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[Sensei]

Ah, the End User License Agreement. This is that bunch of words that come up when you install a game, and you scroll to the bottom and tick the box because you don't want to spend your entire evening reading legalese in an itty bitty window. They're also notorious for being machiavellian and possibly not legally enforceable, because they aren't usually in plain English/aren't present alongside a lawyer, and are presented after you pay for a product.

Sometimes, I read them. Not that I'm a lawyer, but there can be... interesting bits.

With the ado out of the way, today I'll be going through the World of Tanks terms of service, and generally poking at the fun parts, as well as translating it into plain and simple english. If you're legally inclined I recommend you open that link, and refer to it often (or if you're curious about the parts I generalize). Lastly, let me note that if this is tl;dr to you, try skipping forward to the red bit, it's what I really made this for.

Now, I'll take it from the top:
WN TERMS OF SERVICE

These Terms of Service (“Agreement”) covers the public websites of Wargaming.Net LLP (WN/we/us/our)...

Okay, had to get that out of the way for those who are only reading the post. It says that the agreement is basically for all games hosted by WN, or Wargaming.Net- however, at this time that means only World of Tanks and WN's associated forums. The rest of this section is relatively uninteresting (introductions are), except for a couple clauses:

If you are under the age of thirteen (13), you must make sure that your parent or guardian reads and accepts this Agreement on your behalf prior to your use of the Website.

Hah.

Please note that WN may terminate this Agreement and your rights hereunder at any time. (emphasis original)

This is standard, but worth noting- they can close your access to the product for whatever reason they want.

WN may, from time to time, modify, amend, or supplement these Terms of Service, and post those changes on the Terms of Service page. Such modifications, amendments or supplements shall be effective immediately upon posting on the Website. You are responsible for periodically checking the Website for changes to these Terms of Service.

Yeah, that's right. This says that they can change the contract you already agreed to, and you have to keep checking up on it to see if they've changed it. It doesn't say when or if it was last modified at the top either, so you'd have to read through the whole thing and memorize it like a holy book if you wanted to know when they changed something. Usually EULAs say that they have to alert you when the terms of the EULA change.


The agreement then goes on to section I., the objective statement, which just says that these rules govern the game basically.

II. TERMS OF USE
The opening of this section tells you to read their forum rules, yadda yadda. It also explains their account system: CM's (Community Managers) are employees, Moderators are players selected by the CMs, and then there's regular players.

On Account Sharing:

Players must keep all account information confidential. At no time should a player give out their e-mail, account ID or password, secret question or answer to anyone. This includes friends, relatives, parents, children, spouses...

"NEVER LET YOUR SPOUSE USE YOUR ACCOUNT! THEY CAN'T BE TRUSTED!" They only use this as justification so you can't say 'My <person I shared my account with> was a douche, not me, don't ban my account,' but I still find the insinuation that you account info should be guarded the same way as national military secrets a little crazy.

In Account Security:

(ii) immediately report to WN staff on any hacking tools if known that can potentially harm the Website or the Game for further investigation...

Heh, unless of course you're using them.  Also in this section is some warning that someone COULD potentially get your personal information if you transmit it via an internet connection. It doesn't actually give any policies, it just says that they try to be careful with your personal info. Odd.

Lastly this section explains what kinds of warnings, temporary and permanent bans are available. Not precisely what they're issue for, that comes later.

Now, onto charges and billing. We're still in Section II, man it's long.

You also acknowledge and agree that WN and its Third Party Providers do not ensure continuous or error-free access or availability of any game content, feature, game-play, service or server and may change, modify, disable, suspend or remove any such content, feature, game-play, service or server in their sole discretion.

This is under the charges and billing section, interestingly. Prevents you from trying to get your money back if you can't log in after paying for something- but also if they remove the feature. Yikes! Well, I guess I wouldn't want them to be legally unable to nerf paid content.

It then goes on to talk about payment methods (yawn) and ingame gold (a little bit banning RMT and account selling here). It also talks about how virtual goods are a limited license... maybe worth reading, but not quite worth harping on- you DID pay real money for a bunch of pretend ammunition, or whatever.

YOU AGREE, THEREFORE, THAT YOU WILL NEVER ASSERT OR BRING ANY CLAIM OR SUIT AGAINST WN, ITS PARENT COMPANIES, DIVISIONS, SUBSIDIARIES, AFFILIATES, OR ANY EMPLOYEES OF ANY OF ABOVE, WHICH IS RELATED TO OR BASED ON, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO; (I) A CLAIM THAT YOU "OWN" ANY VIRTUAL GOODS IN ANY GAME, (II) A CLAIM FOR THE "VALUE" OF VIRTUAL GOODS IF WN DELETES THEM (AND/OR TERMINATES YOUR ACCOUNT(S)

AHHH BIG TEXT! If you've got the whole EULA open, read that entire section. But gist of it is like it says: You don't "own" (quotes original) anything you paid for. When you hear people being suspicious of DLC, this is why.

It's been pretty boring so far- but hey, at least you didn't have to read grey text on a slightly darker grey background. I'll just leave this red bookmark here, if you want to take a break. Don't worry though, it gets better! Up next:

You understand that by using WN Communication Features, you may be exposed to messages, information, data, text, software, graphic files, or other materials, whether in written, verbal, electronic, digital, machine-readable or other form, whether now known or hereafter to become known ("User Content") that you might find objectionable.

Heh. Actually, the really funny part is where it says WN doesn't guarantee the accuracy of user content. As if somebody thought moderators were out to remove inaccurate forum posts and chat messages.

2. Prohibited Uses

You agree not to do any of the following while accessing or using the Website or any WN Communication Features:

Okay, this is what we're really here for. I've been reading the EULA from the top, but I saw some bits from this section a while ago that inspired me to start this thread. Hope they haven't changed it: Here is what WN prohibits you to communicate.

Transmit or facilitate the transmission of any User Content that is unlawful, harmful, threatening, abusive, harassing, tortious, defamatory, vulgar, obscene, libelous, that may be invasive of another's right of privacy or publicity, hateful, racially, ethnically or otherwise objectionable;

Nothing objectionable! As if they enforce that. Also, I picture some lawyer breaking out the big thesaurus to write this passage. "Tortious"? Really?

Impersonate any person or entity,

You get banned if you say "DEVELOPERS!" too many times.

Transmit or facilitate the transmission of any User Content that you do not have a right to transmit, under any law...

You're... not allowed to break the law? That's redundant.

Use a WN’s Communication Feature in a manner that adversely affects the availability of its resources to other users (e.g., excessive shouting (use of all caps),

Hah! Now it's down in black and white, you annoying, spammy idiots who insist on- wait, it's grey on grey, doesn't count.

Slander and deception of WN Staff. WN Staff is to be as impartial and unbiased as possible.

Haha, oh wow.

There's a lot of good stuff in the full version of the list too. But, if I recall correctly, it used to have a fairly long section regarding how you were not legally allowed to post anything found "offensive"- I guess they took it out. Also in the communication section is stuff saying you can't violate copyrights, some rules for link posting and an epilepsy warning (if they cared about the epilepsy warning it would be somewhere people might actually have a change of noticing it).

After that, there's a big ugly section about beta testing. Not sure why it's still in there, but nothing interesting.

III. Intellectual Property

Then comes copyright, including use of WN copyrighted material in fan sites. I'm not sure why that has to included as such. Aside from the section on a license agreement if a fansite intends to charge subscriptions somehow, I'm pretty sure that WN just has to suck your big long fair use.

D. Submissions, Fan Fiction, Artwork, Content, and Photographs

Anyway, fan fiction...? I guess it's some kind of standard ass-covering, but I don't see how anyone would write fan fiction about world of tanks, a game in which takes place only in instantiated death matches. But let's read it!

It says, first off, that they do not accept any fan design or art suggestions as part of a company policy to prevent legal misunderstandings, and will not use them under any circumstances. Oddly, it says that if you DO send something to them (at their request or in spite of their standing request) then:

Accordingly, WN shall exclusively own all now known or hereafter existing copyrights and all other intellectual property rights to all Submissions of every kind and nature, in perpetuity, throughout the universe and you hereby assign to WN as a present assignment of future rights all such intellectual property rights to the extent owned by you.

Aside from the kind of alarming implications of the ridiculous totality with which this agreement supposedly gives them copyright power, I find the wording "of every kind and nature, in perpetuity, throughout the universe" curiously entertaining. I think somebody was having fun when they wrote this.

There's also a bit on their policies for downloading the actual game files for World of Tanks. It's typically totalitarian but not interesting in any particular way.

IV. Disclaimers
Everybody loves disclaimers! This bit is pretty typical, it says you get no warranty and it's not their fault if your computer explodes. They also say that third-party content is not reviewed in whole or in part by WN (which I'm pretty sure is what we call in legalese a "lie") and that WN is not responsible for ANY content on their website which my be inaccurate or offensive, which I'm pretty sure sort of like saying "WN and all associates and subsidiaries hold that the sky is purple, with yellow polka-dots."

Well, with that out of the way, we've basically come to the bottom of the page. What a labor! There's a section on amendments to the agreement, which restates that they can change the agreement whenever they want, but in a really polite way to trick people who didn't read the whole thing. It says:

If we make a material change to the Policy, we will notify you by posting the change on the Policy

Which is far friendlier than "WE CAN CHANGE THIS POLICY AT ANY TIME SO KEEP READING IT SCROOGE MCGEE!" If you think about it though, it's actually the same thing.

After that it just says to report violations, and has an email address to contact the legal staff.

We're done!

Congratulations if you read the whole post. If you haven't read an EULA before, this should give you a pretty good idea what's in most of them. In fact, we should be able to skim through any other EULAs more lightly, and only pick out the really fun stuff.

Comments? And assuming your brains aren't pudding, what EULA should we read next?

[Korbac]

Brain is pudding, thanks for doing that though Sensei, brain likely to be less of a puddingminster tommorow. XD

[breadbocks]

Hehe. Can you get your hands on the WoW EULA without paying/downloads? If not, do Bay12's. I want to see what BS SMF has put in there.

[Biag]

I want a T-shirt with the "throughout the universe" quote on it.

[cerapa]

This was actually quite interesting. Cant suggest any other EULAs cause I dont read them.

And the universe thing is cool.

[Deon]

I always thought that people writing EULAs are retired comedians. Or taking a break. Or something.

One moment...

YOU AGREE, THEREFORE, THAT YOU WILL NEVER ASSERT OR BRING ANY CLAIM OR SUIT AGAINST WN, ITS PARENT COMPANIES, DIVISIONS, SUBSIDIARIES, AFFILIATES, OR ANY EMPLOYEES OF ANY OF ABOVE, WHICH IS RELATED TO OR BASED ON, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO; (I) A CLAIM THAT YOU "OWN" ANY VIRTUAL GOODS IN ANY GAME, (II) A CLAIM FOR THE "VALUE" OF VIRTUAL GOODS IF WN DELETES THEM (AND/OR TERMINATES YOUR ACCOUNT(S)

What?

...  YOU WILL NEVER ASSERT OR BRING ANY CLAIM ... AGAINST WN ... OR ANY EMPLOYEES ... WHICH IS RELATED TO OR BASED ON, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO <...>

Do I read it right? Do they ask you to agree to never bring any legal case against ANY of their employees which is based on something "BUT NOT LIMITED TO" it?

So if WN janitor kills your wife and children and they include this into the "not limited to" field, you have no right to sue him?

Lulz.

[breadbocks]

Remind me to get a job at WN. >.>

[Bluerobin]

Gotta love EULAs. I'm pretty sure some of the stuff you sign away by clicking agree can't actually be signed away. I guess it's good of them to try and protect themselves from their often idiotic userbase, but... yeah.

[Asehujiko]

Do the PS3 one. There's some incredibly fucked up shit there if their quoting it during the SCEA vs Geohot case is accurate.

[SirAaronIII]

Seconding the B12 forums one. This should be good.

[Sensei]

Grr! The forum ate my post twice, if you're wondering why it seems late.

As many of you have noted, a lot of EULAs ask you to sign away things that aren't legal in most countries. Generally this is just a company covering their bases, but it really sucks to be you if you have a serious issue with it, because you can't really play their game otherwise. If a company does try to launch a crazy lawsuit, most gamers have no good reason to spend the money and time needed to do something about it over a video game. Unfortunately there's no regulation or oversight on these things from parties other than the companies which write them.

So, our suggestions for the next EULA are:
-PS3 (is there really an EULA for the console itself?)
-WoW
-Bay 12 "EULA". I'm not sure what you mean by this, I don't think there's an EULA for Dwarf Fortress, so do you mean the forum guidelines written by Toady? Or the default text (found below Toady's rules) shown when you register on the forum? While it is something you usually skip past, forum guidelines don't tend to be as long, wordy or alarming as EULAs. I should not that WoT had forum/gameplay guidelines too, separate from their EULA (of note, it's longer than your typical rules and DOES have a few things to poke at, but not a ton).

Anyway, I'll be trying to look for links to the WoW and PS3 agreements. If anyone knows where those are, links are appreciated (as would, if possible, links to future suggestions).

Edit: Found the WoW one, added link. Like with the WN one, the text there is annoyingly close to the background color. Edit2: found Playstation network agreement, is that what you're looking for? More awful website design that makes the EULA difficult to read, I might add. I think I see a pattern, like rainbows on all the bad nintendo cartridges... Edit3: Oh troll jegus. Apparently there's three separate agreements associated with the PS3, plus health and safety. Edit4: Wait, I think that's NOT counting the PSN one.

[breadbocks]

Went back and checked, and turns out there was just a basic agreement for when you sign up for Bay12, not a labyrinthine EULA. >.>

Also, yet another suggestion. And I have to say, I just skimmed it, and it seemed surprisingly benign.

[Sensei]

PLEASE READ THIS ENTIRE AGREEMENT

Maybe that would be a clever thread title...

Today I'll go over the contents of the Playstation 3 Terms of Service V1.4, one of several hideous pieces of legal text which, according to Sony's lawyers, you're expected to spend about twelve hours reading before using your Playstation 3. I've copied the EULA into a Word document this time, and it's far easier to read, so if you're reading along I suggest you do the same. It's 16 pages long, compared to 17 on the WoT one.

Note that these terms of use are not the license agreement for the console hardware itself, which is mostly full of clauses prohibiting you from modifying your console or using it to murder people prone to photo-epileptic seizures.

There really is a ton to be said for how unfair EULA type agreements are at forcing customers into a contract they don't understand for a product they already bought. As usual, though, I'll focus on the content in particular that you supposedly read if you were granted access to the Playstation Network.

First let's get the drudgery out of the way:

THIS AGREEMENT IS A CONTRACT BETWEEN YOU AND SONY NETWORK ENTERTAINMENT AMERICA INC. ("SNEA")

So, for the purposes of this contract, Sony is now "SNEA". Man, that's a hideous name. Get used to seeing it a lot, though. You win an internet if you make a Sony fan angry by insisting on referring on Sony by it's full acronym. Oh, we'll also be using PSN for Playstation Network a lot.

[the agreement]...CAN BE ACCEPTED ONLY BY AN ADULT OF LEGAL AGE OF MAJORITY IN THE COUNTRY IN WHICH YOUR SONY ONLINE SERVICES (PSN OR QRIOCITY) ACCOUNT IS REGISTERED.

Well, you don't usually see something this out of whack this early in. While most EULA's say you have to be 13 years of age, a standard set by PEGI (European ESRB) or something I think, this one requires you be legally an adult. If you're under 18 and you saved up the money to buy a PS3, supposedly you can't legally agree to this EULA and gain access to PSN. Mind, this contract-terminating issue is only ever going to come up if they try to terminate your contract, but still.

There's some more about how agree to the agreement if you click agree, you agree to follow the community code of conduct (also part of the agreement), not use unlicensed peripherals (bah, humbug!) and, vaguely, and not use the PSN in a way that is harmful to Sony SNEA.

Also this EULA is organized into reasonably-sized sections. Yay!

1. ACCOUNT REGISTRATION

This bit explains, in rather dull terms, what an account is, that Qriocity is an on-demand video service, and some other things. Also that you get one master account and six sub-accounts.

You are not permitted to create Sub Accounts for adults or persons under the legal age of majority who are not your children or for whom you are not the legal guardian. Your children must be of a certain age in order to have a Sub Account. Sub Accounts may not be available in all countries.

Pretty much all of these limiting clauses on sub-accounts are weird. First off, remember apparently you have to be 18 to create a master account. It then says that you can create sub-accounts for ONLY YOUR CHILDREN, not your sibling or spouse or roommate. I'm sure nobody follows that. It says children must be "of a certain age", but this is never specified. I think it's in case some country decides kids under 12 can't have internet accounts, or something, but that's still really weird. And "sub accounts may not be available in all countries"? I dread to see how that's applied. Do you think they just go, "Hey, those frenchies are rich, they can afford to make more master accounts." or something? I can hardly wrap my head around why they would add that.

you must provide (i) your consent for SNEA to disclose, pursuant to SNEA's Privacy Policy, your child's personally identifying information to third parties for the purpose of allowing your child to participate in Sony Online Services activities, such as video, voice chat and gameplay in PSN; and (ii) your credit card information if requested by SNEA for Sub Accounts for children under the age of 13 in the United States and Canada or under the specific age applicable to your country. Your credit card will be used to verify parental consent under laws requiring such consent. You will not be charged a fee for creating the Sub Account.

If you do not consent to the disclosure of this requested information, you will not be able to create a Sub Account.

Okay, this I can see actually bugging some people. You basically have to sign a release form for anything you do on the PSN. It kinda makes sense, but that's still pretty creepy. Does it seriously use your credit to check if you have children? How? Is that legal? Remember, even if they're eight years old, tell Sony they're 14 and bypass that crap.

After that it says that it's parents' responsibility to monitor what their kids do online and what games they play, so bully (that's European for good) on Sony SNEA for telling parents to be responsible.

2. COMMUNITY CODE OF CONDUCT
or "We make fun of people who try to force their values on other people!"

This is just a huge bullet-pointed list of you-may-nots, and a paragraph afterwards saying the typical stuff about how SNEA can remove content or report you to the cops if you use PSN to organize your drug dealing. Oh, and their ever-beloved right to ban you and your expensive hardware they gave you.

Onto the list!

•    You may not engage in deceptive or misleading practices.

This is the very first one. It should say "unless you are rich and sell video games".

•    You may not take any action, or upload, post, stream, or otherwise transmit any content... that SNEA or its affiliates, in their sole discretion, find offensive, hateful, or vulgar.

This thread would get deleted on the Sony forums.

•    You may not upload, post, stream, or otherwise transmit any content that contains any viruses...[or other hacks]

This is squarely in their right to say, but I always wonder why EULAs keep needing to include this. It's in every online service EULA I've read. I mean, it sure didn't stop anybody. Speaking of which...

•    You may not provide anyone with your name or any other personally identifying information other than your Online ID, nor the name, password or personally identifying information of any other person or business through any means, including messaging, chat or any other form of network communication.

At first it looks like they didn't say you couldn't tell random strangers your credit card number because it was obvious. But the real truth was more sinister. Jokes aside, since when was Sony's position to say that I can't tell people my name on the internet? Remember, these clauses apply to grown adults. I guess we can add it to the list of bannable things everyone does that SNEA can use to pin anyone they want to ban.

The rest is typical stuff, including saying that you aren't allowed to impersonate anyone or knowingly break laws in your country/state through use of their service. Oh, and it says basically not to copy their floppies.


3. ACCESS TO CONTENT
This section is quite brief. It mostly just says that you have to agree to any third-party usage terms and consent that your information can be used by third parties. Bo-ring. This is why people don't normally read EULAs.

All content and services are provided to you by SNEA, including content created or published by third parties.

You know actually, that sentence seems a little suspect.  At the very least their definition of "provided" isn't a universally broad one...

4. WALLET
Also a very short segment. There's some specific details about how wallets behave in relation to sub-accounts (the master account gives them a monthly spending limit), but it's not too alarming. Except, of course, that it says "NO REFUNDS ON ANYTHING".

SNEA has no obligation to reverse or refund unauthorized charges made on your credit or debit card... funds added to the wallet are non-refundable and non-transferable... wallet funds that are deemed abandoned or unused by law will not be returned or restored.

Note that by "unauthorized", they presumably mean sub-account spending, which is supposed to be your kids. However I'm sure that if your credit card information were stolen, SNEA's lawyers could interpret that more broadly...

Section five covers prepaid cards and product codes, not much interesting there.

6. PURCHASES AND TRANSACTIONS
This one's another hideous wall of text.

By completing a transaction through your Master Account or allowing a transaction to take place through an associated Sub Account, you are (i) agreeing to pay for all purchases made by the Master Account and its associated Sub Accounts, including recurring charges for subscriptions that are not cancelled; (ii) authorizing SNEA to deduct from the wallet and charge your credit card all applicable fees due and payable for all purchases made by the Master Account and its associated Sub Accounts;

This is basically more "NO REFUNDS". However, it also specifically mentions subscription fees. There's another section on subscriptions further down with the gory details, but this sounds like they really don't care if somebody forgets to cancel a subscription. Not that I suspect SNEA does this, but other companies have in the past- the text of the agreement basically means that if they make it difficult or extremely inconvenient to unsubscribe, there isn't much you can do about it.

SNEA reserves the right to deduct from the wallet any fee, penalty or other charge resulting from a Master Account holder's request to the Master Account holder's credit card company to reverse charges for a purchase.

Not horrendously unfair, but a little worrying. Also, since it says earlier that everyone "non refundable to the extent permitted by law", this is only AFTER they've been forced to refund you.

To the extent permitted by applicable law, all sales are subject to the laws of the State of California, County of San Mateo.

Now, that's worrying. You never know what they have up their sleeve with something radical yet poorly explained by this. Are they based in San Mateo? Are the laws there just favorable to their interests? *goes to look it up* Well, I dunno. They have a population of 100,000 (not huge) and as far as I can tell Sony doesn't have any particular investment there- in fact, possibly not even an office. This is a list of the top ten employers in San Mateo:

Still have no idea why they chose it though. Back on topic:

You bear all risk of loss for accessing your content, including completing the download of any content, ensuring that you have the necessary capabilities to view your content, including content provided at high resolution/definition, and for any loss of content you have downloaded, including any loss due to a file corruption or hard drive crash.

Geez, that's harsh.  I think it's mostly supposed to apply to temporary content, but I wonder if you're able to re-download things like games.

After that there's an ominous bit about how a "Minimum Fee" will be deducted from your credit card if you try to buy more than you can afford in your Sony-Wallet- and that the Minimum Fee might be more than the purchase price. It says the details are in section 11 so stay tuned folks!

7. GENERAL LICENSE RESTRICTIONS AND TERMS

Except as stated in this Agreement, all content and software provided through Sony Online Services are licensed non-exclusively and revocably to you...

Yup. Standard but still appalling: Everything you pay for is not owned, but a license which may be revoked if SNEA sees fit. This is the big purpose, and issue, with EULAs. Remember buying Nintendo cartridges? And owning them? Sony doesn't.

It also goes on about how extraordinarily non-transferable and limited things are. Nothing shocking, just that you can't re-sell it and you can only activate it on a certain number of devices and yadda yadda. Although it's too long to really put in a quote here, you might want to count how many times they use the words "limited", "expressly permitted", and "You may not". You know, just for fun.

Also oddly enough, copyrights ("You may not reproduce trademarks...") are tacked onto the end of this section.

8. VIDEO CONTENT
These are all the rules regarding video content. There's later sections on comics and music like it. It basically outlines what a rental is in the most anally retentive terms possible. The only particularly interesting thing is:

Some content such as movie trailers may not be representative of the actual feature presentation.

So true, Sony SNEA. So true.

9. COMIC CONTENT
This is probably the shortest section in the EULA. All it says is that if you download a comic you can activate it on up to 3 machines, and that rights to the comic are reserved by SNEA and the comic publisher. But it really is alarmingly short.

Subject to the terms of this Agreement and any additional terms and conditions for the particular content, SNEA licenses to PSN account holders digital comic book content ("Comic Content") via purchase or download on PSN for your personal, private, non-commercial viewing in the United States on up to three (3) activated PSP® (PlayStation®Portable) system(s). Additional software for viewing Comic Content may be required. Except for rights explicitly granted here, all rights in Comic Content are reserved by SNEA and its licensors. Some Comic Content may not be identical with the original formatted content or versions of the same titled content not provided by SNEA.

That's the entire thing. Oh, and it says that some comics might be slightly different on the PS3 than other versions. I'm pretty sure that's mostly for resizing, at the very least I haven't heard complaints of Sony SNEA cutting out the good parts.

10. MUSIC CONTENT
This is much like the video content section. Strict, as usual, but there isn't anything interesting or surprising here.

11. SUBSCRIPTIONS
I've been waiting for this one!

Subscriptions renew automatically unless you cancel the subscription. The cost of each subscription will automatically be deducted from your wallet at the beginning of each subscription term without further notice to you.

Emphasis original- at least they're clear about it. Well, as clear as anything on page 12 of 16 in an 8635 word EULA you weren't planning on reading when you bought a game console can be.

SNEA may also offer a free trial period with some subscriptions. If you do not cancel your subscription before expiration of a trial period, your wallet will automatically be charged the cost of the subscription at the beginning of each subscription term without further notice to you.

See, this sort of sneaky crap is stuff that their business model relies on you not reading. A lot of MMOs do this too.

[In the event that you don't have money to pay an ongoing subscription and] If the automatic funding feature on the Master Account is set to "ON," your credit card will be charged automatically the greater of the subscription cost or the Minimum Fee.

There's that Minimum Fee again, I'm still waiting to find out what it is. Maybe it varies by region and card.

After this it details some other things about canceling subscriptions, which are standard fare (you cancel, and then at the next payment term they close the service to you instead of charging you). Surprising lack of meat in this section.

12. MAINTENANCE AND UPGRADES
This is a brief section, stating that you might be required to have software upgrades to your console, and SNEA is not liable if it screws your console up.

It is recommended that you regularly back up any archivable data located on the hard disk.

I just find this interesting because "archivable" is apparently not a word, according to MS Word, Firefox and Dictionary.com. Normally I'd say that it bloody well ought to be, but in a document as anal as this can't help but point and laugh.

13. USER MATERIAL AND INFORMATION
This is a relatively long section, but mostly all it says is that if you put information on PSN publicly or submit it to third parties then it isn't SNEA's problem what happens to it, which is pretty much the nature of the internet. Not that they pass up the opportunity to affirm their right to remove user material.

Also, it says that SNEA has rights to use anything you, as a user, submit.

You hereby waive all claims, including any moral rights, against SNEA, its affiliates and subsidiaries for SNEA or any third party's use of User Material to the extent permitted by applicable law.

Not as extreme as the 'in perpetuity' one from the other EULA, but still. Geez.

Also in this section: You shouldn't post things you don't have the rights to (NO POSTING SONG LYRICS GUYS).

It says that third parties might harvest statistics about your use of games (such as gameplay time). And then there's this funny quote:

If you do not want your information to be used, recorded or distributed, please do not play the game online through PSN.

...which you just paid for.

14. TERMINATION / CANCELLATION
Well, there isn't anything surprising here- it explains reasons your account might be suspended. It also says you won't get refunds on things if your account is suspended, but we knew that already. The only odd detail is that it says in some scenarios a master account might be suspended, but sub accounts remain usable and even able to purchase things.

Although it states why and how you might be suspended, all that it really comes down to legally is the umbrella clause:

Unless as otherwise stated in this Agreement, SNEA, at its sole discretion, may indefinitely suspend, or discontinue any and all online access to content at any time, including for maintenance service or upgrades, without prior notice or liability.

15. GENERAL LEGAL
I figured this would be boring, but there's actually a few details worth pointing out here.

SNEA, at its sole discretion, may modify the terms of this Agreement at any time, including imposing a fee for creating PSN accounts.

There's the usual mentioning that they can change the agreement. Not that they actually have some obligation to continue providing free accounts, but this implication that they might not is a little scary. Also, at this time I'm going to have to ask you to picture Darth Vader saying "I've changed the agreement. Pray that I do not change it any further."

If material changes to this Agreement are made, you will be notified by e-mail or other communication when you sign in to Sony Online Services.

Hey, that's a lot better than WN's terms of service. Here they promise to send you an email or notification (even if it just says "the EULA has changed" and shows the entire block of text, that's better than not even telling people). I can't say if they actually highlight the changes they make in these notifications, but I'll give them the benefit of a doubt.

Your continued use of Sony Online Services, including use of your associated Sub Account(s), will signify your acceptance of these changes.

For how much they talk about you not getting anything from them unless it's "EXPRESSLY PERMITTED", they sure don't ask you to permit them expressly.

It also says if any part of the contract is found unenforceable, the rest of the contract remains. Most EULAs have this clause, but I have to say: if a court rules that an entire EULA is unenforceable because part of it is unenforceable, is the clause in the EULA saying they can't do that really going to change their minds?

And it says, in the case of a legal dispute:

Except as otherwise required by applicable law, both parties submit to personal jurisdiction in California and further agree that any dispute arising from or relating to this Agreement shall be brought in a court within San Mateo County, California.

San Mateo again. I still don't know why they chose that place as the precedent for all their legal dealings. It's kind of like if someone threatened to torture you with a pen, a rubber duck, a graphing calculator and a clothespin. The not-knowing is scary.

16. WARRANTY DISCLAIMER AND LIMITATION OF LIABILITY

No warranty is given about the quality, functionality, availability or performance of Sony Online Services, or any content or service offered on or through Sony Online Services.

This is a long section, but let's be honest, that's basically all you need to know.

We're done!

That was a headache. I think this was even longer than the other one. So, two questions: How much do you hate Sony SNEA and what should we do next?

[breadbocks]

Oh god, that was actually pretty scary. Is there an X-Box 360 equivalent you can look into?

[Asehujiko]

San Mateo is the place with the ridiculous law that says "You are sued by a company. Time is Money. You are causing economic damage. GUILTY and vice versa (company can never be sued)" I think. I know it's somewhere in CA and this seems likely.

Also, what is the difference between Sony, SCEA and SNEA? There was some confusion during the Geohot trial where they were suddenly revealed to be completely independent companies in terms of law while still SCEA was suing for breach of contract over a SNEA EULA, and Geohot himself was under the impression they were all part of Sony itself. Then again,that whole trial was a complete farce and cavalcade of privacy breaches and plain lies.