Facebook's New Terms Of Service: "We Can Do Anything We Want With Your Content.

[Pat McCotter]

Facebook's New Terms Of Service: "We Can Do Anything We Want With Your Content.
By Chris Walters, 6:14 PM on Sun Feb 15 2009, 634,950 views

This post has generated a lot of responses, including from Facebook. Check them out here.

Facebook's terms of service (TOS) used to say that when you closed an account on their network, any rights they claimed to the original content you uploaded would expire. Not anymore.

Now, anything you upload to Facebook can be used by Facebook in any way they deem fit, forever, no matter what you do later.* Want to close your account? Good for you, but Facebook still has the right to do whatever it wants with your old content. They can even sublicense it if they want.

You hereby grant Facebook an irrevocable, perpetual, non-exclusive, transferable, fully paid, worldwide license (with the right to sublicense) to (a) use, copy, publish, stream, store, retain, publicly perform or display, transmit, scan, reformat, modify, edit, frame, translate, excerpt, adapt, create derivative works and distribute (through multiple tiers), any User Content you (i) Post on or in connection with the Facebook Service or the promotion thereof subject only to your privacy settings or (ii) enable a user to Post, including by offering a Share Link on your website and (b) to use your name, likeness and image for any purpose, including commercial or advertising, each of (a) and (b) on or in connection with the Facebook Service or the promotion thereof.

That language is the same as in the old TOS, but there was an important couple of lines at the end of that section that have been removed:

You may remove your User Content from the Site at any time. If you choose to remove your User Content, the license granted above will automatically expire, however you acknowledge that the Company may retain archived copies of your User Content.

Furthermore, the "Termination" section near the end of the TOS states:

The following sections will survive any termination of your use of the Facebook Service: Prohibited Conduct, User Content, Your Privacy Practices, Gift Credits, Ownership; Proprietary Rights, Licenses, Submissions, User Disputes; Complaints, Indemnity, General Disclaimers, Limitation on Liability, Termination and Changes to the Facebook Service, Arbitration, Governing Law; Venue and Jurisdiction and Other.

Make sure you never upload anything you don't feel comfortable giving away forever, because it's Facebook's now.

(Note that as several readers have pointed out, this seems to be subject to your privacy settings, so anything you've protected from full public view doesn't seem to be usable in other ways regardless.)

Oh, you also agree to arbitration, naturally. Have fun with that.

[Pat McCotter]

Facebook Clarifies Terms Of Service: "We Do Not Own Your Stuff Forever"
By Chris Walters, 6:52 PM on Mon Feb 16 2009, 47,588 views

Well, yesterday's Facebook post certainly blew up today, and it looks like Facebook is currently preparing an official response. In the meantime, a Facebook rep has written to the Industry Standard to emphasize that all rights are subject to your privacy settings, so even if they don't expire when you close your account, they'll still be subject to whatever restrictions you had when the account was active. Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg has also posted a more philosophical response on the Facebook blog saying that while the new Terms of Service are "overly formal," they're only meant to give Facebook the legal ability to enable content sharing among users.

Here's what the Facebook rep told the Industry Standard:

We are not claiming and have never claimed ownership of material that users upload. The new Terms were clarified to be more consistent with the behavior of the site. That is, if you send a message to another user (or post to their wall, etc...), that content might not be removed by Facebook if you delete your account (but can be deleted by your friend). Furthermore, it is important to note that this license is made subject to the user's privacy settings. So any limitations that a user puts on display of the relevant content (e.g. To specific friends) are respected by Facebook. Also, the license only allows us to use the info "in connection with the Facebook Service or the promotion thereof." Users generally expect and understand this behavior as it has been a common practice for web services since the advent of webmail. For example, if you send a message to a friend on a webmail service, that service will not delete that message from your friend's inbox if you delete your account.

[Coconut]

Biggest over-reaction of the year.

Myspace already has this policy. One of the reasons CNN could publish the pictures of Spitzer's girl that they found there. It's more of a "Don't screw us" policy than a "We want to screw you" policy.

If facebook starts suing people for using their own pictures somewhere else, claiming that they now own them, then we can over-react.

[Fluff and Stuff]

Facebook will save your information if you delete your account, also.  It is a great networking site, but if you value your privacy don't put too much on there.  Keep in mind the government (on every level) has full access to everything you put on facebook.

[Kat Kanning]

Facebook will save your information if you delete your account, also.  It is a great networking site, but if you value your privacy don't put too much on there.  Keep in mind the government (on every level) has full access to everything you put on facebook.

This is true of everything you put on the internets.

[Velma]

Facebook will save your information if you delete your account, also.  It is a great networking site, but if you value your privacy don't put too much on there.  Keep in mind the government (on every level) has full access to everything you put on facebook.

This is true of everything you put on the internets.

Very true. 

Geocities had similar wording years ago.  I can still find the remains of several of my old websites from 10 years ago - that I thought I removed.

[Fluff and Stuff]

Facebook will save your information if you delete your account, also.  It is a great networking site, but if you value your privacy don't put too much on there.  Keep in mind the government (on every level) has full access to everything you put on facebook.

This is true of everything you put on the internets.

I thought Myspace deleted your comments, pictures, and videos along with your account when you cancel it to save space.

[dalebert]

Facebook recently said they were not implementing this change at this point and were rethinking the new policies due to the reaction.

[Coconut]

Facebook will save your information if you delete your account, also.  It is a great networking site, but if you value your privacy don't put too much on there.  Keep in mind the government (on every level) has full access to everything you put on facebook.

This is true of everything you put on the internets.

I thought Myspace deleted your comments, pictures, and videos along with your account when you cancel it to save space.

Maybe it's not on Myspace's server, but it's somewhere, in some cache, where it'll be forever.

[Puke]

Damn that legal-ese.

[George Donnelly]

Offended by the new Facebook TOS? Wait till you see the new government terms of service!

http://georgedonnelly.com/opinion/government-terms-service

[J’raxis 270145]

if you value your privacy don't put too much on there.

I haven't put anything on there.

[joeyforpresident]

Tripp, thanks for the "remedial" answer, and to the candidate running, thanks for running. I hope you win.


And for those who don't like the Facebook TOS, don't f-ing use the site. There's the solution to that problem right there.