Sion releases Corn – Goes Legal-Maniac on users

{ August 2, 2009 @ 8:05 pm } · { Business }
{ Tags: Second Life, sion chickens, sion zaius, SionCorn, SL }

For the hundreds of people that went out today to get SionCorn, the new product from Sion Zaius that is an add-on to his chicken industry, you were met with a lengthy, detailed EULA (End User License Agreement.) Now, you see, this is expected with any product that takes off as quickly as Sion’s has, and it is good to see that he has obviously sought legal counsel in the pursuit of preservation of his line of products. Any wise businessman protects their business with an agreement that says you won’t steal, hack, make any derivative of his products. It’s a safety net…

But it goes too far.

I mean, so far as to state that this is no longer a game you’re playing in your free time or as a hobbyist, but a contract existing between you and Sion Labs stating that he can terminate on any grounds he see’s fit at any time without recourse. Lets look at some of the legal jargon in his EULA:

“…you agree to update any and all products and accessories within 1 week (7 calendar days) of an update release and ensure you only use the current release. Failure to comply with the restrictions and limitations contained in this Section 2 shall result in immediate, automatic termination of the license granted hereunder and may subject you to civil and/or criminal liability.”

So from now on, you have 7 days to update his products that you own or risk termination and.. well, he can sue you. You heard that right. Sue you.  Which means now, if he decides to once again, or once a week, deem older teleporter boxes or Proteggtors out of date, forcing you to re-purchase a new supply, you have 7days from the date of update to do it (That’s NOT the date you become aware of the update – lets not forget he never even informed anyone about the previous update!)

But it gets better, the EULA continues on to say;

“This License Agreement is effective until terminated. You may terminate the License Agreement at any time by (i) removing all Sion Products from your inventory and in world resources, land, etc…; and (ii) notifying Licensor of your intention to terminate this License Agreement. Licensor may, at its discretion, terminate this License agreement in the event that you fail to comply with the terms and conditions contained herein or for any reason or no reason at all.“

Sion is stating that he doesn’t need a reason to terminate your ability to own or operate SionChickens, which means people who question his ethics publicly, like the customer who demanded an explanation as to why ALL his eggs were being deleted just moment before he was called a Griefer by Sions Customer Support woman and the Group communication was shut off, better watch out! This portion of the EULA also says that if you choose not to play with Sion’s chickens anymore, you have to let him know.

So if you buy a ton of Chickens and you piss off someone who works for Sion or Sion himself, the hatchet will be brought down on you. He states that if you do not remove his object from in-world OR YOUR INVENTORY, he or his Agent will remove them and no compensation will be offered; This basically says that he wants access to your inventory in the event of termination to ensure your things belonging to him are gone…

“In such event, you must immediately remove all Sion Products from your possession both in world or in inventory and/or  you agree that Sion Zaius or his representative and/or agent will remove them without compensation of any kind for any object or product removed, destroyed, killed or in any way removed from your possession.”

Now, in  BIG CAPITAL LETTERS at the very end of your agreement, you will see that Sion has released himself of all liability to you in whole. Even if everything is destroyed by his scripting mistake that results in destruction or malfunction of things you pay him for. This is actually not legal, as these Terms of Service means are deliberately one-sided, effectively attempting to tie the hands of anyone with a dispute regardless of loss. Take a look:

“NEITHER LICENSOR NOR ITS REPRESENTATIVE AND/OR AGENT, SUBSIDIARIES OR AFFILIATES SHALL BE LIABLE IN ANY WAY FOR LOSS OR DAMAGE OF ANY KIND RESULTING FROM THE USE OF THE SION PRODUCTS, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, LOSS OF EGGS, CHICKENS, CORNCOBS, PLANTS, ACCESSORIES, PARTS, PIECES, OR OBJECTS OF ANY KIND, LOSS OF GOODWILL, LOST INCOME, SIM PERFORMANCE INCLUDING LAG, PRODUCT GLITCHES OR MALFUNCTION, COMPUTER FAILURE OR MALFUNCTION, OR ANY AND ALL OTHER DAMAGES OR LOSSES. FURTHER, LICENSOR SHALL NOT BE LIABLE IN ANY WAY FOR THE LOSS OR DAMAGE TO PRODUCTS, DESIGNS, TEMPLATES, ARTWORK, SCRIPTS, PRICING AND OTHER INFORMATION STORED BY THE SION PRODUCTS. LICENSOR SHALL NOT BE RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY INTERRUPTIONS OF SERVICE, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, ROLLBACKS, RESTARTS, GRID CRASHES, OR ANY OTHER EVENT WHICH MAY RESULT IN A LOSS OF SION PRODUCTS OR ACCESSORIES LOST FROM IN WORLD, INVENTORY, OR OTHERWISE THE POSSESSION OF THE USER. IN NO EVENT WILL LICENSOR BE LIABLE TO YOU FOR ANY INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES.”

As evidence of an unfair and not truly binding attempt to off any responsibility to it’s consumer base, let’s look at a case we should all be familiar with, that of Bragg vs. Linden Lab, an infamous case that left the Judge branding Linden Labs own Terms of Service unfair and unbinding, which resulted in a total legal overhaul of them as there was nothing contained in those that protected you, the actual user of the product. Any contract has to present itself as a mutually beneficial agreement between two parties to protect their respective interests both fiscal and non-fiscal. Sions agreement only protects himself by simply removing you, or any expectations of service or responsibility from the equation. A big legal No-No. And as petty as it would play out, if anyone was unreasonably terminated, they now have substantial legal recourse on the basis of the aggressive, take-it-or-leave-it License that Sion is imposing on his consumers.

Perhaps even worse, and as the final nail in your coffin, he even states that he can even change the terms of his own agreement, including making drastic changes to the products as he did last week. Sadly, his EULA goes on to illustrate that if any changes he makes leaves you upset, or you disagree with his changes, he can blacklist you, your suspected alts, or even your partners. Nothing like incrimination by association here, folks. Take a look:

“Your acceptance and use of any updated or modified versions of Sion Products  or your continued use of the Sion Products following notice of changes to this Agreement as described above will mean you accept any and all such changes. Sion Labs may change, modify, suspend, or discontinue any aspect of the Sion Products at any time and for any reason or no reason at all. Sion Labs may also impose limits on certain features or restrict your access to parts or all of the Sion Products by blacklisting you and any known alts and/or partners without notice or liability. You have no interest, monetary or otherwise, in any feature or content contained in the Sion Products.”

Is this getting scary enough for you, not simply because of all the legal mumbo-jumbo but because you are actually getting quite the significant beat down. This type of business practice would be considered unethical in the real world. If Sion makes a major mistake and deletes all your chickens so you have to buy more eggs, or all your proteggtors are rendered useless because of an update, or your entire farm just vanishes into thin air because of negligence on his part? Tough chicken shit.

Perhaps the most disturbing pat of Sion’s EULA was his conclusion thats seek compensation from you, a user of his license, even if he has no proof or has suffered no damages. That means if your BFF Sally thinks you hit on her boyfriend and decides to tell Sion you are breaching his license, well, Sion can cut you off permanently, without proof that a breach of contract ever occurred. Based on even the most unsubstantiated claims and without any proof of incurred damages, he goes on to say he can sue you based on those as well. Oh yes, and the common caveat, the winner pays the others tab.  But, pay attention to the words “equitable remedies” .. it means he can demand money from you outside court if he suspects you are in breach of your contract. Take a breath and read this:

You hereby agree that Licensor would be irreparably damaged if the terms of this License Agreement were not specifically enforced, and therefore you agree that Licensor shall be entitled, without bond, other security, or proof of damages, to appropriate equitable remedies with respect to breaches of this License Agreement, in addition to such other remedies as Licensor may otherwise have available to it under applicable laws. In the event any litigation is brought by either party in connection with this License Agreement, the prevailing party in such litigation shall be entitled to recover from the other party all the costs, attorneys’ fees and other expenses incurred by such prevailing party in the litigation.

Sorry folks, this may be going a few steps to far in Sion’s case. Protecting your creations and your investment is one thing, but establishing a big profitable business as Sion has become and writing a EULA like this is simply predatory and exploitative. In my opinion, every content creator should take steps to protect their creations and hard work in virtual worlds, let there be NO question. But when a content creator is raking in money by the pound and decides to release a “Legal” license agreement that leaves him without any responsibility to you as a provider, then there is a gravely serious problem.

To reduce all the technical talk to baseline points:

• Sion can terminate your ability to own or sell any of his products if he believe you are in breach of his contract and requires no proof of such a breach or any proof of demonstrative damages whether or not an incident occurred.

• Sion can alter his products at any time he sees fit, including discontinuing them with no reason at all. If, as a result of a change, you suffer any losses, you have no recourse and he has released himself from any liability to you.

• Sion can terminate your ability to own and sell his products if you fail to update any of his products within 7 days of an update. He has also made a provision that will allow him to sue you if you fail to update in the allotted time.

• Sion can Blacklist you any of your alts or partners if he believes you are not complying with his License without notice or being held accountable for doing so.

• Sion can seek payment from you on his terms (Remember “Equitible remedies”) if he believes for any reason, without proof needed of the act or without needing to demonstrate any loss himself.

• Sion maintains no responsibility for the product in your hands despite owning it completely. It is essentially leased to you. He can do anything on the backend he likes including removing them from your inventory (By what means?) and from in-world without any reason whatsoever.

• Sion will never be held responsible for any losses (Monetary or product), even if it is his fault.

• Sion has attempted to make provisions so you, the consumer in good faith of his product, has no legal recourse against him. (That is the ilegal part.)

• Now, Sion can, in a fit of temperament as we saw last week, actually stop selling food, penalizing every user of his product, if he sees fit – without owing you anything or even as much as an explanation. His EULA means he can do as he wishes, commit any act of deliberate service interruption at anytime without having to answer for it or being held responsible!

• While Sion can’t stop you from suing him (for anybody who cares enough to do so,) his License Agreement is designed to cover him so that you can’t win, regardless of your demonstrative losses or claims, even if they are valid. This is the one-sided EULA issue that got Linden Lab into trouble and no court would honor such a EULA.

• Sion has attempted to eliminate ALL your rights as a consumer while eliminating his responsibilities to you as a Service provider. In essence, he wants your money, he wants continued ownership of his product that he is LEASING to you: He doesn’t want to be responsible for his own product or or any issues you have with it, nor does he want any obligation to you whatsoever.

This is a virtual world we’re talking about, folks, and while there are people this instant setting a benchmark for the protection of their digital creations and laws being instituted to support that in every country around the globe, this type of contract would never be upheld in real jurisdiction. It is all beneficial to Sion in the “Gain, Win, Gain” aspect, but you, the consumers, the spenders of your money, are being left vulnerable and riddled with unnecessary risk merely by participating.

Share your thoughts on this new EULA and how you feel about it. Is it fair in your eyes? Do you feel Sion took aggressive action because someone in a group chat threatened to sue him last week? Do you think that this will have an impact on teh chicken industry which was once so celebrated and innocent fun?