Do You Read the "Terms of Service"?

[Joe]

Bob Rankin writes:

To see if people actually read “Terms Of Service” notices, researchers slipped into one a clause that said the free public WiFi service offered in a busy café was provided only if "the recipient agreed to assign their first born child to us for the duration of eternity". Six people agreed during the 30 minutes the experiment lasted. "As this is an experiment, we will be returning the children to their parents," said the tech security firm that ran the experiment, F-Secure.

Geekly Update - 08 October 2014

See: Britons sign away first-born children for free wifi

 

[Blobbenstein]

 

[Joe]

I sent the Rankin quote to my old college philosophy professor, who commented

some may find this a good deal.

 

[Blobbenstein]

so if a terms of service says 'you will, over a ten year period pay us 10,000dollars' then you can be held to that?

I read somewhere that a ToS has to be reasonable or something.

 

[Amy SF]

Do I read the Terms of Service?

Of course not. Does anyone?

 

[Calliegirl]

Sometimes, it depends on the website.

 

[ledboots]

I skim read them.

 

[Clueless Git]

I read somewhere that a ToS has to be reasonable or something.

I believe, under UK law, that terms and conditions that aren't negotiable can't be upheld and so can be largely, if not completely, ignored.

I think it is the reasonableness test of the Unfair Contracts Act that comes into effect there ...

SCHEDULE 2“Guidelines” for Application of Reasonableness Test

The matters to which regard is to be had in particular for the purposes of sections 6(3), 7(3) and (4), 20 and 21 are any of the following which appear to be relevant—

(a)the strength of the bargaining positions of the parties relative to each other, taking into account (among other things) alternative means by which the customer’s requirements could have been met;

(b)whether the customer received an inducement to agree to the term, or in accepting it had an opportunity of entering into a similar contract with other persons, but without having a similar term;

(c)whether the customer knew or ought reasonably to have known of the existence and the extent of the term (having regard, among other things, to any custom of the trade and any previous course of dealing between the parties);

(d)where the term excludes or restricts any relevant liability if some conditionwas not complied with, whether it was reasonable at the time of the contract to expect that compliance with that condition would be practicable;

(e)whether the goods were manufactured, processed or adapted to the special order of the customer.

Clause (a) kinda negates any ToS's where the bargaining power of any one party is zero, I think.

 

[Spang]

Do You Read the "Terms of Service"?

No. I watch the made-for-TV movie, starring Meredith Baxter-Birney and Patrick Duffy, instead.