Who says no one reads the fine print anymore? Dropbox currently sent an e-mail to customers with updated terms and conditions to their clients. Within these revisions it said,
“By submitting your stuff to the Services, you grant us (and those we work with to provide the Services) worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free, sublicenseable rights to use, copy, distribute, prepare derivative works (such as translations or format conversions) of, perform, or publicly display that stuff to the extent reasonably necessary for the Service.”
With a lot of creative agencies using Dropbox as a way to transfer files among employees, this definitely caused an uproar. But do not be scared, after the immense disapproval, Dropbox quickly revised their Terms and Conditions to save their millions of loyal followers. It now states,
“You retain ownership to your stuff. You are also solely responsible for your conduct, the content of your files and folders, and your communications with others while using the Services.
We sometimes need your permission to do what you ask us to do with your stuff (for example, hosting, making public, or sharing your files). By submitting your stuff to the Services, you grant us (and those we work with to provide the Services) worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free, sublicenseable rights to use, copy, distribute, prepare derivative works (such as translations or format conversions) of, perform, or publicly display that stuff to the extent reasonably necessary for the Service. This license is solely to enable us to technically administer, display, and operate the Services. You must ensure you have the rights you need to grant us that permission.”
Dropbox’s intention was to merely cut the legal lingo out to make it more understandable to their everyday user. But it seems that they cut out too much, this simple miss-wording of their terms and conditions could cost them many customers. This is the reason why the use of copy/technical writers AND editors is crucial to releasing pertinent information into the public.
