Re: Microsoft finally acknowledges the security drumbeats

From: spp@cs.berkeley.edu
Date: 02/13/02 

From: spp@cs.berkeley.edu
Date: 13 Feb 2002 22:26:39 GMT

Jeffrey Siegal <jbs@quiotix.com> wrote:

>Marty Fouts wrote:

>> And, for the Nth time, when the courts have ruled on EULAs, they have
>> ruled that they are enforcable contract causes, except when they have
>> ruled against a specific clause of a specific EULA.

>Not in the Step Saver case. In that case, the court ruled the entire
>license agreement to be an invalid attempt to modify an ordinary sales
>contract that was formed at the time of purchase. In the Vault case,
>the court ruled that since such licenses are contracts of adhesion,
>they are subject to greater scrutiny and weaker enforcement than
>normal contracts.

Damn straight.

I consider it bogus that normal consumers, making a normal
consumer purchase, should have to be subject to a highly technical
license agreement that limits their normal consumer rights --
such as, the right of first use, or the rights a fair use.

I understand that if you buy for example a DVD player, you are
supposedly agreeing not to reverse engineer it, or even to tap
off internal signals so as to listen and view discs.

I hope the courts move further in the direction of protecting
the public and not upholding these onerous licensing attempts.

Steve

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