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Comment by q2 | Hacker News Reader

If this is the standard boilerplate, then standard needs to be changed :). Why a "pure" storage service needs to do following?

1. "reproduce, modify, create derivative works (such as those resulting from translations, adaptations or other changes we make so that your content works better with our Services), communicate, publish, publicly perform, publicly display and distribute such content."

2. Why they should have data even after we stop using their Services?

Users may want just storage but no integration/lock-in with their services. Google can offer "opt-in/opt-out" mechanism from their services. Is n't it?

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1. might be for automatically creating a .pdf from a .doc file at a URL you can then share with others. The doc->pdf conversion falls under the "reproduce, modify, create derivative works" legalese, and the URL creation that others can access through the autogenerated "secret" (which isn't, legally, it's public) falls under the "communicate, publish..." legalese. I'm taking this explanation from a similar one that Dropbox themselves (IIRC) published about their own terms of service that had users outraged!

However, I fully agree with you about the suspicious point 2.

This is CYA boilerplate for all services and sounds worse than it is.

1. Reproduce = spread your data on multiple regions/drives/computers/etc inside their data storage systems Modify = format changes Create derivative works = automatic translation, format changes etc publish = show your files to people publicly perform = show your files to people (for video) publicly display = show your files to people (images) distribute = show your files to people

2. Because their datacenter cannot delete files instantly, another CYA point that prevents people from unsubscribing and suing if their files don't disappear the same instant they click the button.

All of that is just shitty legalese that attempts to prevent frivolous lawsuits, and every time some engineer takes it literally and assumes the worst.

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