Why I EDIT:MIGHT NOT think you're dumb if you use Google Chrome:

[theweaselking]

11. Content licence from you

11.1 You retain copyright and any other rights that you already hold in Content that you submit, post or display on or through the Services. By submitting, posting or displaying the content, you give Google a perpetual, irrevocable, worldwide, royalty-free and non-exclusive licence to reproduce, adapt, modify, translate, publish, publicly perform, publicly display and distribute any Content that you submit, post or display on or through the Services. This licence is for the sole purpose of enabling Google to display, distribute and promote the Services and may be revoked for certain Services as defined in the Additional Terms of those Services.

Surf with it, sure, maybe, but why bother using a read-only browser?

Thing is, as soon as you transmit *any* content out using Google Chrome, Google owns it.

EDIT: Google says "Sorry, our bad, that was a C+P from a different contract. We don't really want to have rights to use your credit card information just because you made an online purchase."

So they're fixing the issue.

Comments

[mrbankies.livejournal.com]

Someone just told me about that. I'll be deleting Chrome when I get home tonight.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Feel free to play with it.

Just don't update your livejournal with it.

Or send work email through webmail with it.

Or type, really, *anything* into it.

[falconwarrior.livejournal.com]

Did you post this using Google Chrome? Because that would've been epic.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Maybe, but I don't install software whose EULAs I really hate.

Especially not beta software.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

(PS: I don't use a browser to update my livejournal. That would be slow and inefficient.)

[psyco-path.livejournal.com]

This is why I've been saying that google is evil.

Just like microsoft and apple and every other company on earth.

[missysedai.livejournal.com]

Google is more evil than Microsoft. And Microsoft is refreshingly up front about their evilness.

I like it when they're up front about it.

[silmaril.livejournal.com]

I read the Scott McCloud comic, and it seemed pretty nifty as far as I understand all the programming involved, but I almost never install beta anything anyway, and when I read the EULA thing today I decided to wait until that is resolved, one way or the other, before trying this out.

Happy with Firefox for now anyway, even though, yes, it does do bad things to memory.

[silmaril.livejournal.com]

But this again brings up the question I periodically ask in my journal, and never, ever get a single answer to, not even speculating: GMail still has a "beta" on the logo. What happens when it gets out of beta?

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Absolutely, the application design is clever and the execution will be, I expect, very good.

And it's *open source*, so applying the same techniques to a non-theiving application, or even just stealing some of them for other applications, should be doable.

I'd just be happier if they, like MySpace and a couple of other cases of similarly terrible EULAs, correct it.

[alienor77310.livejournal.com]

And let Google have a licence on the porny fanart I post to DeviantArt? No way! (It's all Share Alike, anyway).

[sebkha.livejournal.com]

I'm not totally convinced that scary-sounding legalese isn't just stating what any Web 2.0 service legally requires in order to operate. You retain your rights, but you permit them to store your comment thread or whatever.

Mostly it's just so obvious that nobody except lawyers would even think to ask.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Most of said services have an EULA that says they have all the rights they need *to provide the service they're offering.*

Google is saying they have a perpetual right to use anything you transmit *in any way they want*, with no restrictions that they be doing so only in a good-faith effort to provide you with service.

Put another way:

If you upload a source code file to your company's intranet through Chrome, Google then has the right, granted by you with the 11.4 proviso that you are assuring them in good faith that you have the right to grant them said right, to use any or all of that code as they see fit.

Or maybe you put a proof of your *novel* up. And once it hits big, Google decides to make it available, for a price paid to Google and not to you, through their new e-book reader. Hell, maybe they'll distribute it for free and rely on ads to bring in revenue. Why pay for this new novel by [insert author here] - they used Chrome and webmail to send the approved proofs to their publisher, so we're offering it for free!

[kafziel.livejournal.com]

Well, not quite, no. They don't own it. You still own everything you write, Google just gets a non-exclusive right to use it. It's a pretty huge difference.

Not saying it's not a very bad thing, mind you. Just not quite as it's painted.

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

No, they don't own it. You retain copyright. They are arrogating the right to distribute it, but it's still yours. Don't like it? Don't submit content to their sites (Gmail, etc.).

This is precisely why i never got a personal Gmail account, nor do i host my email anywhere but the box in my closet. It's my information.

As for Chrome, it looks like a pretty nifty browser and i look forward to the release version.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Not just the right to distribute it. The right to do *anything they want with it*, not just the things that are required in order to provide you with their services.

[interactiveleaf.livejournal.com]

*shrug*

I would care if I were actually using Chrome to do anything that's *worth* anything. I'm using Chrome to post this comment, and Google is welcome to it. This, and all my "hey honey, will you stop at the store for milk on the way home tonight"s.

My email, blog, and chat are hereby willed to Google in perpetuity. May it do them much good.

[pope-guilty.livejournal.com]

EULAs aren't legally binding anyway.

[kafziel.livejournal.com]

Also, they're dumping the clause. (http://news.cnet.com/8301-17939_109-10031703-2.html?part=rss&tag=feed&subj=Webware)

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

Awww, now i have to find a new teacup in which to stir up a tempest.

[autobotsrollout.livejournal.com]

This licence is for the sole purpose of enabling Google to display, distribute and promote the Services

Google only "owns" a license to work they gain access to via Chrome for the purpose of advertising Chrome and the other services they provide for free - a notification like this is their protection against you saying "hey, I uploaded this and I didn't say you could put it on no search engine results page, I'm suing you." They have no permission to reproduce any work you create for profit.

Moreover, you ignore section 13:

13.1 The Terms will continue to apply until terminated by either you or Google as set out below.

13.2 If you want to terminate your legal agreement with Google, you may do so by (a) notifying Google at any time and (b) closing your accounts for all of the Services which you use, where Google has made this option available to you. Your notice should be sent, in writing, to Google’s address which is set out at the beginning of these Terms.

If, for whatever reason Google's use of your work (almost certain to never actually happen, mind you) to promote their products offends you, you can revoke their permission by uninstalling their software and sending them a letter.

In short: sorry, but you're wrong.

[autobotsrollout.livejournal.com]

Although, in fairness, everybody else got this one wrong too.

[tyoko.livejournal.com]

That's an unconscionable contract: No reasonable person would agree to it if they actually understood what it entailed, and therefore can be challenged in court. The person who wrote the contract almost certainly knows this, the idea being that if it ever makes it before a judge, the worst that can happen is that it will simply be reduced to whatever terms are actually allowed by law.

Put another way, it actually makes sense to put in the most evil and over-reaching conditions you can into a contract, if your sure that the customer will agree to it, as putting in nice, respectful conditions might mean that you restrict yourself in a court case beyond what the law says on the matter. And you never know, some of the evilness might turn out to be permitted.

This kind of thing doesn't always work, here in the UK at least, a judge might deem the contract unenforceable if it's spectacularly vicious. This doesn't seem to stop the legal gremlins from trying it on, however.

Oh, and by the way, by reading this you have agreed to hand over your soul to me, become my slave for evar-and-evar, and to buy me a drink.

[kafziel.livejournal.com]

Not true, but good job for trying!

[paradoxicmotion.livejournal.com]

Official statement:

"In order to keep things simple for our users, we try to use the same set of legal terms (our Universal Terms of Service) for many of our products. Sometimes, as in the case of Google Chrome, this means that the legal terms for a specific product may include terms that don't apply well to the use of that product. We are working quickly to remove language from Section 11 of the current Google Chrome terms of service. This change will apply retroactively to all users who have downloaded Google Chrome."

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Yup! Hence my edits.

I really don't view Google as malicious, just negligent and dangerously casual.

And that can really simulate maliciousness *very well* a lot of the time.

[atlasimpure.livejournal.com]

I'm curious what product it came from.

[glitteringlynx.livejournal.com]

Good to know they'll take that out of the TOS of Chrome. However I avoid Google period b/c of that clause. I don't remember what it's for and I don't care. I am not keen on a product, even a search engine, that claims to OWN anything *I* create. That copyright is by default MINE! They cannot has!

*possessive*

[anivair.livejournal.com]

Seriously. Google paranoia has yet to be proven anything but outlandish. You and rich should start a club.