ACK - LJ's User Agreement

[shadowkat]

So, the contract lawyer in me is balking at the new LJ user agreement. Possibly because the English translation isn't valid, only the Russian version is, which means good luck getting that to hold up in US or international courts. There's a general rule that if the user can't read the language, you can't enforce it, particularly if the internationally recognized language is English. (Sorry, Russia, it's not Russian, it's English, and possibly Spanish.) It's a jurisdictional nightmare. And it's vague in various spots. I can see sort of legal issues...

What concerns me? The ability to reuse my content willy-nilly, and/or block it willy-nilly, which to be fair they've always been able to do - regardless of the agreement. Copyright ownership on social media is a slippery slope. People can legitimately cut and past from you without you knowing it. You are, like it or not, posting from the center of Time's Square.

Also, a little unnerved by the fact that we're not protected by the consumer's right act and responsible for security.

I don't know if I will sign it. I transferred my blog over here some time ago and have been more or less cross-posting ever since. The only things not cross-posted are the photos. I may sign and then delete the whole thing in four months. With everything over here. No cross-posting.

I tend to talk to folks over here more than over there anyhow.

What do you think? Thoughts? Any contract lawyers other than me on this thing?

Comments

[kerkevik_2014]

My 'Leaving of Live(rpool)journal is coming very soon' I'm afraid. I'm saving what I need to from my old lj's; importing my current one to DW (need to figure out what to do with the ds9_rewatch comm) and then decide whether to lapse or delete it.

As I've posted already; this make me almost as sad as did finding out the old;my first fandom comm, willtara yahoo group had disappeared.

kerk

[cactuswatcher]

Well, I *could* read the whole new agreement in the original. But I don't think I'll bother. Right off the bat, they want everything to be subject to Russian law, which for all intents and purposes is totally arbitrary as far as we are concerned. I don't think private and semiprivate posts are safe over there, past or future. I'm not going to agree to the user agreement just so I can delete my account. What's past is past. As I tried to warn people years ago (and got poo pooed), Russians buying LJ was not trivial matter.

[shadowkat]

I unfortunately agree...it's why I set up the DW account, and transferred my content over here. The only things that didn't transfer are the Costa Rica Pics, because haven't figured out how to post images on DW yet. But that's minor.

And, I have issues with the fact that you have to agree to the user agreement in order to delete. Because the agreement does sort of state that they have rights to your content and can do what they want with it if you sign the agreement. If you don't they don't. They put the agreement in place, because they've run into copyright infringement lawsuits regarding people sharing content on lj.

[beer_good_foamy]

What do you think?

I think I know when I'm not wanted someplace and will respond accordingly. Fuck'em.

[yourlibrarian]

I think this is probably the most apt and succinct response I've seen yet!

[shadowkat]

Unless of course you are paying them money, in which case, yes, they want you. (The agreement doesn't affect paid users apparently, mainly because it can't -- in violation of certain laws.)

[beer_good_foamy]

I've seen several people with both paid and permanent accounts say they've had to sign the agreement, and that there are now ads on their LJs in direct violation of the deal they made earlier. And of course, US consumer laws no longer apply.

[shadowkat]

Didn't know that. That would piss me off. Very glad I never got a paid account. Someone gave me one for a bit, but I didn't see much benefit in it. Mine was an upgraded account, basically as high as you can go without paying anything.

I deleted my journal. It's gone. Along with my comments. (Well after 60 days, right now, just blocked.)

[mefisto]

Sophist here. DW told me that name was already in use.

I refused to sign it. No more lj for me.

[shadowkat]

You had the same legal response to it that I did. I don't think I can get myself to sign that.