Wording for legal preface
I'm writing up the Terms of Use Agreement for my wife's website, and I wanted to make it as friendly a read as possible. To that end, I put at the top the following preface:
The actual Terms of Use Agreement follows.
Unfortunately, she didn't like the first line about common sense. (A lot of people don't see things they don't understand on first read as common sense, because they confuse common sense with their own inborn sense, so she thinks that some people might find it offensive.)
I thought it was a fairly soft opening to a page that has to say the obvious.
I'm not sure how to reword it. Any thoughts?
(After all, we aren't exactly sorry to have to post such a page -- we are only sorry to have to bother honest people with it.)
| Welcome to the [business name] web sites. Common sense like the following shouldn't have to be explicitly stated, but unfortunately we must. In simple terms, what the following basically means is: * We cannot be held responsible for anything untoward that happens from accessing our websites, and * We can hold people responsible for copyright, trademark, and other intellectual property infringements. Our aim is to provide a useful service to you. This just protects us from sharks. |
Unfortunately, she didn't like the first line about common sense. (A lot of people don't see things they don't understand on first read as common sense, because they confuse common sense with their own inborn sense, so she thinks that some people might find it offensive.)
I thought it was a fairly soft opening to a page that has to say the obvious.
I'm not sure how to reword it. Any thoughts?
(After all, we aren't exactly sorry to have to post such a page -- we are only sorry to have to bother honest people with it.)
I agree with her. Some people might think you're saying "We're assuming you have no common sense, so we're posting this to make you shut up."
Also,
"This just protects us from sharks"
I think you should mention dinosaurs and lasers.
Also,
"This just protects us from sharks"
I think you should mention dinosaurs and lasers.
We are saying, "We're assuming you have no common sense." Such is the current state of the internet and the world. People who seek to abuse us thus have no legal rights.
I just want to say it the most kindly way possible: "we have to assume you are evil and will seek to harm us, but not because we want to."
Do you suggest I avoid the obvious analogy and instead say: "This just protects us from those of you who think you can attack, harm, steal from, profit from, and/or destroy us with impunity"?
I just want to say it the most kindly way possible: "we have to assume you are evil and will seek to harm us, but not because we want to."
Do you suggest I avoid the obvious analogy and instead say: "This just protects us from those of you who think you can attack, harm, steal from, profit from, and/or destroy us with impunity"?
I wouldn't say "those of you," that sounds a bit like you're suspicious and mistrusting. Perhaps you could say something like "For our own protection from less than friendly members of the community..."
I have a number of comments on this, as well. First, I don't think this belongs on the welcome page. There could be a single sentence with a link to the terms/agreement/disclaimer. In fact, provided that users join or any other similar login/authentication, a simple checkbox to agree to the terms, etc. is very commonplace.
Also, consider completely leaving out the, "This just protects us from sharks"-part. It doesn't sound very professional nor does it offer any additional information.
Additionally, the entire fact that you provide a summary promotes users to skip out on reading the details. Does the summary hold up legally to the same extent as the rest?
Also, consider completely leaving out the, "This just protects us from sharks"-part. It doesn't sound very professional nor does it offer any additional information.
Additionally, the entire fact that you provide a summary promotes users to skip out on reading the details. Does the summary hold up legally to the same extent as the rest?
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| Why don't you just use the BSD licence's disclaimer? |
What,
| THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS AND CONTRIBUTORS "AS IS" |
I don't think a business is a type of software :l
chrisname
Why on earth would I put "those of you" in the wording of this!? I am trying to be pleasant!
I do like the suggestion though..
helios
A website is not software. To the extent that the Terms of Use Agreement intersects with BSD-style license agreements, I do have the proper wording (more than 150 words for the indemnity section alone).
moorecm
Who said this was on the welcome page? The TOUA is on a page by itself, and is linked at the bottom of every page.
A summary is not legally binding. All it does is very shortly summarize what follows: the legal agreement. It does not purport to supplant or limit the legal part of the page in any way. Further, for reasons I'll list below, I don't think any legal authority could claim otherwise.
As to your final concerns:
"sharks" - Good points. I will amend that part.
"summary promotes users to skip out on reading the details" - perhaps, but that is not a legally binding argument against reading plainly stated, required reading. Just as no one can argue that reading the summary of a book qualifies him to know the contents of the book, I don't believe that anyone can violate reasonably posted terms of service and claim ignorance because he read the summary.
Remember, fellas, this is just a gentle overview of what the page represents. I expect that the only people who will actually ever review it to any startling degree are those wishing to abuse us, or who have already abused us.
Give me a bit and I'll post back an update. Thank you for your advice.
When I'm done it all, I'll have an actual lawyer look it over for any problems -- but it is really a short document (around 500 words) designed to protect us and inform the user what refund rights he has when paying online.
Why on earth would I put "those of you" in the wording of this!? I am trying to be pleasant!
I do like the suggestion though..
helios
A website is not software. To the extent that the Terms of Use Agreement intersects with BSD-style license agreements, I do have the proper wording (more than 150 words for the indemnity section alone).
moorecm
Who said this was on the welcome page? The TOUA is on a page by itself, and is linked at the bottom of every page.
A summary is not legally binding. All it does is very shortly summarize what follows: the legal agreement. It does not purport to supplant or limit the legal part of the page in any way. Further, for reasons I'll list below, I don't think any legal authority could claim otherwise.
As to your final concerns:
"sharks" - Good points. I will amend that part.
"summary promotes users to skip out on reading the details" - perhaps, but that is not a legally binding argument against reading plainly stated, required reading. Just as no one can argue that reading the summary of a book qualifies him to know the contents of the book, I don't believe that anyone can violate reasonably posted terms of service and claim ignorance because he read the summary.
Remember, fellas, this is just a gentle overview of what the page represents. I expect that the only people who will actually ever review it to any startling degree are those wishing to abuse us, or who have already abused us.
Give me a bit and I'll post back an update. Thank you for your advice.
When I'm done it all, I'll have an actual lawyer look it over for any problems -- but it is really a short document (around 500 words) designed to protect us and inform the user what refund rights he has when paying online.
| Why on earth would I put "those of you" in the wording of this!? I am trying to be pleasant! |
Oh, sorry, I thought that was what you were considering putting.
| I do like the suggestion though.. |
Thank you :)
As promised, here is the update for my wife's site. Click the link at the bottom for the terms of use page. (All other pages are currently just a placeholder -- as are, BTW, the images of the kids -- we still need to do our own photography, so this is just a mockup.)
http://home.comcast.net/~mlyn7576/signandgrow/
Thanks for looking!
http://home.comcast.net/~mlyn7576/signandgrow/
Thanks for looking!
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Also, here's my super awesome home page.
http://home.comcast.net/~michaelthomasgreer/
I still need to learn what I did wrong on IE. IE7 almost displays it correctly. IE6 == fail, and right now I'm not so sure I want to spend the time to fix it... Works fine in Opera, Safari, Firefox, and even Navigator almost gets it right. Heck, even Lynx displays it fine. So ATM I just want to fix the menu/list display bugs in IE7 and (if possible) Netscape.
Check out what happens when you resize the page. *seamless background*
If anyone knows how to redraw without reload, please let me know. Everything I've tried doesn't work.
:-)
http://home.comcast.net/~michaelthomasgreer/
I still need to learn what I did wrong on IE. IE7 almost displays it correctly. IE6 == fail, and right now I'm not so sure I want to spend the time to fix it... Works fine in Opera, Safari, Firefox, and even Navigator almost gets it right. Heck, even Lynx displays it fine. So ATM I just want to fix the menu/list display bugs in IE7 and (if possible) Netscape.
Check out what happens when you resize the page. *seamless background*
If anyone knows how to redraw without reload, please let me know. Everything I've tried doesn't work.
:-)
I can load both of those pages. It's just the menu on the latter one which doesn't work.
I tried posting a reply about half an hour ago, but it seems the Internet didn't like my post.
Edit: I like this:
I tried posting a reply about half an hour ago, but it seems the Internet didn't like my post.
Edit: I like this:
| We wish it weren't so, but for our own protection we must require our site visitors to agree to the following terms of use. What they basically mean is: * We cannot be held responsible for anything untoward that happens while accessing our websites, and * We can hold people responsible for copyright, trademark, and other intellectual property infringements. Our aim is to provide a useful, friendly service to you, and for your experiences with us to be pleasant and worthwhile. |
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@helios
Yes, it is wonton soup. Good eye! :-)
I haven't gotten as far as the links working yet...
@chrisname
What OS/browser/version are you using, and how does the menu fail you?
I am still trying to figure out how to make the <ul> work properly to display the menu in IE... and it doesn't show at all in Netscape... that may be part of the problem you are having? [edit] Because I am a rank amateur with HTML/CSS [/edit]
Glad you like!
Yes, it is wonton soup. Good eye! :-)
I haven't gotten as far as the links working yet...
@chrisname
What OS/browser/version are you using, and how does the menu fail you?
I am still trying to figure out how to make the <ul> work properly to display the menu in IE... and it doesn't show at all in Netscape... that may be part of the problem you are having? [edit] Because I am a rank amateur with HTML/CSS [/edit]
Glad you like!
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