All the obfuscation I described is present in EULAs, ToSs, and US law, all of which are enforced, when called upon, mostly as written. Maybe there is a higher s

All the obfuscation I described is present in EULAs, ToSs, and US law, all of which are enforced, when called upon, mostly as written. Maybe there is a higher standard in custom B2B contracts, but that really gets down to the point of it: you start seeing clear communication only when the speaker is motivated to be understood. And I wouldn’t call it trickery, because that implies intent. I think the forces at play make no distinction between a knowing operator and somebody who just does what’s normal, what’s safe. I think plenty of companies slap an unintelligible ToS on their website not as a trick, not even thinking of it as unintelligible, but just because there’s good evidence that this particular boilerplate protects them in court.