Dropbox has updated its T&C and a simple way to describe the update is that – it’s damn scary (and its anti-cloud):
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. [source]
That is, Dropbox will also ‘own’ your data and by using the service, you grant them the right to copy, distribute, prepare derivative works of your data (even though for file conversion) to the extent reasonably necessary for the Service.
How do you define reasonably necessary for the Service?
This is the last thing an individual would like to hear from a cloud service provider – i.e. your data is just not yours, but actually belongs to your service provider.
Look at it – a lot of service providers use Dropbox to share WIP/documents with their clients – and all of this is supposed to be a ‘private’ conversation. But Dropbox’s new T&C will now force them to think of a private cloud service, which is free from these legal bindings.
Dropbox was recently in news for the access f****up and the new T&C will just have many people drop out of the box.
What do you think?