari (opera is pretty nice in its minimalistic sense though) they provide competition.
In the end can't we all agree that any competition to IE is great!
So cheers to google for providing new innovations which can always be food for thought for FF and can make IE seem even weaker.
Besides the comic was awesome :P
Just to reply directly to this comment: this code is part of the User metrics service and is *completely opt-in*. User metrics and crash reporting is very helpful to improve Chrome in the future, but it's off by default. So this code does not run unless you deliberately choose to run it.
While using Chrome I found that a lot of sites sites don't work, due to missing plugins for the new platform. Sometimes just quitting the site is not an option so I created an easy way to open the page in your "old" browser. Just drag and drop the URL from the Chrome URL bar into the Mirror form and you can continue your Chrome browsing. Download: http://www.zonator.com/mirror.zip