<http://schema.org/articleBody>
"Quick, raise your hand if you actually read the terms of service and privacy policy at every web site you visit.  Yeah, that's okay \u2014 I don't either.  In fact, most people don't.  \nAnd the reason they don't is that web site terms and polices are generally long, often in confusing legalese, and would take the average person 8 days of reading to actually consume every one they come across in a single year (and that's actually just for privacy policies!).  So if reading all those terms and conditions is so unlikely in the first place, how is anyone expected to be able to keep track of the changes and updates that companies often make?\nToday, the Electronic Frontier Foundation is launching a new site called TOSBack, which monitors terms of service, user agreements, and privacy policies for many of the web's largest sites, including Amazon, Google, Facebook, MySpace, Flickr, and Apple.  In all, the site is currently tracking 44 policies for any sort of changes.\n\n\n\n\"Some changes to terms of service are good for consumers, and some are bad,\" said EFF Senior Staff Attorney Fred von Lohmann in a statement. \"But Internet users are increasingly trusting websites with everything from their photos to their 'friends lists' to their calendar \u2014 and sometimes even their medical information. TOSBack will help consumers flag changes in the websites they use every day and trust with their personal information.\"\nTools like TOSBack are ultimately a good thing for users, since they'll help them become more aware of their rights (or lack thereof) when using popular web sites and services.  Occasionally changes to web site policies are noticed, but more often users are never aware of potentially important changes to their legal relationship with the sites they use.\nIn February, Facebook made some very unpopular changes to its TOS and the user blowback actually caused the social network to revert to their previous terms, and even ask users vote on their new legal documents.  The Facebook case shows that when users are aware of changes to their rights on a web site, they have power to influence a company's decision making process if they're not happy.  TOSBack should be helpful in keeping users aware of changes and how they are affected."^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://mashable.com/2009/06/04/eff-tosback/>