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20 Hours a Month Reading Privacy Policies
Barence sends word of research out of Carnegie Mellon University calling for changes in the way Web sites present privacy policies. The researchers, one of whom is an EFF board member, calculated how long it would take the average user to read through the privacy policies of the sites visited in a year. The answer: 200 hours, at a hypothetical cost to the US economy of $365 billion, more than half the financial bailout package. Every year. The researchers propose that, if the industry can't make privacy policies easier to read or skim, then federal intervention may be needed. This resulted in the predictable cry of outrage from online executives. Here's the study (PDF).
If there were a few standardized policies that most sites used, then users wouldn't need to read them. Like with software licenses, you don't bother to read the GPL for each time you install software that uses that license.
Even better, a tag could tell your browser which standard policy is being used. Tell your browser which policies you want to be accepted, and what action to take for sites with other policies.