[vollmarj]

Great point. I'm one of the founders of FarmLogs and I can tell you we started this company to help make farmers (like my family) more successful. We don't have ulterior motives with regard to using farmer data. We help them use it to be more profitable and that is all.

That said, it looks like we aren't doing a good enough job making it obvious in our ToS. That page has not been updated in a very long time. I am going to be sure to update it to more accurately reflect our values.

[kfcm]

"...We don't have ulterior motives with regard to using farmer data. We help them use it to be more profitable and that is all."

Until the investors/board say otherwise. :)

Been there. Experienced it. Resigned rather than comply.

Understand FarmLogs is the whipping boy here because you're the thread's subject (and your TOS clause 7 really is scary), but my concerns are also with the others, including for example Deere.

And as your TOS are updated, things might want to consider:

1) Who owns the data--the landowner or the tenant? Which data specifically? Who can order it removed? 2) What happens when a farm changes owners and the new owner wants all data regarding his land removed? 3) What happens when the data is subpeonaed in a clean water lawsuit for agricultural nitrate runoff?

[driverdan]

> Been there. Experienced it. Resigned rather than comply.

Not to derail the topic but I'd love to hear that story. Have you published it anywhere?

[dasboth]

I second that, I'm intrigued.

[cat9]

Good stance, however, that leaves unaddressed two key prongs of this issue:

1) Is this actually a concern to the people you want to be selling to, as evidenced by talking to a number of them? Don't bother with surveys, just straight-up have a non-sales conversation about it with 10 people who match your target customer model.

2) Lots of people don't read a ToS. Or if they do, they're not going to be 100% confident that their interpretation is what will stand up. If this is a legitimate concern for your users, you need to allay that concern, directly, in your primary sales contexts. Make it a focus item on your landing page, with design such that people will see it and go "oh, okay, I don't need to have that concern after all."

[Cshelton]

As somebody who previously prepared many tax returns for farmers, it's great to see people trying and help them to be more profitable. A very small percent of them actually are profitable. (Not including the ones who are trying to show a loss for tax reasons :p) 20% is a good start, and hopefully tools like this will help more farmers, because I like fresh and real food, usually local, and many of them definitely struggle.

[codinghorror]

Kudos, this is exactly the kind of response I love to see.