If only governments were this reflexive…
Okay, so: Smash makes a valid point here (thanks, Palash, Bill) and frankly I snorted cranberry juice out of my nose when I was reading it. It’s always nice to have perspective restored by a wee rant.
My concern about this was always professional rather than personal; I saw myself having annoying discussions with potential rights-buyers in Hollywood or elsewhere whose lawyers had found – for example – a single mention of a character on my blog, and were concerned that because the blog was imported to Facebook, Facebook’s ToS gave them a technical rights claim on that character. And yes, that is insane, and yes, that is a real worry, even if a supremely tenuous one. My concern was not so much that the claim might be valid, but that the prospect of it could make trouble. Film studio lawyers are paid partly to find ludicrous things to worry about and worry about them or use them to make other people worry enough to let their studio in on a deal they want in on.
Examples? Oh, let me think… Yes, I know, there was much more to go on there. But it’s common enough. And actually (and not unrelated), there’s this, too.
Anyway, Facebook’s response pleases me enormously. Here’s the first thing:
1. You own your information. Facebook does not. This includes your photos and all other content.
2. Facebook doesn’t claim rights to any of your photos or other content. We need a license in order to help you share information with your friends, but we don’t claim to own your information.
3. We won’t use the information you share on Facebook for anything you haven’t asked us to. We realize our current terms are too broad here and they make it seem like we might share information in ways you don’t want, but this isn’t what we’re doing.
4. We will not share your information with anyone if you deactivate your account. If you’ve already sent a friend a message, they’ll still have that message. However, when you deactivate your account, all of your photos and other content are removed.
5. We apologize for the confusion around these issues. We never intended to claim ownership over people’s content even though that’s what it seems like to many people. This was a mistake and we apologize for the confusion.
The second thing is a thoughtful post from Mark Zuckerberg, recognising that Facebook’s nature is evolving, and that the ToS must change to stay relevant and appropriate.
It’s going to be a long discussion, but I believe it will be very interesting. If you find it interesting at all. Otherwise it’s just one of those endless, drab wrangles about wording.