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25 years of making people who agree with you cringe25 years of making people who agree with you cringePosted Oct 21, 2010 21:09 UTC (Thu) by madhatter (subscriber, #4665)In reply to: 25 years of making people who agree with you cringe by Fats Parent article: How not to recognize free hardware > I've no problem with the EULA. 2.4 Backup Copy. You may make one backup copy of the Software, provided your backup copy is not installed or used. You may not transfer the rights to a backup copy unless you transfer all rights in the Software as provided under Section 4. You ever make backups of your system, including the directory where flash is installed? I hope you don't ever keep more than one backup. That would be wrong. 3.1 Adobe Runtime Restrictions. You will not use any Adobe Runtime on any non-PC device or with any embedded or device version of any operating system. For the avoidance of doubt, and by example only, you may not use an Adobe Runtime on any [...] tablet and Tablet PC (other than with Windows XP Tablet PC Edition and its successors) You weren't planning on running flash on Linux on a tablet, were you? That would be wrong. You agree that the Software will not be shipped, transferred or exported into any country or used in any manner prohibited by the United States Export Administration Act or any other export laws, restrictions or regulations (collectively the Export Laws).Planning on taking your netbook on holiday? That might be wrong, and it's your responsibility to check whether or not your holiday destination is permitted to you. 16.1.3 You are required to take all reasonable measures to avoid and reduce damages, in particular to make back-up copies of the Software and your computer data subject to the provisions of this agreement.I particularly enjoyed this one, inasmuch as it requires you to make backup copies of the software in accordance with the agreement, when the agreement earlier forbids you from making copies (a copy is OK; copies are not). That might be wrong; it's definitely impossible. There are other fairly objectionable terms in there, too. I can understand that people don't read it - it's 210 pages long, and in a whole selection of languages - but I'm vaguely surprised that people rush to defend it.
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25 years of making people who agree with you cringe Posted Oct 21, 2010 21:35 UTC (Thu) by felixfix (subscriber, #242) [Link]
Silly rules are there for ego stroking.
I have rented apartments with illegal clauses in the rental agreements. One silly landlord tried to enforce one (cleaning deposit in California), I took her to court, and won.
The point isn't that the clause was illegal so much as it was unenforceable, and the same applies to silly clauses in EULAs. The only real enforcement the manufacturer has is to not honor a warranty if they can find a reason to show you have abused their product. In practice, the clauses you cite are as unenforceable in every practical aspect as the truly illegal rental clause the landlord tried to enforce on me.
I don't like flash, but I use it without having read the EULA, and I don't care what nonsense they have put in there. There is nothing they can put in the EULA that has any affect on me.
25 years of making people who agree with you cringe Posted Oct 23, 2010 18:19 UTC (Sat) by giraffedata (subscriber, #1954) [Link] Silly rules are there for ego stroking. I don't see how any ego gets stroked by Adobe including a silly rule in its EULA. But I can see how Adobe would include a restriction even knowing that it would be silly to enforce it 99.9% of the time, because in some scenario (which you haven't thought of, but lawyers are paid to imagine) it could mean a lot of money for Adobe. I have rented apartments with illegal clauses in the rental agreements. One silly landlord tried to enforce one (cleaning deposit in California), I took her to court, and won. (for those of you following along, felixfelix is talking about a "nonrefundable cleaning deposit," which is the oxymoronic term some rental agreements use to refer to money you put up in advance to pay for cleaning when you move out, whether the apartment is dirty or not. In California, a renter does not have the power to commit to that). But silly rules matter to some people on a moral basis, even if the law doesn't stand behind them. Some people believe it is wrong to renege on a deal, even when the government allows and encourages you to do it. If you gave your landlord money knowing that she expected to keep it and wouldn't give you the apartment without it, some would say you have a moral obligation to let her keep it. The law lets you renege on that deal as an efficient device to eliminate competition (with other renters who might pay that cleaning fee) and create a different distribution of wealth than the free market would. I know a case where a woman in New York City begged a landlord to rent her an apartment with broken plumbing, because she couldn't afford any normal apartment, lived there for 18 months, then took her entire rent for the whole time back. You can do that in New York, because it's the City's way of preventing apartments with broken plumbing from existing. But I can tell you lots of people would not have the chutzpah. I also know of several cases of people borrowing money and not paying it back, possibly intending that all along, and the law supported it because the parties agreed to interest higher than 10%. Some would call that theft, and I also know of cases where people repaid everything in spite of the legal privilege not to.
Adobe EULA stupidities Posted Oct 22, 2010 10:27 UTC (Fri) by james (subscriber, #1325) [Link]
It gets worse.
In order to use Adobe Reader, you have to click-through a box saying "I have read and agree to the EULA".
The EULA is provided as a PDF.
The only way out of that circular dependency is with another PDF reader.
25 years of making people who agree with you cringe Posted Oct 23, 2010 8:31 UTC (Sat) by Fats (subscriber, #14882) [Link]
I have to admit I sometimes don't follow laws and EULAs to the letter. I sometimes cross the street in a diagonal way. I sometimes use the bike lane on the wrong side of the road for short distances. I sometimes install software without reading the EULA.
Some people will call me a criminal for it.
I still don't have a problem with the EULA. I may be silly in certain places but it is just a showing of the mad world we live in. A world where people sue their microwave manufacturer because they fried their cat and it was not mentioned in the manual that you should not put a pet in the oven.
The EULA only applies to the software itself so if there would ever be a problem with it, like Adobe suing people for their use of the Flash plugin, I can just uninstall the software and be done with it.
That said, I don't defend Adobe's business practices. There is probably one thing worse then getting a bunch of IBM lawyers knocking on your door and that is having a bunch of Adobe lawyers knocking on your door ...
greets,
Oppressive Adobe Flash EULA Posted Oct 23, 2010 17:49 UTC (Sat) by giraffedata (subscriber, #1954) [Link] 16.1.3 You are required to take all reasonable measures to avoid and reduce damages, in particular to make back-up copies of the Software and your computer data subject to the provisions of this agreement.I particularly enjoyed this one, inasmuch as it requires you to make backup copies of the software in accordance with the agreement, when the agreement earlier forbids you from making copies (a copy is OK; copies are not). That might be wrong; it's definitely impossible. You just aren't parsing it correctly. A backup copy of the Software and a backup copy of your Windows registry constitute two backup copies, i.e. copies of the Software and your computer data. And incidentally, there is a rule of contract construction that says if a clause can be interpreted two ways and one of them is impossible, the other one is the one that applies.
Oppressive Adobe Flash EULA Posted Oct 23, 2010 21:27 UTC (Sat) by madhatter (subscriber, #4665) [Link]
I can't agree with your reading. One of each would be "you are required to make a back-up copy of the software and your computer data"; the singular has no other use. "Back-up copies of both" implies multiple copies of each.
Your point about contract construction seems much more convincing to me, and very sensible to boot - but it will doubtless vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. An EULA which requires me to do the impossible seems unwise to me, even though local contract law might save me from its insanities.
Oppressive Adobe Flash EULA Posted Oct 24, 2010 0:51 UTC (Sun) by giraffedata (subscriber, #1954) [Link] If I were writing that contract, with the meaning that we both know Adobe intended, I would write "copies," because "you are required to make a back-up copy of the software and your computer data" means you're required to make a single combined copy of the two, which is not normally how people back those things up. It's "you must send bills to all your customers," not "you must send a bill to all your customers." But I know people often say the latter. Also, the plural includes the singular in the same way the masculine includes the feminine in formal English. For example, "you must send bills to your customers" validly covers a merchant with one customer, if the text doesn't otherwise assert there is only one. I could add a bunch of words to prevent any interpretation like you're proposing, but it wouldn't be worth complicating the the text since I know no judge will choose an interpretation that makes it impossible to perform. Contract law varies very little throughout the US and even the whole English common-law world. Local variations are in specific subject matter areas; it's hard to find variation in basic things like construction (what did the parties mean when they said X?). You don't find law school contract textbooks specific to a state, for example.
Oppressive Adobe Flash EULA Posted Oct 25, 2010 9:48 UTC (Mon) by madhatter (subscriber, #4665) [Link]
You may well be right. I suppose I'm, oddly, minded to prefer software with a license that I don't have to examine with Strunk and White, and the 2010 White Book, to hand, in order to decipher my obligations. I'll stick with the GPL, and other free licences, and enjoy their protection, thanks.
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