Simpson wrote in his column he was alarmed to find that the Terms of Service (ToS) of his ISP contained a provision that allowed it to "use, copy, sublicence, redistribute, adapt, transmit, publish, delete, edit and/or broadcast, publicly perform or display" his content in as part of a "perpetual, royalty-free, non-exclusive, irrevocable, unrestricted, worldwide licence", since in order to update his Web page, Aardvark, he sends the content through the system of his ISP.
The ToS (screen dump) went on to say "The above rights you grant to use include the right to exploit all proprietary rights in any of the materials including, but not limited to, rights under copyright, trademark, service mark or patent laws under any jurisdiction worldwide." Simpson went on to point out that by including any material posted on its "Web sites or systems" the ToS included e-mail in its broad scope.
Xtra, the ISP in question, reportedly quickly changed its ToS, but included provisions prohibiting criticism of the ISP, and requiring users to "edit, delete or cease any future publication of any material or communication which we consider to be... detrimental to our reputation or to our brand" (screen dump). Xtra reserved the right to "edit, delete, block or disconnect that material or communication [themselves]".
"This has simply gone way beyond an amusing joke," wrote Simpson in his column.
Xtra defended its ToS, saying the intention was "to make clear that Xtra and its suppliers are able to deal with materials given to them by customers for the purposes of running their services."
While the intentions of Xtra may have been perfectly benign, it does raise the question of what rights ISPs try to grab in their terms of service, and whether most users would read the entire document to discover what they are signing away.
Have you come across a ToS that effectively demands rights to the intellectual property posted on its network, or some other nefarious practice? Let us know.
