Google has responded with haste to the huge outcry about a section in Chrome‘s EULA that gives Google “a perpetual, irrevocable, worldwide, royalty-free, and non-exclusive license” to do all kinds of dirty stuff—in public no less—to content you post through Chrome. Rebecca Ward, Senior Product Counsel for Google Chrome, told Ars that it’s actually an oopsie from basically copying and pasting the same EULA it uses in other products, and that they’re updating it as fast as they can to remove the ridiculous terms. She says that Google is
“working quickly to remove language from Section 11 of the current Google Chrome terms of service. This change will apply retroactively to all users who have downloaded Google Chrome.”
It’s not that I don’t trust Google, but the Ctrl+C, Ctrl+V explanation (“this means that the legal terms for a specific product may include terms that don’t apply well to the use of that product”) seems like an odd oversight for a product in secret, heavy development for close to two years. (If you’re interested in Chrome, read Steven Levy’s deep inside feature about its birth, it’s great.) Either way, whether Google knew it was in there and hoped it would slide—though I can’t see a reason for that—or it was an honest mistake, it’ll be fixed soon. [Ars]
