An interesting story is making it rounds across the internet the past few days about someone who made a system to get his cat to agree to the EULAs she was presented with. While that's just a funny joke, it does raise a very interesting point: if person A agrees to an EULA, does its power extend to person B?
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Member since:2005-06-29
Member since:2005-07-06
Holland is not any different. The whole story comes from the Art45j, which is not entirely clear how it needs to be interpreted. It says that if you acquire a piece of software legally, you also have permission to load the program and bring it on the screen.
There are some lawyers that say that acquiring means purchasing something physical. As software is necessary something physical, Art45j may not apply in all cases, thus you need copyright permission to load and bring up a program on your screen, thus the EULA is valid, even if you disagree (same copyright permission that the GPL uses, if you don't agree you have no permission at all). Buying a software then means nothing, as it it doesn't give you copyright permission to use it, you still need to acquire that via the EULA. Getting that permission by agreeing to terms is legally valid. The license gets then the legal status "terms of use" because it is valid for all users, and is not an individual, personal agreement. A status "terms of use", rather than "contract", invokes some extra consumer protection law.
However, this interpretation is rather (extremely?) dubious. A much more sane interpretation is that if you have bought a program, you have legally acquired it and therefore got, by art45j, the permission to use it. An EULA then equals to adding additional terms to the sales agreement, which is impossible in Holland just like in other places.
Member since:
2006-11-21
How about if an EULA is presented AFTER a purchase? I believe in most European countries the EULA is then void, because you can not present further terms to a purchase once that purchase is completed. I'd be surprised if Holland is any different.
As for downloads where you haven't paid anything, they may well be binding. And very likely if they were presented before you downloaded.