How do they get away with this?

[gaydemon_jr]

Facebook wants to be your friend forever

Facebook, the social networking website, is always anxious to be your friend, projecting a matey, ethical, sensitive image to its 150m users. But for those who fall out of love with the popular site, it could now be near-impossible to dissolve the friendship.

Blogs and technology forums have been buzzing with chatter about a change in Facebook's "terms of service". Users have always given the website a "irrevocable, perpetual, non-exclusive" right to license all their content (such as personal details, conversations and photographs). But until two weeks ago, Facebook said its rights over the data would expire if a user left the website. No longer. The social network's ownership of user content will "survive any termination of your use of the Facebook Service". In other words, Facebook owns your details - forever.

This is crazy! How can anybody suddenly have the right to "own" your personal data, ever!?

[ChadKnowsLaw]

Data about you does not belong to you~ where you live, how old you are, telephone number -- that is not really "yours". It is "about" you but does not really "belong" to you.

However, I agree that the previous TOS is much more ethical.

[rawTOP]

If you were to leave this forum, who would own what you've posted on it? Bjorn... I'm not seeing a huge difference...

I'm not a Facebook user, but the decision doesn't stop people from deleting and changing their Facebook pages, right? It just means the pages won't get taken down if they never come back to the site.

[HunkMoneyLuke]

given that facebook now owns your uploaded images, that should make them responsible (and therefore can be sued) for anything that people upload, including all the nasty shit. This is not a good move on their part, its crossing over from being a provider of a hosted service to being a content owner and they must assume all the legal responsibilities that go with it.

[Squirt]

These online companies playing God is getting old real quick.

People are odd about information they post on the internet. They have no problem posting all sorts of crap EVERYWHERE publicly, for the whole worlds to see, but when it shows up somewhere they don't expect their whole attitude changes.

I think FaceBook is full of crap and are sorry they got caught being devious. You can't tell me that FaceBook has the right to what minors upload to their service, as minors can't enter into a legal contract, at least in the U.S.

[gaydemon]

You're mine now! 666

its interesting though, never really spend much time on thinking what happens to your details. We / I enter them all over the place, paying for products, services or signing up for memberships.. but think no more about it while actually maybe a lot of it will hang around for a long time and can be used..


If you were to leave this forum, who would own what you've posted on it? Bjorn... I'm not seeing a huge difference...

I'm not a Facebook user, but the decision doesn't stop people from deleting and changing their Facebook pages, right? It just means the pages won't get taken down if they never come back to the site.

[abostonboy]

I don't find what Facebook is doing to be all that unreasonable at all. Boards don't remove posts from members that leave. Why shouldn't facebook be allowed to keep "wall posts" etc after members leave?

[Squirt]

I don't find what Facebook is doing to be all that unreasonable at all. Boards don't remove posts from members that leave. Why shouldn't facebook be allowed to keep "wall posts" etc after members leave?

Facebooks policy used to have a provision that you could remove your content at any time, at which time the license would expire. They deleted this provision without notice to anyone. They then added the provision, without notification, that Facebook owns the license to retain users content after an account was terminated.

Of course their terms say they can do whatever they want, at any time, without notification. We all know that just because a company says they can do something, doesn't mean they can ;)

Now Facebook is saying that the terms they added are overbroad to protect themselves legally and over time they will clarify their position. In the meantime they ask that everyone trust them.

Here's a good article (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/17/technology/internet/17facebook.html?ref=technology) on the matter.

Meanwhile here is the exact wording on their terms (http://www.facebook.com/terms.php) below, notice they now give themselves the right to use whatever you post on their site for any purpose, including commercial or advertising:

You are solely responsible for the User Content that you Post on or through the Facebook Service. You hereby grant Facebook an irrevocable, perpetual, non-exclusive, transferable, fully paid, worldwide license (with the right to sublicense) to (a) use, copy, publish, stream, store, retain, publicly perform or display, transmit, scan, reformat, modify, edit, frame, translate, excerpt, adapt, create derivative works and distribute (through multiple tiers), any User Content you (i) Post on or in connection with the Facebook Service or the promotion thereof subject only to your privacy settings (http://www.facebook.com/privacy/) or (ii) enable a user to Post, including by offering a Share Link on your website and (b) to use your name, likeness and image for any purpose, including commercial or advertising, each of (a) and (b) on or in connection with the Facebook Service or the promotion thereof. You represent and warrant that you have all rights and permissions to grant the foregoing licenses.

[gaybucks_chip]

Now Facebook is saying that the terms they added are overbroad to protect themselves legally and over time they will clarify their position. In the meantime they ask that everyone trust them.


Given that Mark Zuckerberg is apparently a lying sack of shit who stole the idea from his partners, used and abused everyone who helped him establish Facebook, and has the reputation of being an arrogant putz, I'd see no reason to trust him :)

[Gaystoryman]

Given that Mark Zuckerberg is apparently a lying sack of shit who stole the idea from his partners, used and abused everyone who helped him establish Facebook, and has the reputation of being an arrogant putz, I'd see no reason to trust him :)

Now tell us how you really feel about him Chip... lol

[Craig]

http://www.gaydemon.biz/image.php?u=14&type=sigpic&dateline=1234616725

aces!

[camcruise]

Facebook is full of shit. They cant just say that they now own the image you just posted there.
Thats steeling pure and simple. They may have the right to use that image until you ask them not to. Lots of sites do this.
But to say they own it is theft of copyrighted images.
This will not hold up for long.

I am glad I never put any of my images on the site. on that site.