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Sure, people don't read terms and conditions, but I have to ask, do retailers care? Usually terms and conditions are tucked into a quiet corner so no one will e

Sure, people don't read terms and conditions, but I have to ask, do retailers care? Usually terms and conditions are tucked into a quiet corner so no one will ever find them. They're intentionally written in an almost unreadable style, even though it's not necessary. Some sites don't even have them, despite dealing with tons of user-submitted content. Stack Overflow has been claiming to license user-submitted content under cc-wiki since its inception without ever asking users for this permission. Stack Overflow cannot even legally display content from users without permission, yet they presume to license it out to third parties and even provide data dumps of it. People don't read terms and conditions because companies don't care. Stack Overflow has grown into one of the most popular sites on the web without ever settling the most fundamental legal issue related to the site. I've even emailed Stack Overflow about this. Their response can best be summed up as "Huh?" Companies only provide terms and conditions to cover their asses. They don't care what's in there any more than customers do. If they don't think their asses need covered, they skip the terms and conditions altogether.

lkijuhyghjm 17y ago
There is a big tag at the bottom of each page saying you submit it under cc-wiki. This is a good thing, it's better than you having to read through 100s of pages of their own license to discover that they reserve the rights to put in a pay wall later.
- DanielStraight 17y ago
  This is exactly Stack Overflow's (mis)understanding. The statement on the bottom of the page is that user-submitted content is licensed under cc-wiki. That they are granting you a license to use it under cc-wiki. The statement is not that you will license your content to Stack Overflow under cc-wiki. I can easily say, "The entire content of Hacker News is in the public domain." Without asking for permission though, this statement is meaningless. Same with Stack Overflow.
flipbrad 17y ago
To be fair, the T&Cs are not written in 'an almost unreadable style'. They're written so that in a court dispute, the meaning will be clear. They're readable by lawyers, and all the less fuzzy for it. The problem is that they're unreadable by the actual parties to the transaction!

lkijuhyghjm 17y ago

There is a big tag at the bottom of each page saying you submit it under cc-wiki. This is a good thing, it's better than you having to read through 100s of pages of their own license to discover that they reserve the rights to put in a pay wall later.

DanielStraight 17y ago
This is exactly Stack Overflow's (mis)understanding. The statement on the bottom of the page is that user-submitted content is licensed under cc-wiki. That they are granting you a license to use it under cc-wiki. The statement is not that you will license your content to Stack Overflow under cc-wiki. I can easily say, "The entire content of Hacker News is in the public domain." Without asking for permission though, this statement is meaningless. Same with Stack Overflow.

flipbrad 17y ago

To be fair, the T&Cs are not written in 'an almost unreadable style'. They're written so that in a court dispute, the meaning will be clear. They're readable by lawyers, and all the less fuzzy for it. The problem is that they're unreadable by the actual parties to the transaction!