Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by joonix 4955 days ago
The article doesn't talk enough about level of assent to Terms by users. Don't show the Agree button until they scroll all the way down. Require them to type their initials to agree. It is really easy to throw out your terms in civil litigation by showing the user never actually assented -- there wasn't a "meeting of the minds" in order to form a contract between you and your users.
2 comments

Even this will not help you in the EU. The basic rule for EULAs in the EU is that they are only valid if you show them pre-purchase.

Oh, and they become automatically invalid if you make a user sign away rights that he has under the law (of his resident member state).

Great point and requiring your users to scroll through the TOU and then agree (only after scrolling) is the best practice. Courts, however, have not conclusively said this is the silver bullet. Many TOUs have held up in court via a mere click through (with no scroll).
Right, it's presently very murky in the US and varies from court to court. You can only try your best to mitigate risk.