- The end draws near(er) for EchoStar DVRs
We’ve previously covered the drawn-out battle between EchoStar and TiVo over EchoStar’s DVR technology, which TiVo claims infringes its patents. The merits of the patent dispute are, as with most, Byzantine, but a jury has found that EchoStar has indeed infringed TiVo’s patents, and appeals courts have affirmed that finding. The key point from an FOI perspective is this: the trial court ordered without any apparent hesitation, by way of remedy, that all of the millions of infringing DVRs—DVRs that are already purchased, reposing in homes, and recording episodes of the Jersey Shore—be zapped via satellite to fix the infringement. (A few are to be spared at random!)
This is yet another example of appliances-as-services. The item that used to be yours when you brought it home from the store is now only contingently yours, subject to ongoing regulation. In some ways this is good—particularly if you believe in vigorous patent enforcement—but it seems hard on several million consumers here, and this is a remedy simply not realistically available before the Internet: the patent police don’t knock on your door to seize an infringing mousetrap inside. Rather, the bad mouse trap company pays damages, as EchoStar is to do here — tens of millions of dollars.
TiVo has its remedy; not clear what the consumers’ is when their DVRs are fried through the vector of a “feature update,” other than suing a probably-broke company. And, as discussed before, it’s worrisome that exactly this kind of control can be exercised so casually, and in a spectrum of ways beyond total destruction—spying, bricking as a punishment for certain consumer behavior, and so on.
The latest development in the story, from last week, is that the Federal Circuit has again affirmed that EchoStar needs to destroy the DVRs. The court didn’t directly review the merits of the order, but rejected EchoStar’s narrower claim that the order should be construed to allow other remedies other than remotely disabling the DVRs. EchoStar’s delay in implementing the bricking has resulted in a finding of contempt of court.
What’s really striking about all the different court orders was how totally unconcerned they were with the novelty and arguable unfairness of the remote-disablement solution. The district court’s order just asserted, without discussion, that the disablement order was appropriate. (“The hardship of disabling DVR capabilities to Defendants’ DVR customers is a consequence of Defendants’ infringement and does not weight against an injunction…The public has an interest in maintaining a strong patent system.”) The Federal Circuit didn’t say much more, asserting that “We find the manner in which the disablement could be accomplished irrelevant to the issue at hand.” Moreover, the Federal Circuit actually rejected EchoStar’s argument that it could just remotely change the parts of the technology that infringed, leaving the DVR players intact generally—the court simply said that wasn’t the point of the disablement provision. One might understand why the Federal Circuit didn’t want to (or couldn’t) jump in with a broad equitable rewrite of the disablement order at this point, but the blasé treatment of a seemingly more reasonable solution was startling. The public may have an interest in a strong patent system, but we haven’t really had a chance yet to weigh whether that means innocent customers have their products disabled: that technology is still new.
It’s worth noting, though, that EchoStar has thus far defied the disablement order, and has been hit with $90 million of contempt fines instead. Complex procedural rules make it difficult to predict how this will all turn out, but EchoStar could just hold out on this, paying contempt fines into bankruptcy. Or TiVo and EchoStar could negotiate a settlement. So we’ll have to watch to see whether any DVR units actually are fried. In the meantime, what I take away from this case is that we can expect more cases like this in the future, and for parties and courts to fully accept and exploit these characteristics of tethered appliances.
—By EO + JZ
- FOI Topics and Links of the Week
A roundup of happenings that bear on the issues in The Future of the Internet –
Canadian Android Carrier Forcing Firmware Update. A Canadian carrier wanted users to download a firmware upgrade that fixed a glitch prohibiting users from dialing 911, so it made the upgrade mandatory. Seems reasonable. But it bundled in an update that “prevent[ed] users from ever gaining root access to their phones.” Sneaky—one more way that contingent generativity really is contingent, even for savvy users.
Biggest Mobile Operators Join Forces On App Store Project. A few dozen mobile operators have come together to try to create a mobile developer’s dream: a set of standards for applications that would work across phones and mobile OSes, and a single app store (with a single approval process) in which to sell those apps. This could be a good thing if it worked—developers might have more say in big-picture application development, and single carriers or hardware manufacturers would have less ability to be a development chokepoint. (It would also be nice for consumers, generally making the smartphone world look more like the PC world.) I’d be more excited if efforts to create uniform mobile standards weren’t so difficult and historically so unsuccessful.
Demand for Android Phones Makes “Monstrous” 250% Jump. Another developer’s dream (perhaps), Android, is seeing significant growth. “Android has finally caught consumer interest,” according to a research firm. Also, Android users are almost as happy as iPhone users with their phone (72% to 77%).
Big Brother Is Here, Families Say. This story is so bizarre, I don’t know what to make of it. A school in Philadelphia gave out laptops without telling the students or their families that the cameras could be remotely activated. The idea was to use the cameras if the laptops were stolen, but one family claims a camera was used to spy on a student. If true (details are cloudy), that would (a) be mind-bogglingly dumb on the school’s part, and (b) reminiscent of this (ubiquitous cameras) and this (remote activation) in the book. Check out the Onion’s take here.
Microsoft takes the StopBadware Approach Further. Last week, MS obtained a restraining order to deactivate 277 domain names it had linked to the Waledec botnet. Severing the connection between drones and the mothership goes beyond tactics employed by the Google/StopBadware Project. It effectively makes the targeted websites invisible, instead of slapping a prominent warning label on them. Although MS attempted to cut off only addresses used exclusively for spam, it appears that the single U.S.-based target may be a legitimate site, if a hapless drone. While owners have the opportunity to reclaim their addresses, MS’s actions raise questions of proportionality and whether cooperation and information-sharing between prominent Internet denizens, such as MS and Google, if possible, would result in more efficient and just solutions. Their approach also highlights the tension between the need for secrecy to effectively attack the spam network and the notice usually required prior to legal action.
One step behind. Thesixtyone.com, a site that allows the public to listen to, rate, and buy largely indie music, is looking for a hacker that can break up the bot-powered voting rings seeking to game their democratic rating system. A laudable goal, but one spammers have already begun to circumvent by using real people instead of bots.
Passing through the cloud. Katherine Boehret recently reviewed Pogoplug, a device that makes files web-accessible without actually storing them in the cloud. While this type of solution doesn’t address data-portability concerns surrounding extraction of personal data in usable form – to allow seamless transition between social networking sites, for example – it does let the user to maintain more control over data instead of entrusting it entirely to the cloud. This control prevents third parties from holding data hostage and from losing, allowing government access to, selling, or mining personal information; but users can still access their files from almost anywhere.
Please think twice. A website launched last week illustrates the risk of publicly sharing information online. Pleaserobme.com aggregates Twitter posts that contain location-sharing information from Foursquare in a chronological list to show the potential for exploitation by Internet users with malicious intentions. While it’s probable that only a small set of burglars will take advantage of this information, the site is an example of a grassroots campaign to raise awareness of potential problems for users who don’t recognize how the information they freely give can be mined. Whether this awareness leads them to alter their behavior or simply “get over it” is up to the individual.
Facebook messaging glitch. A subset of Facebook users experienced firsthand the risk of entrusting control of personal messages to third parties. Last Wednesday, FB accidentally sent the private messages of a “small number” of users to strangers instead of the intended recipients. Unlike well-publicized security breaches of credit card companies and banks, the misdirected messages were largely personal in nature and contained little identifying information, so the risk of actual injury is low. But that may not be very comforting to those who had intimate details divulged to strangers. Some of the accounts indeed provoke a gut-level enquiry as to how privacy violation should be measured. On the flip-side, the occasional misrouting of a letter by the Post Office doesn’t give rise to much concern – and in that case the sender is usually clearly identifiable – so why should electronic mail be afforded greater scrutiny?
—By Jennifer Halbleib and Elisabeth Oppenheimer
- FOI Topics and Links of the Week
AppMakr Transforms App Store Landscape, Enables Anyone To Make Their Own iPhone App. Gagan Biyani raves about AppMakr, a product that allows anyone to make a simple RSS-based iPhone app for $199. The company will even submit the app to the App Store. (So, for instance, Biyani put together an app that aggregates all of MobileCrunch’s offerings.) The comments on the article are worth reading — one person says that “these types of startups definitely bridge the gap between idea people and actual phone developers,” and others consider how this will change the App Store.
Mike Petrucci’s AppMakr Saga. Mike Petrucci decided to use AppMakr to put together an app aggregating his Twitter, blog, etc, feeds…only to have Apple reject it because it wasn’t of general interest. That’s a big difference between iPhone apps and, say, web apps (blogger has definitely never rejected someone for being of limited interest). It’ll be interesting to see what line Apple decides to take on this, and how AppMakr and similar companies push them.
Apple orders Android mention scrubbed from App Store. Speaking of Apple…they order a developer to take “Finalist in Google Android’s Developer’s Challenge!” out of the description of its app. Just silly.
In Europe, Challenges for Google. Much attention has been paid to Google’s business in China, but Europe (particularly Italy) poses difficulties, too—different copyright laws, different privacies laws, and different free speech traditions.
Google Buzz Privacy Issues Have Real Life Implications. However, Google has more pressing privacy concerns to worry about this week, with the rollout and reaction to Google Buzz. Google generally does just fine releasing a half-baked product and cleaning up the details later, but that’s a terrible idea when the rollout includes auto-sharing previously private information. It’s disturbing that this concern made it past however many rounds of internal testing Google did.
—Elisabeth Oppenheimer
- JZ on the iPad
JZ has recently pondered the iPad in a column in the Financial Times. Some excerpts of his thoughts…
First, he begins with a quick history of the subtle but massive shift between the Apple II and the iPhone:
In 1977, a 21-year-old Steve Jobs unveiled something the world had never seen before: a ready-to-program personal computer. After powering the machine up, proud Apple II owners were confronted with a cryptic blinking cursor, awaiting instructions.
The Apple II was a clean slate, a device built – boldly – with no specific tasks in mind. Yet, despite the cursor, you did not have to know how to write programs. Instead, with a few keystrokes you could run software acquired from anyone, anywhere. The Apple II was generative. After the launch, Apple had no clue what would happen next, which meant that what happened was not limited by Mr Jobs’ hunches. Within two years, Dan Bricklin and Bob Frankston had released VisiCalc , the first digital spreadsheet, which ran on the Apple II. Suddenly businesses around the world craved machines previously marketed only to hobbyists. Apple IIs flew off the shelves. The company had to conduct research to figure out why.
Thirty years later Apple gave us the iPhone. It was easy to use, elegant and cool – and had lots of applications right out of the box. But the company quietly dropped a fundamental feature, one signalled by the dropping of “Computer” from Apple Computer’s name: the iPhone could not be programmed by outsiders. “We define everything that is on the phone,” said Mr Jobs. “You don’t want your phone to be like a PC. The last thing you want is to have loaded three apps on your phone and then you go to make a call and it doesn’t work any more.”
The openness on which Apple had built its original empire had been completely reversed – but the spirit was still there among users. Hackers vied to “jailbreak” the iPhone, running new apps on it despite Apple’s desire to keep it closed. Apple threatened to disable any phone that had been jailbroken, but then appeared to relent: a year after the iPhone’s introduction, it launched the App Store. … But the App Store has a catch: app developers and their software must be approved by Apple. If Apple does not like the app, for any reason, it is gone.”
This blog has covered many of the apps that Apple has axed: the countdown to Bush’s departure, the app with information about health care, BabyShaker, religious spoofs, and programs to redirect calls, Google Voice, and I am Rich, among many others.
But the lingering question is, so what? Is the world really worse off because we can’t pay $999 for an app that does nothing (I Am Rich), especially given that Apple’s screening system does get rid of many apps with security problems? Is this like First Amendment absolutism — a preference for open systems that doesn’t take into account actual costs and benefits?
In response, JZ tries to imagine what we would have lost had the PC been as appliancized as the iPhone:
To be sure, many rejected apps will not be missed. (Only eight spendthrifts bought I Am Rich before it disappeared.) And users can be protected from harmful software from suspect sources. But consider: the world wide web started as, and remains, an app. Its first versions were written by Tim Berners-Lee, a British computer scientist who was unaffiliated with any software or hardware vendor. How worthy of approval would Wikipedia have seemed when it boasted only seven articles — dubiously hoping that the public would magically provide the rest? How threatened might today’s content publishers feel by peer-to-peer apps that let iPhone users trade data from one phone to another? We know the answer to that: enough that they have persuaded Apple to exclude all such apps from the App Store.
The web, Wikipedia, p2p — that’s a lot to lose. And at the same time we lose those benefits of generativity, as JZ points out, we give companies (and through them, governments) unprecedented censorship power. But the iPod, Pad, and Phone aren’t going anywhere. JZ concludes:
Hope lies in more balanced combinations of open and closed systems, such as that embodied by the traditional Apple Mac – or phones based on the Android operating system from the Open Handset Alliance, a consortium of hardware, software and telecoms companies. Android Market is the approved counterpart to Apple’s App Store but, in this case, users are also free to go off-roading, installing any code they like. Android is a canary in the digital coal mine: will its more open model survive should people load suspect apps and find they cannot make calls any more?
Mr Jobs ushered in the personal computer era and now he is trying to usher it out. We should focus on preserving our freedoms, even as the devices we acquire become more attractive and easier to use.
—By Elisabeth Oppenheimer
- FOI Topics and Links of the Week
The Extraordinaries Haiti Earthquake Support Center. A followup post on the Extraordinaries’ efforts to use ubiquitous human computing to help find missing people after the Haiti earthquake — a positive vision inspired by JZ’s nightmare scenario of crowdsourced secret police work. Did they succeed? “Yes and no”—but, as they detail, there’s obvious potential for future disaster relief.
Amazon Cracks Open the Kindle. Amazon is opening the Kindle to outside developers who can market their products in what sounds exactly like an App Store, down to the 70-30 revenue split and and light policing of apps. (One difference is that developers have to pay for wireless delivery.) It’s seeming like this is *the* model for the next few years. Speaking of which…
Computers Should Be More Like Toasters. The sale of the Apple Tablet could mark an important moment for generativity. Computers have been shrinking and phones have been growing—but the critical difference has been that anyone could still code for a computer, until now. The Tablet looks more like a computer than a phone, but will Apple will prescreen apps they way it does for the iPhone? Farhad Manjoo thinks that would be a good thing, but there are clear generativity costs.
The Splinternet means the end of the Web’s golden age. Josh Bernoff points out that, as we switch to appliancized computers and smart devices instead of PCs, the web becomes a “splinternet.” Websites show up and operate differently on each device. He thinks about how to handle this from a business and marketing perspective, advising: “Here’s what not to do: panic and try to unify things again. The shattering cannot be undone.”
Technology Changes “Outstrip” Netbooks. Meanwhile, the BBC considers the convergence among netbooks, smartphones, and tablet notebooks, and who the short- and long-term winners are likely to be.
Apple censors Dalai Lama iPhone Apps in China. An interesting look at how censorship works on iPhones in China. (The story was written pre-Google announcement, so some portions are out of date.) Apple, complying with local law, appears to be removing apps related to the Dalai Lama in the Chinese App Store, and a search for Falun Gong apps freezes the search page. On the other hand, it’s possible to access YouTube through an iPhone app, which isn’t always possible on a PC.
And in the crystal ball dep’t — from JZ’s book:
Imagine entering a café in Paris with one’s personal digital assistant or mobile phone, and being able to query: “Is there anyone on my buddy list within 100 yards? Are any of the ten closest friends of my ten closest friends within 100 yards?” Although this may sound fanciful, it could quickly become mainstream. With reputation systems already advising us on what to buy, why not have them also help us make the first cut on whom to meet, to date, to befriend? These are not difficult services to offer, and there are precursors today.
As usual, there’s an app for that… the “datecheck” app allows you to enter a name, phone number, or email address, and get information on your date. The categories are “sleaze detector” (check of criminal convictions & sex offenses), “$$$” (home ownership, etc), “interests” (gleaned from social networks), “living situation” (who they live with), and “compatibility”—although unfortunately, the “compatibility” check is still just a check of astrological signs. Now all they need is friends’ feedback rankings.
—By Elisabeth Oppenheimer
February 18th, 2009 at 7:09 pm (#)
Jonathan, sorry, I think this post completely misses the point. The Facebook users were not objecting to the opacity of the modified TOS; they were objecting to the impact. Whether in plain English or in $700/hr NY lawyer English, the modified TOS was clearly an attempt to shift control of user-generated content (the photo, the status updates) from the user to the service provider. The bloggers focused on the removal of the account deletion provision in the original TOS, but more significant was the removal of the sentence at the beginning of the same paragraph that made clear that FB needs the license to enable service delivery, not to claim of the content. The modified TOS stood the original deal on its head. The FB folks figured that out. That — not “the party of the first part” — was the reason for the protest. I also happen to disagree that the “P2P” privacy violations are significant. As I’ve written elsewhere, with FB it’s all in the defaults. Throw a switch and it impacts the rights of millions of users. Cheers, Marc.
February 18th, 2009 at 7:27 pm (#)
No one expects Facebook to be run by anyone other than its management and private owners [...] but if the communities there are truly to flourish, perhaps it’s time to experiment with forms of self-governance.
You’re proposing a solution in search of a problem. According to your post, FB has 175,000,000 registered users. How many of those people actually would have deleted their accounts rather than submit to the new ToS? Sure, FB upset the people who make a living by paying attention to these things, and there were a bunch of people on Digg getting all pissy about it, but so what? I saw a report yesterday that the ToS protest group picked up about 10,000 FB members in the first day. Should FB really be concerned that 0.00057% of their userbase and a bunch of smarty-pants internet policy wonks objected to the new terms?
The value of the site is in its users- but that value inures entirely to the site’s owners. As long as the owners don’t drive away significant portions of their user base, they don’t have anything to worry about… and given the switching cost, where are 175 million people going to go?
February 18th, 2009 at 8:20 pm (#)
[...] For a full discussion of this issue by Jonathan Zittrain, see this post on his blog. [...]
February 18th, 2009 at 9:31 pm (#)
I can only applaud a law professor who openy whishes for more plainspeak. I would personally prefer (CC)-style pictograms — but everybody always neglects the illiterate Facebook users.
Thank you even more for pointing out that, once again, Facebook and its bunch of nerdy Californians are not the culprit: if they want anything stalky, they probably know where to find far savvier then my party plans. I have yet to come across an issue with Facebook that isn’t instantly resolved by a little honnesty and integreity towards either a close relative a significant other or your boss — and neither deserve anyless, with or without Internet.
What they *are* about to be guilty of, however, is re-shaping social relations by trying to make explicitely coherent the contradictions that Mark Z. indicated in his post. I can imagine only mostly cumbersome standards and little possible generativity out of there — and I’m afraid that the main thing I’m neglecting is Facebook’s employee ethnocentism.
February 19th, 2009 at 3:41 pm (#)
[...] Jonathan Zittrain has a nice post looking at longer-term implications of this particular storm, now that it has passed. Like me, JZ [...]
February 20th, 2009 at 12:20 am (#)
I just can’t believe they went back on their TOS change. People are dumb if they think they are getting any privacy from Facebook or Myspace. All they are doing is voluntarily supplying valuable info to huge marketing mills. Although there are ways to communicate with privacy: anonymous sites like http://www.anonboard.com
February 20th, 2009 at 6:33 am (#)
It seems fascinating that the “great evil” that is DRM suddenly becomes desirable in this context. The user wants to be able to upload their data and yet retain control over who can copy it, when they can “un-upload” it, and so on. Maybe DRM isn’t so bad after all: it’s just a case of who’s got the rights and who’s doing the management.
February 20th, 2009 at 8:07 am (#)
The post makes several points, the second of which seems most salient and which I almost entirely agree with (see my related post, written in ignorance of this one). I’m not certain that we need to analogize FB or similar things to a country, but governance is clearly the issue.
Marc is right that defaults are key, but that doesn’t mean that P2P privacy problems are (relatively) unimportant. P2P defaults matter, too. This case just didn’t happen to present that question.
February 20th, 2009 at 6:15 pm (#)
Should we compare Facebook’s TOS to other similar SNSs to see on how Facebook would have been wider effects?
Shall we compare it to Myspace, Xanga, Bebo, Twitter, Fliker and who else?
- MySpace : users’ ownership but licence to Myspace for distributing etc… unless marked ‘private’ , After will cease distribution as soon as practicable,
“6. Proprietary Rights in Content on MySpace.
6.1 MySpace does not claim any ownership rights in the text, files, images, photos, video, sounds, musical works, works of authorship, applications, or any other materials (collectively, “Content”) that you post on or through the MySpace Services. After posting your Content to the MySpace Services, you continue to retain any such rights that you may have in your Content, subject to the limited license herein. By displaying or publishing (“posting”) any Content on or through the MySpace Services, you hereby grant to MySpace a limited license to use, modify, delete from, add to, publicly perform, publicly display, reproduce, and distribute such Content solely on or through the MySpace Services, including without limitation distributing part or all of the MySpace Website in any media formats and through any media channels, except Content marked “private” will not be distributed outside the MySpace Website. This limited license does not grant MySpace the right to sell or otherwise distribute your Content outside of the MySpace Services. After you remove your Content from the MySpace Website we will cease distribution as soon as practicable, and at such time when distribution ceases, the license will terminate. If after we have distributed your Content outside the MySpace Website you change the Content’s privacy setting to “private,” we will cease distribution of such “private” Content outside the MySpace Website as soon as practicable after you make the change.
6.2 The license you grant to MySpace is non-exclusive (meaning you are free to license your Content to anyone else in addition to MySpace), fully-paid and royalty-free (meaning that MySpace is not required to pay you for the use on the MySpace Services of the Content that you post), sublicensable (so that MySpace is able to use its affiliates, subcontractors and other partners such as Internet content delivery networks and wireless carriers to provide the MySpace Services), and worldwide (because the Internet and the MySpace Services are global in reach).
………
6.4
…MySpace hereby grants you a limited, revocable, nonsublicensable license to reproduce and display the MySpace Content …”
…
– Xanga : Ownership of the content provider + temporary licence , content license ’shall expire either immediately or upon termination of any promotional or marketing activities ongoing at the time’
“CONTENT SUBMITTED TO XANGA.COM
(This section refers to Content that you create)
You retain all ownership rights to your Content. Except for its ownership of the collection of all content on Xanga, as described below, Xanga does not claim ownership of any Content you publish in your area of the Website (�Your Xanga Site�).
When you publish your Content on Xanga, you grant Xanga a temporary license to �rebroadcast� it. ….
By publishing Content on Your Xanga Site you grant Xanga a world-wide, royalty-free, and non-exclusive license to reproduce, modify, distribute, transmit, publicly perform and publicly display the Content (as well as permit others – including without limitation Xanga�s co-brand, content and syndication partners – to do the same) solely for the following purposes:
* Displaying, distributing and promoting Your Xanga Site
* Promoting and marketing Xanga�s products and services and general operation of the Xanga Service
* Promoting and marketing the products and services of Xanga�s partners and affiliates
* Promoting and marketing products and services related to your Content.
This license exists only for as long as the Content remains published on Your Xanga Site and only for as long you remain a Xanga member, except that you grant Xanga a continuing perpetual license and right to maintain a copy of your Xanga Site and Content for archival purposes. This archival copy is not posted publicly on the Xanga system; it is maintained solely so that Xanga may recover content and restore accounts (in case of errors or system failure) or cooperate with law enforcement in order to make the Xanga service safer. Except for this license for archival use, in the event that you remove the Content from Your Xanga Site or in the event that your membership is terminated, this license shall expire either immediately or upon termination of any promotional or marketing activities ongoing at the time.
COPYRIGHT
Content created by Xanga or its suppliers
All content created by Xanga, its partners, or its suppliers and included on Xanga, such as text, logos, graphics, images, javascript code, HTML code, and other software, is the property of Xanga, Inc. (or its partners or suppliers) and protected by U.S. and international copyright and other intellectual property laws.
Compilations of Content
Notwithstanding the provisions outlined in �Content submitted to Xanga.com� above*, the collection of all Content on this site is a collective work under the U.S. copyright laws and is the exclusive property of Xanga and protected by U.S. and international copyright laws. The Content and software on Xanga may be used as a homepage creation or web-surfing resource. Any other use, including the reproduction, modification, distribution, transmission, republication, display, or performance, of the Content on Xanga is strictly prohibited.
*Individual Contributors retain all ownership rights to their Content. Xanga does not claim ownership of any Content you publish on Your Xanga Site.”
……..
- BEBO : no ownership claimed + limited license clearly defines the after contract termination
“Proprietary Rights
Bebo does not claim any ownership rights in any Materials that you submit, post, or display on or through the Bebo Service. ……
you hereby grant to Bebo and its agents and assigns a limited license to use, modify, publicly perform, publicly display, reproduce, and distribute such Materials solely in connection with the Bebo Service or the promotion thereof.
…
This license will terminate at the time you remove your Materials from the Bebo Service, except that you agree that the license will continue solely with respect to other Members’ continued use of your Materials that are not music or videos (i.e. photos or skins); provided, however if you remove any of the Materials from the Bebo Service, Bebo reserves the right to remove all of your Materials from other Member’s pages. The license does not grant Bebo the right to sell your Materials You represent and warrant that: (i) you own the Materials posted by you on or through the Bebo Service or otherwise have the right to grant the license set forth in this section, and (ii) the posting of your Materials on or through the Bebo Service does not violate the privacy rights, publicity rights, copyrights, contract rights or any other rights of any person. You agree to pay for all royalties, fees, and any other monies owing any person by reason of any Materials posted by you to or through the Bebo Service. The hosting of certain items that you post, such as video, may require your agreement to a separate license agreement or terms of use.
Bebo, Inc. and its affiliates and licensors own and retain all rights in the Bebo Web site and Bebo Service, which contain proprietary and confidential information that is protected by applicable intellectual property and other laws, …..
We take your privacy very seriously and collection and use of personal information is governed by our Privacy Policy. Click here to review the Bebo Privacy Policy.
Information collected in connection with your use of the Bebo Service may be processed and stored in the United States, or other countries where Bebo or its parent, affiliates, subsidiaries or service providers maintain facilities. If you live outside the United States and use Bebo, you expressly consent to the transfer to the United States of the personal information you provide Bebo, or such other countries as we may disclose from time to time. Additionally, you agree that we may use your Bebo user name to authenticate you on any service provided by Bebo or its affiliates.”
- TWITTER no ownership claimed + promise that all removed after at anytime
“Copyright (What’s Yours is Yours)
1. We claim no intellectual property rights over the material you provide to the Twitter service. Your profile and materials uploaded remain yours. You can remove your profile at any time by deleting your account. This will also remove any text and images you have stored in the system.
2. We encourage users to contribute their creations to the public domain or consider progressive licensing terms.
3…….”
All these examples shows how a free service accept little liability, the service take no any liability to maintain and could disappear or be swallow at any time.
February 20th, 2009 at 8:42 pm (#)
I think the switch by Facebook is just an extension of the current governmental information grab. Sure, they changed their policy back, but for how long and will they announce it the next time. They still have the clause about changing without notification.
March 1st, 2009 at 5:33 am (#)
[...] Facebook’s privacy storm :: The Future of the Internet — And How to Stop It [...]
April 21st, 2009 at 6:42 am (#)
[...] founder, Mark Zuckerberg, responded quickly – in plainspeak rather than legalese – and I credit his view that the changes in terms of service really weren’t meant to be a stealthy way of doing [...]