Netflix Terms of Service Invalidates Your Right To Sue

New submitter ebombme writes "Netflix has decided to go the route of AT&T and others by trying to take away the rights of their users to form class action lawsuits against them. A copy of the new terms of use states 'These Terms of Use provide that all disputes between you and Netflix will be resolved by BINDING ARBITRATION. YOU AGREE TO GIVE UP YOUR RIGHT TO GO TO COURT to assert or defend your rights under this contract (except for matters that may be taken to small claims court). Your rights will be determined by a NEUTRAL ARBITRATOR and NOT a judge or jury and your claims cannot be brought as a class action. Please review the Arbitration Agreement below for the details regarding your agreement to arbitrate any disputes with Netflix.'"

Comments

Not legal.

[Anonymous Coward]

Next question.

Re:Not legal.

[kurt555gs]

Verizon just won this in the Supreme court. You must be reading Constitution V 1.0 which is out dated. The 7th Amendment has been revised to allow big companies to do what ever they want as I just said along with reducing the 1st, 2nd, 4th, 5th, and 6th amendments to meaningless gibberish.

yep

[poetmatt]

entirely non starter. Not enforceable either.

So why is this news?

Re:yep

[russotto]

Right, because the law explicitly makes arbitration legal. (See "Federal Arbitration Act"). The courts don't want to have to deal with actually providing justice (or even injustice) to pissants like us; better to fob us off on a "neutral" arbitrator hired by the other party who can deal out injustice without bothering the judges.

Re:yep

[Anonymous Coward]

So... is anyone going to provide a citation instead of just shouting that the other person is wrong?

Re:yep

[errandum]

Arbitration doesn't work like this (at least where I come from). There are 3 arbitrators, one yours, one from them and one neutral, as in, agreed by both parties. So the "neutral" should be neutral. And even if it is only one, it should still be agreed by both.

On the other hand, it is highly unlikely that you'll ever get a giant compensation via arbitration, and I believe that is what they are trying to avoid. It is also extremely more cost effective in terms of legal bills.

Unlike most people, I do believe that most claims should be decided like this. Decisions would be speedier, there would be no legal system to abuse because you have more money and power than the common joe...

Most people don't know what arbitration is... That's why they complain. It is actually a common clause in contracts between giant companies - and believe me, none of them want to lose money.

Re:yep

[russotto]

You're forgetting that the decision on an arbitrator has to be agreed by both parties. If you feel you're getting the short end of the stick, simply don't agree to him and another one needs to be found.

How, as a consumer, am I to know anything about the arbitrator? I don't have a legal department to research these things. And in any case, all arbitrator are similarly situated -- they all hear a lot of cases where the plaintiff is J. Random Consumer who they'll never see again, and a few massive companies who they'll see again and again and again.

Your assumption that every arbitrator in the country will be corrupt is the reason why there is no progress and the courts are jammed.

It's not that every arbitrator in the country is corrupt. It's that the process is such that the arbitrator's interests naturally favor the corporation. If an arbitrator gets the reputation of being too consumer-friendly, the corporations (who can research these things) will stop agreeing to him and he's out of a job. If an arbitrator gets the reputation of always agreeing with the corporation, most consumers won't even know about it, and those few who do find out aren't significant enough to matter.

In any case, deciding disputes is the civil courts' JOB. If they can't do it, why the heck do we even have them?

Re:yep

[i-like-burritos]

Yup...and I can't for the life of me figure out how that jives with the 7 th Amendment: "In Suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury, shall be otherwise re-examined in any Court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law." Seems pretty clear to me.

The Constitution is like the Bible. It's supposedly sacred and infallible, but It's not meant to be taken literally and you have to let the courts interpret it for you (in the context of their own personal interests). As time passes, more and more of it gets flat-out ignored, and eventually it will only ever be read as an academic exercise by historians.

who wrote this?

[mapkinase]

Your rights will be determined by a NEUTRAL ARBITRATOR and NOT a judge or jury

Kafka?

Irrelevant for the normal consumer

[FaxeTheCat]

The values i a Netflix subscription is just too small for a normal person to engage in a lawsuit. Even a class action suit would be off little value (look at history - only lawyers get any real money out of it). The real power for the subscribers is to stop the subscription. And you do not need to sue or go to arbitration over that.
And of course, if they give bad service it is far more efficient to slashdot them over it than to sue anyway.

if they break the law...

[Bananatree3]

If netflix decides one day to suddenly to perform some kind of shady spying on it's customers, I don't see how this "forced EULA" could have a snowball's chance in hell in court. SUE ANYWAY

Re:What other legal rights can they get you to wai

[Hatta]

In the US it's common to take someones life and/or liberty because of their pursuit of happiness.

EULA = broken

[Anonymous Coward]

There is another matter here.

The inclusion of such a clause would render the contract void in a number of jurisdictional, thereby voiding the whole EULA. Just another case of careful work by a contract lawyer being completely undone by their employer. See shrink-wrap EULA's contained inside of an opaque product package that you become bound to only after you open it, these are automatically void.

Netflix has authority beyond the law?

[dicobalt]

The company should be fined and their head of legal sent off to federal "pound you in the ass" prison for even attempting to put this in an EULA. How can an EULA supersede law?

If Netflix has this "right"...

[mallydobb]

then I as a customer have the right not to choose their service, simple as that. I really don't see how this can be legal, but I am unable (and unwilling) to be a person who brings this to court to test the waters.

It's a trick, that's all it is.

[Weaselmancer]

You have it exactly right. You cannot enter into a legal agreement where you sign away one of your rights. For instance, I couldn't sign a binding contract that said "you may not vote". Courts would throw it out.

The reason why they add these clauses is because they are trying to trick people. Ever see the sign on the back of a large truck? "This Vehicle Not Responsible for Objects Coming from Road"? Or in parking lots at grocery stores. "Not Responsible for Damage Caused by Shopping Carts." Know why they have those signs? Because they hope you believe them. They're not true. It's up to the courts to make that determination after you bring suit. Of course the defendant is going to say "not guilty".

It's a bluff, that's all. They are just hoping you believe it.