No more privacy - Yet another reason to ditch AOL/AIM

[Stalkid64]

From the good ship slashdot;
"AOL has posted new terms of service for AIM, that include the right for AOL to use anything and everything you send through AIM in any way they see fit, without informing you. A sample passage: '...by posting Content on an AIM Product, you grant AOL, its parent, affiliates, subsidiaries, assigns, agents and licensees the irrevocable, perpetual, worldwide right to reproduce, display, perform, distribute, adapt and promote this Content in any medium. You waive any right to privacy.'"
I feel sorry for all you AOL'ers. Well I already did of course but more so now. Damn that's a scary thing to have to agree to.

[Gorxon]

Yikes...That's gotta be a fake EULA? Usually it's way more subtle than that, and that's just outragous. Imagine the phone companies putting up something like that for conversation and SMS. I am pretty sure that EULA isn't even legal here in my country, but since it's an US based company that doesn't matter.

[smegforbrain]

It's not fake, Gorxon. I just located it in the Terms of Service from www.aim.com.

And with ICQ also being owned by AOL, I wouldn't be surprised if the same terms apply there.

I should add: didn't they try a ToS like this years ago with Hotmail, and everybody took notice of MS's stupidity?

[Stalkid64]

I wonder what AOL will do about something like Trillian, where they really shouldn't have any control... It's a pretty shocking idea considering it'll apply to text chat, voice/video chat, sent files etc. Hm, wonder if this might even be considered as breaking the current wiretapping laws..?

[bcrew1375]

It's not fake, Gorxon. I just located it in the Terms of Service from www.aim.com.

Are you sure? I couldn't find it anywhere in their ToS. Is this the same thing you were looking at? http://www.aim.com/tos/tos.adp

[_Chrono_]

Are you sure? I couldn't find it anywhere in their ToS. Is this the same thing you were looking at? http://www.aim.com/tos/tos.adp

its there

Content You Post
You may only post Content that you created or which the owner of the Content has given you. You may not post or distribute Content that is illegal or that violates these Terms of Service. By posting or submitting Content on any AIM Product, you represent and warrant that (i) you own all the rights to this Content or are authorized to use and distribute this Content on the AIM Product and (ii) this Content does not and will not infringe any copyright or any other third-party right nor violate any applicable law or regulation. Although you or the owner of the Content retain ownership of all right, title and interest in Content that you post to any AIM Product, AOL owns all right, title and interest in any compilation, collective work or other derivative work created by AOL using or incorporating this Content. In addition, by posting Content on an AIM Product, you grant AOL, its parent, affiliates, subsidiaries, assigns, agents and licensees the irrevocable, perpetual, worldwide right to reproduce, display, perform, distribute, adapt and promote this Content in any medium. You waive any right to privacy. You waive any right to inspect or approve uses of the Content or to be compensated for any such uses.

[Dysprosium]

My friend sent me a security addition for AIM for this patch, so that AOL can't read the messages and such. It's quite impressive..

[smcd]

My friend sent me a security addition for AIM for this patch, so that AOL can't read the messages and such. It's quite impressive..

Uh, just use gaim and the plugin for it that uses gpg... presto.

[2fast4u]

you gotta be fucking kidding me. good thing i never used the aim messenger in the first place.

[Trotterwatch]

I doubt they'll get much of interest out of the chat logs, unless AOL really want to use things such as:

i donloded teh knew britney speers sexy sung of kazzaz it good!!!!

AOL have always sucked ass anyways Indeed I recommend that everyone who doesn't like this measure just log onto AOL once a day, and write:

AOL suck donkey balls

See if they use that