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 Website Legal Terms 
 
 This Website is owned and provided by General Mills (including its affiliates) and is provided for your personal entertainment, information, and education. “Website” as used in these Terms of Use includes our pages and applications on third-party social-networking services such as Facebook or Twitter and our applications on mobile devices. Your use of this Website is subject to the following terms and conditions. Your use of the Website constitutes your acceptance of these terms and conditions and your agreement to be bound by them. If you do not agree to these terms, please do not use this Website or any services offered by this Website. 
 
 We reserve the right to change these terms and conditions at any time without notice. Please check back often to ensure you are aware of any updates or changes to these terms. 
 
 United States only 
 
 Unless otherwise specified, the materials in this Website are presented solely for the purpose of promoting products or programs available in the United States, its territories, possessions, and protectorates. We make no representation that materials in the Website are appropriate or available for use in other locations. If you access the Website from locations other than the United States, you are responsible for compliance with any applicable local laws. 
 
 Copyright and intellectual property policy 
 
 All names, logos, service marks, and trademarks appearing in this Website, including the trademarks, service marks, brand identities, characters, trade names, graphics, designs, copyrights, trade dress, and all other intellectual property ("Content"), except as otherwise noted, are protected intellectual property of, or used with permission or under license by, General Mills and its affiliates. This includes the entire Content of the Website, copyrighted and protected as a collective work. 
 
 The use or misuse of these trademarks or any other content on this Website, except as provided in these Terms of Use or in the Website content, is strictly prohibited. You may print copies of the information on this Website for your personal use, store the files on your computer for personal use, or reference this server from your own documents. However, you may not distribute text or graphics to others without our express written consent. Also, you may not, without our permission, copy and distribute this information on any other server, or modify or re-use text or graphics on this system or another system. We reserve all other rights. 
 
 Your use of the Website is limited to personal and non-commercial use only unless other uses are granted expressly to you. You may not copy, distribute, modify, transmit, reuse, re-post, or otherwise display the Website Content for public or commercial purposes without our written permission for such use of Content. You may not harvest or otherwise collect information about others, take any action that imposes an unreasonably large load on the Website’s servers, violate the security of the Website, or engage in any other conduct that exposes us or any of our users to any liability or potential harm. 
 
 General Mills respects the intellectual property of others, and we ask our users to do the same. General Mills has no responsibility for content on other websites that you may find or access when using General Mills’ products or services. Material available on or through other websites may be protected by copyright and the intellectual property laws of the United States and/or other countries. The terms of use of those websites, and not this Website’s Terms of Use, govern your use of that material. 
 
 It is General Mills’ policy, in appropriate circumstances and at its discretion, to disable and/or terminate the accounts of users who may infringe or repeatedly infringe the copyrights or other intellectual property rights of General Mills and/or others. 
 
 User submitted content 
 
 This Website may allow users to post text, images, audio, video, links to other sites, or other content to the Website. As a consequence, you may see materials that have been submitted to this Website by individuals not affiliated with General Mills. Neither General Mills nor any of its affiliates endorses these individuals nor are we in any way associated with any of the materials that they may post on this Website or link to from this Website. Neither General Mills nor its affiliates (nor their respective officers, employees, or agents) shall have any responsibility or liability of any nature whatsoever arising in connection with any materials provided by these individuals or in connection with any conduct of these individuals. 
 
 By submitting any content to this site, you understand and agree that you are giving us a royalty-free, irrevocable, non-exclusive and sublicenseable license to use, reproduce, publish, distribute, perform, display and creative derivative works from any such user submissions, in whole or in part, in any form (including for promotional or marketing purposes). You agree not to disparage, defame or otherwise seek to damage anyone or invade anyone’s rights through any submitted content. 
 
 Notice for claims of intellectual property violations and agent for notice 
 
 If you believe that your work has been copied in a way that constitutes copyright infringement, please provide General Mills’ Copyright Agent with the following information: 
 
 1. an electronic or physical signature of the person authorized to act on behalf of the owner of the copyright or other intellectual property interest; 
 
 2. a description of the copyrighted work or other intellectual property that you claim has been infringed; 
 
 3. a description of where the material that you claim is infringing is located on the Website, with enough detail that we may find it; 
 
 4. your address, telephone number, and email address; 
 
 5. a statement by you that you have a good faith belief that the disputed use is not authorized by the copyright or intellectual property owner, its agent, or the law; 
 
 6. a statement by you, made under penalty of perjury, that the above information in your Notice is accurate and that you are the copyright or intellectual property owner or authorized to act on the copyright or intellectual property owner's behalf. 
 
 General Mills’ Agent for Notice of claims of copyright or other intellectual property infringement can be reached as follows: 
 
 By mail 
 
 Copyright Agent 
 
 c/o General Mills, Inc. 
 
 Number One General Mills Blvd 
 
 Minneapolis, MN 55426 
 
 By phone 
 
 (800) 248-7310 
 
 By fax 
 
 (763) 764-2268 
 
 Disclaimer 
 
 Without limiting the foregoing, everything on the Website is provided to you "AS IS" WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND EITHER EXPRESSED OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE OR TITLE AND NON-INFRINGEMENT. ADDITIONALLY, WE DO NOT WARRANT THAT THE WEBSITE(S) OR THE SERVERS MAKING THE SITE(S) AVAILABLE ARE VIRUS FREE. We do not warrant that the functions contained in these materials will be uninterrupted or error free, that defects will be corrected, or that this Website or the server that makes it available are free of viruses or other harmful components. We do not warrant or make any representations regarding the use or the result of the use of the materials in this Website in terms of their correctness, accuracy, reliability, or otherwise. 
 
 Your use of the Website is at your risk. Neither General Mills nor any of its affiliates will be liable for any damages including direct, indirect, incidental, consequential, or punitive damages, arising out of your access to or use of the Website and however caused, whether in contract or tort. If you become dissatisfied in any way with this Website or its Terms of Use or Privacy Policy, your sole and exclusive remedy is to stop using this Website and its services. (Some states do not allow the disclaimer of implied warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages, so these provisions may not apply to you. If any portion of these limitation on liability is found to be invalid or unenforceable for any reason, then the aggregate liability of General Mills and its affiliates shall not exceed one hundred dollars ($100).) 
 
 Links 
 
 This Website may contain Links allowing you to leave this Website for other sites that are not under our control. We are not endorsing any such Linked sites. We are not responsible for the contents or transmission of any Linked Site or any Link contained in a Linked Site or for ensuring that the Linked Sites are error and virus free. Nor are we responsible for the terms of use or privacy practices of such sites. We encourage you to carefully read the policies of each site you visit. 
 
 Submitted ideas 
 
 All comments, suggestions, ideas, notes, drawings, concepts, recipes or other information disclosed or submitted to us by you through this Website or in response to solicitations in this Website (“Submitted Ideas”) shall be and shall remain our property. You understand and acknowledge that we have both internal and external resources which may have developed or may in the future develop ideas or other items identical to or similar to the Submitted Ideas and that we are only willing to consider the Submitted Ideas on these terms. In any event, no Submitted Idea is submitted in confidence and we assume no obligation, express or implied by considering the Submitted Idea. Without limitation, we shall exclusively own all now known or hereafter existing rights to the Submitted Ideas of every kind and nature throughout the Universe and shall be entitled to unrestricted use of the Submitted Ideas for any purpose whatsoever, commercial or otherwise without compensation to the provider of the Submitted Ideas. 
 
 Choice of law and enforcement 
 
 Your access to the Website as well as the terms and conditions and the agreement they create are governed and interpreted by the laws of the United States without regard for conflict of laws provisions. 
 
 Agreeing to terms 
 
 If you do not agree to these Terms of Use or the privacy policy posted on the Website, please do not use this Website or any services offered by this Website. We reserve the right to make changes to these terms at any time. Please check back from time to time to ensure you are aware of any updates or changes. Your use of our Website indicates acceptance of all terms. 
 
 Contact Information 
 
 You may contact us with any comments. ||||| AT&T Mobility v. Concepcion, 563 U.S. 333 (2011), is a legal dispute that was decided by the United States Supreme Court.[1][2] On April 27, 2011, the Court ruled, by a 5–4 margin, that the Federal Arbitration Act of 1925 preempts state laws that prohibit contracts from disallowing class-wide arbitration, such as the law previously upheld by the California Supreme Court in the case of Discover Bank v. Superior Court.[3] As a result, businesses that include arbitration agreements with class action waivers can require consumers to bring claims only in individual arbitrations, rather than in court as part of a class action.[4]:708–09 The decision was described by Jean Sternlight as a "tsunami that is wiping out existing and potential consumer and employment class actions"[4]:704 and by law professor Myriam Gilles as "the real game-changer for class action litigation". By April 2012, Concepcion was cited in at least 76 decisions sending putative class actions to individual arbitration. After the decision, several major businesses introduced or changed arbitration terms in their consumer contracts (some of which were based on the consumer-friendly terms found in the AT&T Mobility agreement), although the hypothesis of massive adoption of consumer arbitration clauses following the decision has been disputed. 
 
 Facts [ edit ] 
 
 In 2006, Vincent and Liza Concepcion sued AT&T Mobility over contract, contending that the cell phone company had engaged in deceptive advertising by falsely claiming that their wireless plan included free cell phones. Their suit became a class action. AT&T asked the U.S. District Court for Southern California to dismiss the suit, because AT&T's contract required the Concepcions to submit any disputes to individual arbitration rather than filing any class action lawsuits. 
 
 Unlike other arbitration agreements, AT&T Mobility's arbitration agreement was designed to facilitate the pursuit of small claims in arbitration. The arbitration agreement provided that AT&T Mobility would pay the entire cost of arbitration (unless the claim was determined to be frivolous). The arbitration would take place in the county where the consumer was located, by telephone, or through document submission, and forms for the arbitration were made available on AT&T Mobility's website. The arbitrator was not limited in the damages it could award to a consumer, and if the consumer received an award greater than AT&T Mobility's last written settlement offer, the award would be increased to $7,500, and the consumer would be entitled to double attorney's fees. This led the United States District Court for the Southern District of California to state that arbitration under AT&T Mobility's agreement was "quick, easy to use, and prompts full or, as described by Plaintiffs, even excess payment to the customer without the need to arbitrate or litigate." 
 
 Nevertheless, the district court declined to dismiss the suit, ruling that California law prohibits contracts that unfairly exculpate one party from its wrongdoing, such as clauses that do not allow class action lawsuits alleging fraud in consumer adhesion contracts where the individual damages are small. AT&T appealed the case, saying that the Federal Arbitration Act should preempt state law. On October 27, 2009, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the lower court decision. AT&T, represented by Andrew J. Pincus of Mayer Brown, then appealed to the Supreme Court.[5][6] After the Supreme Court granted review, appellate lawyer Deepak Gupta of Washington, D.C. was brought in to help represent the Concepcions and to argue the case in the Supreme Court on their behalf. 
 
 The Court heard oral arguments on November 9, 2010.[2][7] Justices Scalia and Sotomayor questioned Pincus (attorney for AT&T Mobility) about when unconscionability doctrines are made under state law.[8] Pincus argued that the California law was not being applied uniformly. Scalia challenged that assertion when he asked, "Are we going to tell the State of California what it has to consider unconscionable?".[9] Other justices questioned different procedural issues arising from the unconscionability discussion and the scope of the rule AT&T was proposing. Deepak Gupta, representing the Concepcions, argued that the contract AT&T imposed on Respondents was clearly unfair. He asserted that state law should be a guidepost in these questions. Some of his arguments drew criticism from Chief Justice John Roberts. Gupta concluded by arguing that California "has made a judgment that if you preclude class-wide relief... that will gut the State's substantive consumer protection laws..."[9] 
 
 Judgment [ edit ] 
 
 The majority opinion was written by Justice Antonin Scalia, and joined by Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Anthony Kennedy, Clarence Thomas, and Samuel Alito. "Requiring the availability of classwide arbitration interferes with fundamental attributes of arbitration," Scalia wrote. "We find it hard to believe that defendants would bet the company with no effective means of review, and even harder to believe that Congress would have intended to allow state courts to force such a decision."[10][11] Justice Scalia focused on the impact California's unconscionability law was having on arbitration clauses - since the rule was invalidating a large proportion of arbitration agreements, the rule must violate the policy in favor of arbitration.[12] Therefore, it was preempted by the FAA. 
 
 Justice Stephen Breyer dissented, joined by Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Sonia Sotomayor, and Elena Kagan. Breyer stated that class arbitrations are appropriate ways to resolve claims that are minor individually but significant in the aggregate. "Where does the majority get its contrary idea — that individual, rather than class, arbitration is a fundamental attribute of arbitration?" He said that without class actions, minor frauds would not be remedied. "What rational lawyer would have signed on to represent the Concepcions in litigation for the possibility of fees stemming from a $30.22 claim?"[10][11] 
 
 Significance [ edit ] 
 
 Concepcion has been widely criticized in academic literature,[13] and calls for its reversal through an Arbitration Fairness Act have been made. Following Concepcion, many businesses introduced or renewed motions to move pending lawsuits to arbitration. In September 2011, J. Russell Jackson described the Supreme Court's ruling in Concepcion as "the decision that has launched a thousand motions", as defendants sought to compel arbitration of cases that had been pending "for some time", especially in California.[14] In April 2012, Public Citizen published a list of 76 putative class actions where a court cited Concepcion in granting a motion to compel individual arbitration.[15][16]:32–33 University of Kansas law professor Christopher Drahozal wrote that the Public Citizen statistic overstated the impact of Concepcion, as several decisions applied state law that permitted class action waivers prior to Concepcion.[17]:156–57 Cardozo law professor Myriam Gilles wrote that the Concepcion decision had a greater impact on class actions than Wal-Mart v. Dukes, since Concepcion allowed businesses to avoid class actions by including arbitration clauses in boilerplate terms.[18] 
 
 The Concepcion decision also impacted the usage of arbitration clauses in consumer contracts, including the usage of "consumer-friendly" arbitration terms like the ones in AT&T's agreement. Jean Sternlight said that the Concepcion decision would cause businesses to include arbitration clauses with class action waivers, saying that the Concepcion decision removed the possibility of "costly litigation" over whether such terms are enforceable.[4]:718 In a 2012 research paper, Gilles wrote that the majority opinion in Concepcion led to a "race to the top" in implementing arbitration procedures that are more friendly to consumer claims and more likely to allow their vindication.[19]:828 Gilles wrote that corporate lawyers encouraged companies to implement terms similar to the ones used by AT&T Mobility and upheld in Concepcion.[19]:844–45 According to Gilles, many large consumer-oriented businesses changed their arbitration provisions in 2011 and 2012.[19]:853 However, Gilles noted that only 6 out of the 37 companies she examined had arbitration clauses that "offered anything close to AT&T's set of incentives, and none were quite as generous".[19]:853 Ann Marie Tracey and Shelley McGill wrote that businesses would introduce more consumer-unfriendly terms in their arbitration clauses since unconscionability "provided strong motivation for business to draft agreements fairly in the pre-Concepcion environment; that motivation does not exist in the post-Concepcion era."[20]:466 Suzanna Sherry said that the broad holding of the decision would make harsh arbitration clauses, similar to the earliest consumer arbitration clauses, enforceable, since the unconscionability doctrine that had been used to strike down those harsh clauses could be found preempted based on Concepcion.[21] 
 
 Several large businesses introduced arbitration provisions after Concepcion, and several companies' addition of arbitration clauses was reported by the media to have been prompted by the Supreme Court's ruling in Concepcion. According to a September 2011 CNN article, a Sony spokesperson said that Sony added an arbitration clause to its PlayStation Network terms of service because "[t]he Supreme Court recently ruled in the AT&T case that language like this is enforceable".[22] PCWorld writer Jared Newman cited Sony and Microsoft as examples of companies that took advantage of Concepcion to add arbitration agreements with class action waivers.[23] Drahozal and University of Georgia law professor Peter B. Rutledge wrote that Sony and Netflix added arbitration provisions following data breach class action litigation.[24]:1000[25] Other companies reported to have added arbitration provisions to their consumer contracts after Concepcion include Umpqua Bank, Valve, eBay, PayPal, Instagram, and StubHub.[24]:1001 American Arbitration Association Senior Vice President Richard Naimark said that a number of companies increased their usage of consumer arbitration after Concepcion, while before Concepcion, the number of consumer arbitrations administered by the AAA had been declining.[26]:10:17:50 Rutledge and Drahozal wrote that the adoption of arbitration in franchise contracts did not significantly increase after Concepcion or American Express Co. v. Italian Colors Restaurant, a case decided in 2013 that closely followed Concepcion, casting doubt on the hypothesis that Concepcion would cause businesses to adopt arbitration en masse.[24]:955–56 In November 2015, Stephen L. Carter wrote that although he and other critics had predicted that businesses would introduce "increasingly burdensome and one-sided arbitration clauses", "this hasn't happened".[27] 
 
 See also [ edit ] 
 
 US contract law 
 
 US labor law 
 
 Magna Carta 1215 clause 40, "To no one will we sell, to no one will we refuse or delay, right or justice." 
 
 Notes [ edit ] 
 
 References [ edit ] 
 
 Ewan McGaughey, 'Fascism-Lite in America (or the social idea of Donald Trump)' (2018) British Journal of American Legal Studies 
 
 M Finkin, 'Workplace Justice: Does Private Judging Matter?' (2014) Zeitschrift für Vergleichende Rechtswissenschaft 2/2014 ||||| General Mills updated their online Privacy Policy to say that anyone who’s received any benefit from them — even downloading an online coupon, or liking their Facebook page — can’t sue them. Instead, they must settle any disputes about the purchase or use of any of their products in forced arbitration. Is this legal? 
 
 According to a 2011 Supreme Court ruling — yes. It is. The case AT&T Mobility v. Concepcion gave companies the right to stop customers from joining together for class-action lawsuits by including language in the contracts they sign. Check your phone contract. There’s likely something in there telling you you can’t sue your provider. 
 
 Here’s the exact language from the General Mills Privacy Policy update: 
 
 • New provisions relating to any disputes. These new provisions contain an agreement to resolve any and all disputes you may have with General Mills or any of its affiliated companies or brands contain through informal negotiations and, if these negotiations fail, through binding arbitration. This includes disputes related to the purchase or use of any General Mills product or service. All arbitrations will be conducted on an individual basis; you may not arbitrate as a member of a class. Claims may not be brought in court (with the limited exception of small claims court in certain circumstances), nor may you participate in any class action litigation. (See Section 3, “Binding Arbitration.”) • New provisions about how you become bound by these legal terms and how you can opt out of them. Your use of any of our sites or services, or participation in any other General Mills offering, means that you are agreeing to these Legal Terms. You may terminate this agreement at time by notifying us by email of your intent to do so, but only if you also cease to participate in any of our offerings. (For details, see Section 1, “Your Agreement to these Terms” and Section 2, “Duration of this Agreement; Your Right to Terminate.”) 
 
 As General Mills also points out, these are only “brief summaries of some of the significant changes to the Privacy Policy and Legal terms.” 
 
 The key bit is in the second paragraph: “You may terminate this agreement at time by notifying us by email of your intent to do so, but only if you also cease to participate in any of our offerings.” We couldn’t find a contact email for General Mills, but there is an online form to email them here. They do note that emailing them isn’t enough. You also have to “cease to participate in any of our offerings.” They outline what exactly that means in their Legal Terms which can be read on their site. 
 
 Here’s the relevant section: 
 
 1. Your agreement to these legal terms These terms are a binding legal agreement (“Agreement”) between you and General Mills. In exchange for the benefits, discounts, content, features, services, or other offerings that you receive or have access to by using our websites, joining our sites as a member, joining our online community, subscribing to our email newsletters, downloading or printing a digital coupon, entering a sweepstakes or contest, redeeming a promotional offer, or otherwise participating in any other General Mills offering, you are agreeing to these terms. Of course, your decision to do any of these things (i.e., to use or join our site or online community, to subscribe to our emails, to download or print a digital coupon, to enter a sweepstakes or contest, to take advantage of a promotional offer, or otherwise participate in any other General Mills offering) is entirely voluntary. But if you choose to do any of these things, then you agree to be bound by this Agreement. 
 
 General Mills notified customers by adding a small gray banner to the top of their page today. I looked at their Facebook page for Lucky Charms, and there’s no mention of the change despite the new language applying to any of the General Mills brands. General Mills themselves doesn’t seem to have a Facebook page. Facebook has generated an automatic place holder for the brand with their Wikipedia page and a few related pages. 
 
 (General Mills via The New York Times, image via General Mills) 
 
 Meanwhile in related links
– If you've "liked" a company on Facebook, downloaded its coupons, or really in any way interacted with it online, you might have inadvertently given up your right to sue it. The New York Times spotted new language in the privacy policy on General Mills' website indicating that customers who did any of those things were agreeing to settle any disputes they might have with the company via arbitration. When the Times asked about it, the company doubled down, adding new text suggesting that anyone who so much as purchased Cheerios was agreeing to the same thing. (A new gray bar atop the site reads in part, "Please note we also have new Legal Terms which require all disputes related to the purchase or use of any General Mills product or service to be resolved through binding arbitration.") The Supreme Court opened the door for this maneuver when it ruled, in 2011's AT&T v. Concepcion, that companies could forbid class-action lawsuits in the contracts their customers sign, and many companies are moving to take advantage. "Although this is the first case I’ve seen of a food company moving in this direction, others will follow—why wouldn’t you?" said a rep from a trial lawyers trade group. "It's essentially trying to protect the company from all accountability." General Mills defends the practice as simply an "efficient way to resolve disputes." Geek-O-System has a detailed breakdown of the policy language.