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I honestly don't understand how "If you don't opt out within 30 days you'll be bound to the new TOS" works. I have heard of two big "trends" of how people thin

I honestly don't understand how "If you don't opt out within 30 days you'll be bound to the new TOS" works. I have heard of two big "trends" of how people think about legal contracts: [1] What is written there and what both parties agreed to is the truth. [2] A contract is supposed to be a "meeting of the minds". If it's proven that one party was being deceitful, then the contract (or that part) doesn't hold. If we go by [1], then the company can change the TOS by sending me a notice with "if you don't opt out, then you're bound by these terms"... but so should I. I should be able to send a letter to 23&me saying "if you don't disagree these are the new terms: if my information is ever hacked, you owe me 10M dollars in damages" If we go by [2], then sending a notice like that is absolutely invalid. They have no way of proving that I read that notice within 30 days, so there was never a "meeting of the minds".

lolinder 3y ago
The theory is that you start the contract with the terms specifying that changes put forward by the company (but not the user) are automatically accepted with 30 days' notice. That's where the meeting of the minds occurs: in theory, from that point on, you've agreed that the terms can change. However, I'm not sure if that's ever been tested in court as a valid theory, and regardless it certainly shouldn't be legal (any more than noncompetes).