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The Courts Government Privacy Software News

Robolawyer to Handle Clickwraps? 211

Posted by michael from the fatally-flawed-ideas dept.
adelord writes "Recently Wired published an essay by Mark D. Rasch describing the need for a 'browser-based automaton that could be adjusted to match your tolerance for legal mumbo jumbo' to help the user navigate the torrent of user agreements most of us click through without reading. Is this a job for Google Labs, and if not, who else would write the software for it? Do you think it is a good idea? While the legal exposure from writing software that partially fills the role of a lawyer could be enormous, I sure that it would have an ironclad user agreement that I would simply click through in my excitement to use it."
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Robolawyer to Handle Clickwraps? More

Robolawyer to Handle Clickwraps?

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  • Settings (Score:5, Funny)

    by mfh ( 56 ) on Thursday October 14, 2004 @12:41PM (#10526493) Homepage Journal
    I would like a prefs setting that goes something like:
    • Idiot proof : no EULAs needed. I only want freely available stuff.
    • Some legal crap allowed : we will allow some EULAs if they validate to XYZ standards
    • Most legal crap allowed : pretty much anything goes, as long as it validates to some standard or another
    • Nearly Wide Open : I will pretend that I only speak pig latin if they catch me on some bogus contractual agreement or copyright infringement. Iay eekspay igpay atinlay!
    • Spyware bait : I have "I'm a sucker" tatooed on my forehead. All Nigerians are my friends and I must help them save their fortunes from the evil tyrany of Nigeria!
    • I just cross my fingers and think to myself that clickthrough EULAs can't really be legally binding and then I click away!
    • Back when I went to law school, which admittedly was for a very brief period, contracts required a "meeting of the minds" in order to be enforcable. How could a software program that reads EULAs ever result in a meeting of the agreement parties' minds?
      • How could a software program that reads EULAs ever result in a meeting of the agreement parties' minds?

        You may as well ask how ANY click-thru EULA could meet that standard. There can't be a meeting of "the minds" unless at least 2 minds are involved, and from my vague recollection of purchasing OTS software, the customer is alone by the time the license comes up.

        So this program is no more or less valid than EULAs in general.

        (As a side note, this program will be illegal in most states, because it is an

  • Before you'd have a real Robolawyer... (Score:4, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 14, 2004 @12:43PM (#10526523)
    ...they would have to develop a mechanical hand that could pick your pocket.

  • Do you think it is a good idea? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by darth_MALL ( 657218 ) on Thursday October 14, 2004 @12:44PM (#10526528)
    Hmmmm. If they end up with a product that works as hit-and-miss as Babelfish, wouldn't that jeopordize the correct translation of legalese? Are you still bound to the original mumbo-jumbo if you only understood a flawed translation? Doesn't seem feasable. Why not just dumb down the actual legal language?

    • Re:Do you think it is a good idea? (Score:5, Interesting)

      by WormholeFiend ( 674934 ) on Thursday October 14, 2004 @12:50PM (#10526611)
      I don't think that lawyers themselves understand legalese properly.

      Why? In the past, I've been asked to translate various contracts and agreements from English to French, and more often than not, when I talked to the alleged writer, s/he was not able to answer the question(s) I had about weird syntax/grammar that made the text basically nonsensical.

      And a lot of them asked me to "keep the nonsensical part" in the resulting translation.

      Incompetence or deliberate and dishonest obfuscation?
      • Just babelfish the EULA English->Chineese->English, and then click away!

        "I agreed to WHAT ?!!!!"

      • Re:Do you think it is a good idea? (Score:5, Informative)

        by eln ( 21727 ) on Thursday October 14, 2004 @01:13PM (#10526877)
        Lawyers drawing up contracts tend to go out of their way to make things as precise as possible. Lawyers hate leaving unintended loopholes, so they bend over backwards to try and make sure they don't happen. This is why there's usually so much redundance in legal filings.

        However, in the process of making things as precise as possible, they often make things very difficult to understand, and ironically the stuff they put in to make things very precise may end up not being interpreted as intended, because it's so hard for a third party to understand.

        Of course, when a contract stretches into a hundred pages of overly precise legalese, even the lawyer who wrote it might glaze over a little bit while re-reading it, and miss all of the unintentionally misleading or confusing pieces.

        There is a movement in the legal profession these days to make things more readable, but try as they might, lawyers still usually get caught up in the overwhelming need for absolute precision, and things end up being unreadable by the average person.

        There's also the fact that every time you try to dumb something down to more common language, you risk losing a lot of the nuance of the original language, and can often produce a document that is interpreted very differently than the original, even though the words might technically have the same meanings.
      • I don't think that lawyers themselves understand legalese properly.

        I agree. I took a law class in High School. The problem with today's law is it has gotten so complex. Interpeting law is about on the same level as interpeting the christian bible. Anyone can interpet just about anything one way or another. If they need backup, there is always some previous person/case that they could look up showing the same interpetation to help argue their case. However, the other lawyer can do the same thing to show

      • Re:Do you think it is a good idea? (Score:4, Informative)

        by torokun ( 148213 ) on Thursday October 14, 2004 @02:37PM (#10527777) Homepage
        Lawyers often adhere to specific language because that specific language has been adjudicated to have a specific and desired meaning in a case. So if you stick to that language, you're reasonably assured of the desired interpretation.

        However, if you deviate from that language, sometimes a judge might construe it differently that you wish, which could be bad. When you're working for a client, the important thing is getting the desired meaning and result, not the clarity of the documents in question... :)
  • it would make more sense to me for someone to write software that would track down the author, or the authoring firm, of each eula down and deliver small electric shocks to them via their keyboards (size of shock could be user-specified).

  • Has to be done..

    "I am sorry Dave. I cannot allow you to agreee to this agreement."

    • Re:Perfect for a HAL system (Score:5, Funny)

      by mfh ( 56 ) on Thursday October 14, 2004 @12:50PM (#10526612) Homepage Journal
      "I am sorry Dave. I cannot allow you to agreee to this agreement."
      "Hal...!!! Open the webpage HAL!"
      "I'm sorry Dave, it has a Nigerian scam on it."
      "Hal!!! It's not a Nigerian scam. It's President Bush's campaign page [georgewbush.com]. I need to read about his views for the big election. Since you wouldn't let me read CNN, this is my next option."
      "I'm sorry, Dave, but the answer is still, No."
  • No spyware would play by the rules. They'd do everything they could to bypass the robo lawyer bot thingy. And how would you - as the article implies - install this software *before* you install your OS?

  • Infospace already owns this IP (Score:4, Informative)

    by dfn_deux ( 535506 ) * <datsun510&gmail,com> on Thursday October 14, 2004 @12:46PM (#10526561) Homepage
    Infospace aquired Millet software in 2000, Millet software had a product called "Privacy Bank" Which did exactly what this article is describing. The only hard part is that it doesn't scale well, because there isn't a text parser on earth good enough to unwrap the intent of the legalese in most EULAs. So either you have to employ an army of well trained EULA readers or get individual sites to submit to a cleanroom EULA with Infospace's language so that the software can know exactly what is allowed/disallowed.

    • You miss the point of P3P - No army needed (Score:4, Interesting)

      by thpr ( 786837 ) on Thursday October 14, 2004 @12:51PM (#10526623)
      The purpose behind P3P [w3.org] is that it really distills the privacy down to a few multiple choice questions. Thus, there isn't a need for an army of readers - the robolawyer could automatically check the answers to the multiple choice questions... after all, those answers are machine readable.
      • That is the purpose of the "cleanroom EULAs". Even if you get someone to answer yes/no questions about their intent, the language is what you are agreeing to, not the intent....
      • The problem is that you can't distill the EULA's of most commercial software down to that level. It works with privacy policies because most companies are willing to work with a very loosely defined one; they just take the next available 'size' up from what they need to do with your information and use that.

        You can't do that with an EULA. They contain wildly varying terms, with specific phrasing that the company's lawyers have recommended over and above any other. They're not about to choose the phrasin
    • After looking around a little bit I found a few articles about their product, I'm going to assume that means my NDA has expired... :) Most of the articles were PR plant type info, but this one is a review of the ewallet technology that was integrated with the Privacy Policy/EULA ranking bit. http://www.ecommerce-guide.com/resources/product_ r eviews/article.php/241021 [ecommerce-guide.com]

    • Re:Infospace already owns this IP (Score:5, Interesting)

      by serutan ( 259622 ) <snoopdougNO@SPAMgeekazon.com> on Thursday October 14, 2004 @01:21PM (#10526975) Homepage
      Off on a tangent, it's sad to see anyone substitute the term "IP" for "idea," It's sort of like tv people referring to places in the world as "destinations," as if they exist mainly from the travel industry's point of view. Ideas are not property and never have been. People only "hold" patents, trademarks and copyrights, which give them rights temporarily granted by the government. They never "own" anything, which is why people who infringe their rights aren't "stealing" anything. The distinction is important because thinking of ideas as property lets the rights-control industry play the part of the little old lady running after the purse snatcher. The ideas of ownership and theft are deeply ingrained in our culture. Everybody can identify with them. But they just don't apply.
      • I wrote IP, because that is precisely what I meant. Infospace bought the patents, trademarks, and software assosciated with a product that provides the functionality described.
        Ideas aren't created in a vacuum, but then again it is common for two entirely seperated inddividuals to have the same idea. Although, since Privacybank was started in 1997 I'd go out on a limb and say that they had the idea first....
  • anything would be better than now, currently everyone just clicks 'agree' w/o knowing what the hell they're agreeing to. leaves the door open for users to get the shaft for sure, plus, you should never agree to anything w/o knowing what you're agreeing to.

    speaking of, please vote. thanks

    CV&*$@#@#$B

  • Solution to EULAs (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Sparr0 ( 451780 ) <sparr0@gmail.com> on Thursday October 14, 2004 @12:47PM (#10526573) Homepage Journal
    Dont agree to them. Simplest way to deal with EULAs. They offer you a contract, you decline it. Optionally you can offer a more reasonable contract to them, perhaps as detailed in the SVLA [cexx.org]. The GPL is pretty much the only EULA I agree to these days.
    • Dont agree to them. Simplest way to deal with EULAs. They offer you a contract, you decline it.

      No, the easiest way to do it is to violate the EULA and happily have someone fight MSFT in court on your behalf.

      EULAs are going to continue to exist even though their legality has never been proven. We need to fight these click through licenses and end them.

      If you don't sign something and have it notarized it shouldn't be considered legal.

      • Re:Solution to EULAs (Score:4, Funny)

        by 3terrabyte ( 693824 ) on Thursday October 14, 2004 @02:13PM (#10527429) Journal
        NOICE TO READER: Please read this contract carefully. By reading all or any portion of this garcia (6573) [slashdot.org] * [slashdot.org] "garcia post" you accept all the terms and conditions of this agreement, including, in particular the limitations on responding negatively. You agree that this agreement is enforcable like any written negotiated agreement signed by you. If you do not agree, do not read this garcia post, or respond to said garcia post. If you acquired this garcia post on tangible media (e.g. HTML) without an opportunity to review this license and you do not accept this agreement, you may obtain a moderation point refund of any amount you originally lost if you: (A) Only post anonymously (B) Apologize in a grandchild post (C) Become another one of garcia's lackeys and start agreeing with him.

        Garcia, his multiple accounts, his gullible fans, and most anonymous posts supporting garcia, own all intellectual property in garcia posts. Garcia permits you to respond to garcia posts only in accordance with the terms of this Agreement.

        1. Definitions. "Garcia" means (a) a loser slashdot entity that feels inadequate with the world and believes that crafting carefully worded garcia posts will make him feel more loved, and less alone in the world. "Garcia post" means (a) long crafted slashdot post geared to gain the most moderation points possible (b) well crafted slashdot post geared to gain the most responses possible. The posts are usually empty of substance and full of invoking words to force immediate reactions. "Garcia response" means (a) a response to your negative response to a garcia post. This will always contain sympathetic cry against your post being an (i) unfair response (ii) childish response (iii) elitist response (iv) quit picking on me. This will always be followed by (a) a call to moderators to correctly moderate your post down as a (i) Troll (ii) Flamebait. "Garcia anonymous response" means garcia is responding anonymously to (a) keep from losing any more precious moderation points (b) pretend he is someone else supporting garcia (c) knows he is losing a cat fight and is defending his noble garcia posts. "Garcia agenda" means (a) as yet undisclosed reason for garcia gathering moderation points and responses like money and favors.

        2. Garcia Post License. As long as you comply with the terms of this Garcia Post License Agreement (this "Agreement"), garcia grants you to keep your moderation points, and be a part of a pointless debate with garcia about things he doesn't really care about.

        2.1 Subject to the terms of this Agreement, you may respond to garcia for the sole and exclusive purpose of furthering the garcia agenda.

        2.1.1 Agreeing with a garcia post. You may agree with garcia without being anonymous. This will make garcia feel good. You may even win moderation points from other garcia accounts, friends of garcia, newbies, or other idiots. If you leave an opening, this may even award you with a quick garcia response that praises you on your common sense in agreeing with him.

        2.1.2 Disagreeing with a garcia post (Not Anonymous). You may disagree with garcia without being anonymous. This will quickly be followed by an ever-watching garcia with a garcia response. Garcia responses are quickly followed by moderation points going against your post. You now have less karma than garcia, feel his girth.

        2.1.3 Disagreeing with a garcia post (Anonymous). You may disagree with garcia while anonymous. This will quickly be followed by an ever-watching garcia with a garcia response. This will also explain how you are a chicken shit for being anonymous. You will not lose any karma points. However, you are expected to feel whipped by garcia's wit.

        2.1.4 Agreeing with a garcia response. Your name is garcia. The the hell are you reading this for?

        2.1.5 Disagreeing with a garcia response. You may disagree with a garcia response. This will be quickly followed by an anonymous garcia response. You

    • The GPL is a license not a EULA.
      • The GPL is a license not a EULA.

        What do you think the 'L' in EULA stands for?

        I'm seeing increasing numbers of OSS software projects with installation programs (e.g. Windows ones) insisting that the end user accept the GPL before allowing them to install. I've asked a few about this, and the general response is, 'we need you to accept that, because that's where the "no warranty" agreement is, and we don't provide you with a warranty.'
      • Are you saying that a EULA is not a license?

        I hate to break it to you, but the GPL is a EULA. It dictates what you can and cannot do with a given piece of software (or in the GPL's case, the code).

        When you click 'I Agree' and install a copy of Windows, you are agreeing that you will not hold Microsoft liable should your 1st born die to the software, along with a number of other stipulations.

        The GPL is far shorter yes, and it too dictates what you cannot do... like release a binary without making availabl

        • Are you saying that a EULA is not a license?

          No, he's saying the GPL is not a EULA, and in that he is entirely correct. The GPL does not address what the end user does with the software, it addresses under what circumstances it may be copied and distributed.

          However if he were to claim that EULA's are not licenses he would also be correct. A license is a permission to do something that is prohibited without the license. Most EULA's do not come into this category the are attempts to restrict your legal

        • The GPL is far shorter yes, and it too dictates what you cannot do... like release a binary without making available the code.

          No, a license gives you additional freedoms, not additional restrictions. The default state under copyright law is no freedom to copy or modify. The GPL gives you those freedoms under certain circumstances, but you are not required to accept them. Regardless, you have the right to use the software. That right is not restricted by copyright law and hence requires no grant of a licen

  • Danger! Danger! (Score:3, Insightful)

    by RomSteady ( 533144 ) on Thursday October 14, 2004 @12:48PM (#10526578) Homepage Journal
    While the fact that legal documents have a very set structure and certain terms are required to be used a certain way in certain documents would help the "robolawyer" parse the documents, when you start getting into jurisdiction changes, differing court judgments on certain clauses, as well as potential legal liability for bad judgment calls made by the "robolawyer," you might just be better off with a Magic 8-Ball.

    Of course, the same would apply to an actual lawyer nowadays, but the Magic 8-Ball is less likely to countersue you into oblivion.
    • What if EULAs were to take the form of a checklist of (mostly) preset clauses? I.e., Clause #1 is "This is an agreement between [Company Name] and you, the user..." and so on; #35 is "Severability..." and so on; and after a while you have many standardized clauses with their EULA can signal by code. Your robolawyer would then just show you the checklist; any custom clauses would just be shown to you, possibly with warning tags pointing out unusual or consternation-causing strings ("hold harmless", "pay",

  • Proper Response (Score:5, Funny)

    by Cajunator ( 572036 ) on Thursday October 14, 2004 @12:49PM (#10526591)
    Just as long as Robolawyer started his response with : "IANAL, but...."

  • No need to RTFA (Score:2, Insightful)

    by cavemanf16 ( 303184 )
    This is ridiculous, michael. Why even post this crap. Legal "mumbo-jumbo" exists to protect someone, and is therefore of ultimate importance to be kept AS IS. Changing it with some automated software to "simplify it" is altering the terms of the agreement, which I'm sure wouldn't fly AT ALL in a court of law in nearly any jurisdiction world-wide. How is this "news for nerds, stuff that matters"? This most certainly DOES NOT matter.
    • Rediculous? Doesn't Matter?

      Don't Tell the W3C that P3P [w3.org] doesn't matter. Or the "30% of the top-100 sites and 20% of the top-500 sites" which are P3P enabled they talk about here [w3.org].

    • Did you read the article? (Never rely on the crap that the submitter gives you) What the "robolawyer" will do is you give it a set of terms that you do or do not agree with, and it will determine if the EULA meets your requirements, and report back. It doesn't change the terms of the agreement, the terms of the agreement are set in stone by the writer, and you can't agree to anything else.

      It's like hiring someone to review lengthy documents for you and tell you whether or not you should sign it and why.

  • so will I need another robolawyer (Score:5, Funny)

    by deathcloset ( 626704 ) on Thursday October 14, 2004 @12:49PM (#10526594) Journal
    to expain the first robolawyer's EULA?
  • I'm trying to imagine the convoluted and restrictive EULA they would have to slap onto a piece of software designed to essentially give you legal advice. Aiee, I'm caught in an infinite loop!

    I can summarize it in half a paragraph: don't agree to anything that doesn't come from a legitimate organization or individual you recognize and trust, and that thing you just clicked says, you can do pretty much whatever you want with this thing except sell it, but we're not responsible for ANYTHING that happens as a

  • Yes, but.... (Score:3, Funny)

    by ShatteredDream ( 636520 ) on Thursday October 14, 2004 @12:49PM (#10526604) Homepage
    do we get RoboLAPDCops to beat down and mangle anyone who breaks their end of the deals signed by the RoboLawyer on our behalf?

  • Simpler solution (Score:5, Insightful)

    by LastToKnow ( 449735 ) on Thursday October 14, 2004 @12:50PM (#10526606) Homepage
    I'd prefer it if we just required companies to add summaries to their legal aggreements. Like a little bit at the top that says thing like

    * You're not allowed to re-sell this software
    * We can use our update feature to install whatever we want on your computer
    * Your soul belongs to us

    Followed by all the legal mumbo jumbo required to make it all hold up in a court.

    • Re:Simpler solution (Score:4, Informative)

      by dfn_deux ( 535506 ) * <datsun510&gmail,com> on Thursday October 14, 2004 @01:12PM (#10526867) Homepage
      a contract is based on language, not intent. Any sort of summary would not be sufficient legal protect against exploiting vunerabilities in the language which create loopholes in favor of either agreeing party.

    • Re:Simpler solution (Score:3, Insightful)

      by julesh ( 229690 )
      If they can phrase a summary like that that contains all the information required for you to understand what you're agreeing to, there's no need for the legalese section. You don't think contracts _have_ to be written like that, do you? The only reason that they _are_ written like that is that that is the only way to include all the information that's necessary without approximating the size of war & peace.
      • ...I reckong they're written that way to pad the pockets of as many lawyers as possible. You need a lawyer to write one and you nearly need a lawyer/law degree to understand one.

        They're also written that way so that people just blank out and click next without knowing what draconian terms they are agreeing to.
    • "All Your Base Are Belong to Us". "For Great Injustice". "Someone set us up the loophole".

  • The obvious question? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by scribblej ( 195445 ) on Thursday October 14, 2004 @12:51PM (#10526616)
    My first thought is, if you have a peice of software "signing" these EULAs for you -- who's bound by the "contract?"
    • Well, assuming for the sake of argument that EULAs are contracts (I'm not sure what/if the courts have decided), you are. The software acts as your "agent" - it's just a tool.

  • Natrual language parsing is hard enough for humans (Score:5, Interesting)

    by RealAlaskan ( 576404 ) on Thursday October 14, 2004 @12:51PM (#10526618) Homepage Journal
    I don't see a browser plugin doing a good job of it.

    I could imagine EULAs having a ``metafield'' which would have values like: GPL, BSD, Unknown Proprietary, Not Specified. You could set your browser to click through known, approved licenses. I'm not sure that would be valuable, though; those that are generally known and widely regarded as innocuous are the ones that don't usually hassle you in the first place.

    I'd rather see some effort put into enforcing the first sale doctrine, and invalidating EULAs and clickthroughs in court, myself.

    • I'd rather see some effort put into enforcing the first sale doctrine, and invalidating EULAs and clickthroughs in court, myself. Wasn't this recently tested in a federal circuit court that found it was legal to nullify your "first sale" rights in the EULA? I swear slashdot had a headline to that effect sometime in the past 2 weeks.
      • You're not purchasing the software (where the first sale doctrine is in force), you are licensing it (where first sale does not apply). There is (obviously) a huge legal difference.

        EULAs and clickthroughs will not be invalidated in court as long as they are reasonable. The courts consider "reasonable" the ability for you not to use the software (or return it within a short period of time).

        The case you are recalling (where the court explicitly defined what it thinks is reasonable) is probably Blizzard [eff.org]

        • You're not purchasing the software (where the first sale doctrine is in force), you are licensing it (where first sale does not apply).

          Says who? What proof is there that I'm not purchasing it?

          If you follow a customer at Computer World through the process of legally acquiring a copy of Microsoft(tm) WindowsXP(r), all the evidence suggests he is buying it.

          When a customer brings a box to the counter, asks "How much to buy this?", pays the money, and then gets a reciept stating "Proof of sale"... then a pu

  • What about MY terms (Score:3, Interesting)

    by gr8_phk ( 621180 ) on Thursday October 14, 2004 @12:51PM (#10526625)
    Since the browser sends a string to the server (indicating browser type and stuff), why not include my terms in the string including "your servers response to this http request indicates your acceptance of these terms". Any response by the server then means they agree.
    • Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • Then technically, didn't the httpd process (not the owner of the physical server) become bound to the license?

      After it completely ignores the terms of your agreement, by the time your EULA-violation lawsuit wends its way to court, that httpd process will probably be long dead (say, after it has served 100 requests on a default Apache installation...)...in any event, getting it to actually pay you will be a b*tch.
  • ...especially for any attorney or layperson who lent their talents to the software for translating EULAs. The big question is whether it would be the equivalent of the practice of law. Additionally, would a service like this be the equivalent of beginning an attorney-client relationship between the end-user and the people who helped create and distribute the software?

    Quite honestly, I don't know. Like most issues where IT and the law merge, it's a murky area at best. The U.S. legal system is woefully i
  • OK, slightly off topic, sorry.

    I'd like to see EULAs standardised. Then instead of reams of unreadable gobbledegook on each installer, you'd get something like "This is a Type 1 EULA", or "This is a Type 4 EULA with the following differences" and so on. Once you know what a Type 1 EULA is, anything that describes itself as such, you know exactly what it's all about and can determine quickly what exactly you need to do.
  • What we need is software which changes the text of the "I agree" button to "What the Hell? No, I don't agree, just install it". In very fine print, of course.
  • I haven't read TFA yet, but I did happen to glance at OSTG's (which /. is a part of) Terms of Service [ostg.com] for the first time.

    It indeed does contain the usual technobabble and typos (eg: NO UNLAWFUL OR PROHBIITED USE), but some parts of it stood out, especially those related to the DMCA.

    I quote the parts that caused concerns, especially given the fact that /. has covered stories in the past about companies (ISPs/etc) taking down content upon receiving a DMCA notice, without paying much attention to user's ri

  • Instead of a Robolawyer how about a program that detects EULA and then opens up a new brower page that is linked to a community run website (somelike like Wikipedia, but with more security so that malware writers can't get in there and change things)

    This page would display dumbed down information about the EULA that you or I could understand.

    I.e:

    "Crockbot2004"
    This EULA would like you to agree to the following:
    I will allow "Crockbot 2004" to:
    1. monitor my browing and send information about it pe

  • Just my thoughts (Score:2, Interesting)

    by ZZeta ( 743322 )
    I'd defintely use a product like this. But I'm not sure whether the software company developing it could be held responsable.

    Let me explain myself. Above all, IANAL. But something that always puzzles me is the enphasys put in someone reading the EULA. I mean, sometimes, they actually make you scroll the EULA all the way to the bottom before letting you click the "I Accept" botton.

    Again, I'm not a lawyer, but if so much effort is put by the Soft. companies in the fact that you read the EULA, must be to sav

  • Is there a standard out there with prewritten legal blocks that can be referred to by reference number? I figure it'd be nifty if I can log onto a web site.. select a few clauses I want.. then fill in blanks Madlibs style. Then I can perhaps pay a fee for the service to check for loopholes.

    But the real benefit would be the reverse translation for those reading the legal document such a service can provide. Each clause has a "simplification" that can be dynamically produced by my customer who is brow

  • A legal-ese bot would be a bit difficult. I just think all click-throughs should include a link to an FAQ about that specific agreement.

    On a similar note, I'm surprised there aren't more online arbitration sites (for EULA and other disputes). Anyone used one of those?

  • armchair lawyer thoughts (Score:5, Interesting)

    by fred fleenblat ( 463628 ) on Thursday October 14, 2004 @01:08PM (#10526819) Homepage
    Here's my thought. Design a click through thing that just blindly accepts any legal agreement without showing it to the user. The name of the program is something like "agree to disagree". This calls into question the validity of any agreement that (a) you weren't shown and (b) did not have direct control over and (c) which you installed something to avoid dealing with.

    While the company that presented the agreement will have a record of a URL hit by you with a form with a certain radio button set, when it comes time to deal with a lawsuit it won't stand up in court because the form submission was automated. To make a bizarre metaphor, if I hand a screaming monkey a rubber stamp with my name on it, I am not bound by any contracts the screaming rubber-stamp-wielding monkey accidentally stamps.

    Second idea is to publish your personal conditions and email them to the company or include the URL in some form submission. Once you have a situation where your conditions conflict with theirs and the only "signatures" are form submission records, they are going to have a difficult time proving that there was an actual agreement in the legal sense of the word.
    • yeah, but if you spent years specifically training the monkey to stamp any documents that were put in your IN box... then, knowing that's what you'd trained him to do, you left him to handle all your paperwork for a few days, I think the argument could be made that you authorized themonkey to sign papers for you.

      Maybe, I dunno. It just seems fishy to me. You most certainly couldn't claim that you didn't have any knowledge of what the monkey was supposed to be doing for you.

      EULAs in the first place are p

    • Re:armchair lawyer thoughts (Score:4, Informative)

      by odin53 ( 207172 ) on Thursday October 14, 2004 @02:57PM (#10528079)
      To make a bizarre metaphor, if I hand a screaming monkey a rubber stamp with my name on it, I am not bound by any contracts the screaming rubber-stamp-wielding monkey accidentally stamps.

      This is wrong. Under contract law we look at whether there is mutual assent objectively; that is, would a reasonable person believe there is mutual assent to the contract? If the other party receives the rubber-stamped contract and reasonably thinks that the monkey-owner agreed to the contract, then the monkey-owner is bound by the contract (assuming all other elements are satisfied). It's not fair to the other party to bear the risk that assent was not given when a reasonable person would have thought the deal was done.

      Your "agree to disagree" program for click-wrap licenses isn't really different (in some ways, it's worse, because by using it it seems like you're really trying to get the benefit but avoid the obligations).

  • Requirements: (Score:2, Interesting)

    by dhasenan ( 758719 )
    A system like this is a complex language-parsing utility that can connect its analysis of a text with a database of appropriate knowledge--legal, in this case. It must also have the ability to discriminate between levels of complexity to appropriately disclude certain information. That's the easy 90% of creating an AI. You could cut out the legal database. That's not too important. But the only other way to simplify a EULA summarization utility would be to match the pattern of each clause with a member of
  • I don't know if the whole thing can be taken seriously, but a nice possible side effect could be that there would be no more expensive lawyers helping the rich out, but the poor guy could have an equal robot for free.
    No matter how much money you have, it's lawbot 1.2 vs lawbot 1.2 in court.
    Reminds me of pokemon but with robolawyers ;)
    • Nope, it's me buying Lawbot 1.2 for $50 at CrapUSA vs. Corporation XYZ with their customized version of Lawbot 1.2++ with EXTRA OBFUSCATION! that they bought for $50*10^6 (since they'll be suing tons of people, they can afford to splurge).

      Just like it is now.

  • Bad (Score:2, Interesting)

    by t_allardyce ( 48447 )
    Sales volume is inversely proportional to EULA clarity, therefore if you make EULAs 'super' clear, you will jepodise the sales of many consumer goods. EULAs would often look something like this:

    -This disk won't work with other players
    -You can't use this phone on any other network
    -This software may not be secure and if you loose your data its not our fault
    -You cannot copy this CD, it will not work in some players
    -This player will not let you skip adverts on DVDs that you have bought, you will have to watch
  • How does this compare to IBM's P3P? I know privacy policy and EULA are kinda similar in a way; a EULA can have a Privacy Policy... Why not just expand on IBM's P3P idea to cover the EULA or whatever for web sites?
  • I think that in the future AI lawyers will become an essential part of our world. The legal system is too complicated and counterintuitive for the average person to understand without undue effort. It would be nice to be able to feed a document into an expert system and get a reasonably simple explanation, or to describe a planned activity such as starting a certain kind of business and get a reliable opinion on the chance of it being legal. Such a system could keep a lot of small business people from wande

  • P3P (Score:2)

    by mnot ( 71203 )
    There have been small steps in this direction, most notably the World Wide Web Consortium's Platform for Privacy Preferences Project. Unfortunately P3P, as it's known, is limited to relatively simple matters of online privacy, ignoring other kinds of online contracts like software license agreements, ISP policies, and terms of service contracts.

    That's true, and it's because it took P3P [w3.org] about five years to figure out the appropriate terminology and concepts relating to online privacy. The technology is pre
  • It only has four outputs though.

    1) You are screwed
    2) You are really screwed
    3) You are going to be screwed
    4) k.
  • The Mozilla Foundation want to make users agree to the following EULA before installing Firefox. Looks like a lot of legalese, but might it not make Firefox non-free?

    ==
    LICENSE AGREEMENTS

    YOU MUST AGREE TO THE FOLLOWING LICENSE AGREEMENTS TO USE THE MOZILLA FIREFOX BROWSER AND ANY ACCOMPANYING SOFTWARE COMPONENTS. WHEN YOU INSTALL MOZILLA FIREFOX YOU WILL BE GIVEN THE OPTION OF INSTALLING ADDITIONAL COMPONENTS FROM MOZILLA AND THIRD PARTY PROVIDERS. THE MOZILLA FIREFOX END-USER LICENSE AGREEMENT GOVERNS US

  • Patent (Score:2, Interesting)

    by pk2000 ( 792069 )
    Has anyone patented it yet? Seems a good thing to patent.
  • egrep 'soul|firstborn' EULA.doc
  • is give context for the existing text rather than simplify it.
    For example, the 'robolawyer' could identify whole sentences and paragraphs that are widely used, like the typical paragraph giving the user limited rights to make an archival copy, and could tell a user when these paragraphs fit a particular model (i.e. the fairly common warning against reverse engineering). Perhaps it could detect the usual Microsoft, Sun or IBM type EULA clauses that many smaller software companies seem to have copied almo
  • The insurance industry has regulated itself in this regard, in that they have all agreed to make their policies readable. Perhaps the software industry needs to do the same?

    Though I still ike what one guy suggested here recently, that anytime you encounter a EULA after making a purchase, write up a letter expressing your post-purchase terms, and send it to the company, mentioning that if they do not accept your agreement, they can retrieve the software themselves by bring a full refund to your home.

    Here'
  • This was the notion behind P3P [w3.org]. Also see Agent: I dont think it means, what you think it means. [harvard.edu]

    Abstract

    As the deployment of computer agents that act on behalf of users grow, so do questions regarding the legitimacy and legal standing of computer based agreements. I note the use of the terms "agents" and "proxy" in the technical discipline and argue that a more explicit understanding of these terms is necessary to properly address the convergence of technical and legal issues related to electronic commer
  • This cannot possibly work. Why not? Well, in order for it to work, it would need cooperation of software vendors, who would have to mark up their EULAs into a form it could understand.

    Why would they do this?

    In fact, specifically, I believe that most software vendors are concerned about the enforceability of click-through EULAs. If the EULA is never actually shown to the user, this would possibly make them less enforceable. Therefore they will not cooperate with such a system, at least until such unsee
  • Ppth. Not like I care about them. I just wait until I'm drunk to install software.
  • In a perfect world, the amount of legaleze I need to agree on would have some relation wih the product. a 10 page contract, that requies in depth study and advanced knowledge of the law to fully understand, might be appropriate for a million dollar deal, but not for a 20$ piece of software from walmart.

    of course I have no good idea how to enforce this.

    a possibility would be to define certain standart conditions with descritive labels, that companies could use, like NO-WARRANTY, MUST-NOT-COPY, ONLY-NONCOMM
  • What happens (legally speaking) when someone else, i.e. a sysadmin, clicks through a EULA? Are you bound by that EULA even though you never read it and therefore there was never a "meeting of the minds"?
  • "Please put down your EULA. You have twenty seconds to comply." ...[whiiiirrr]...
    [RATTATTATTATTATTAT]
  • At the very least I want my browser (or other User Agents) to save a cryptosigned copy of the licenses in my own local database. As well as the privacy policies of every remote site with which I exchange info. Building on that audit trail a negotiation system so licenses can be autonegotiated to my personal preferences will be the icing on the cake. And make it as easy for us to take our businesss elsewhere as it is now to surf to another server whose SSL certificate is autodetected as valid. Distributing t
  • Well, of course, the Robolawyer will undoubtedly have a EULA explaining that the translation will not always be perfect and they are not responsible if you agree to something you didn't mean to, yada yada yada.

    Question. Can I read the Robolawyer's EULA with Robolawyer? Please?

  • Weird. I made a post to /. about this a year ago. I can't find it. My basic idea/suggestion was the same: legalese is overwhelming us and automated assistants would help. However, my solution was a little more P2P -- upload the checksum of a a legal contract to a centralized server, and on that server qualified people would enter summary bullet-points for each contract. Moderation would mod up the most accurate/easy-to-understand batch of bullet points. End-users would be able to view the bullet point

  • Instead of parsing English legales, why not make codes for things described?

    For example:
    001Y Free Personal Use allowed
    002Y Resale allowed
    002N Resale Not allowed

    You get the idea ...

    Then, this will just be like codes on QuickTax, or web site ratings: easy for a computer to understand and for users to select what they want.

    Will the lawyers agree to this? Or will they want us to drown in the legalse on purpose?

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