It's really a miracle that any judicial system considers "clicking accept without reading" to be a valid form of binding contract in the first place.

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thayne 12 hours ago | parent | next [-]

And that they let businesses change the license at any time, with just an email notification, and the only way to opt out of the new terms is to stop using the service.

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godwinson__4-8 11 hours ago | parent [-]

How else would you "opt out"? You want to have your cake and eat it too?

Most people don't care about the Terms of Service. Would you have a more positive assessment of the judicial system if it infantilized its citizens? If someone doesn't read it the first time or ignores an email what is the system supposed to do? Stand over your shoulder and make you read it? Do you want citizens to be prosecuted for signing things on the theory they didn't actually read them?

What number of people actually read the terms, actually read the new terms, decide they don't like the new terms, but after caring this much decide they don't want to "opt out" (I'm still not clear what remedy you want to invent for this)? Do you think this number is so high that you should be shocked that for some reason this is not a priority? I'm not even sure you've actually articulated a problem.

Is there a Terms of Service change you find particularly offensive that might better explain your concerns here? If so, I would be interested to hear you describe it with greater specificity.

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bluefirebrand 10 hours ago | parent [-]

> How else would you "opt out"? You want to have your cake and eat it too

If the TOS changes you should be automatically opted out until you explicitly accept the new agreement

That way if you stop using the service because of the new TOS, it actually means your old activity is still bound by the previous TOS not the new one. Weird how that's never an option though.

	▲	godwinson__4-8 10 hours ago \| parent [-]
		> If the TOS changes you should be automatically opted out until you explicitly accept the new agreement Does it not work this way? Don't the terms you sign often say something like these terms can be updated at any time? Yet they still often want you to agree to the new terms to proceed, right? > That way if you stop using the service because of the new TOS, it actually means your old activity is still bound by the previous TOS not the new one. Are you suggesting a statutory remedy? What is the average diff of a terms change? Are they really that meaningful? I would think the scope of what they can actually change is controlled by various other areas of law. If you don't accept the new terms are you concerned your old data is going to be used in a new way, while you remain opted out of the future? Is that actually how it works? It feels like it would not, which I gather is why they often want you to explicitly accept the new terms. Once again it would be helpful if a specific change or event was brought up here that better explained your concerns. I feel like there are times when I am forced to agree to new terms to continue using the service, and other times where it feels like I am not. I would suspect this relates to some controlling law regarding the nature of the update itself, as not all updates are equally meaningful?

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VladVladikoff 12 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

In Canada at least it currently has the same level of legal binding as signing a paper contract with a pen.

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what 12 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

It’s not really different from paper contracts. Nobody reads them, they just sign where they’re told to.

	▲	GrantMoyer 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		I regularly fully read and try to understand paper contracts before signing them. Every time, it's clear that no time was set aside for me to read the contract, and the other party expected me to sign the contract within a few seconds of first receiving it. Often, I get the sense that the other party is annoyed or frustrated that I take time to read the contract before agreeing to it. I've read that contracts fundamentally require a "meeting of the minds", where two parties come to a mutual understanding of an agreement. At the same time, overwhelming people are expected to not read and understand contracts they agree to. I don't understand how these two facts don't combine to mean the vast majority of written contracts are not legally binding, but apparently judges don't share my confusion.