This week, in The Virtual Whirl, I'd like you to join me as I take a stab at a virtual environment user's bill of rights. It's a perennial topic given that service operators have a very unbalanced power relationship with users.
I don't believe that users should make unreasonable demands or boss their VE providers around, but certainly there's a list of things that I believe are important to look for in a general purpose virtual environment, and that the lack of one or more of them should certainly get you thinking about alternatives.
Clear terms and plain speaking
Plain, simple, unambiguous English terms in policies and agreements. The operator should say what they mean, no more and no less. Expecting a user to click through without reading (while common) is unreasonable, and so is 30,000 words of legalese. A glossary is okay, but keep it short.
You, the user, should never be in doubt as to your rights and obligations with a service; nor should you require an attorney to help you figure them out. If you can't remember something particular it should only take you moments to find it. It shouldn't require a grand expedition with interpreters.
No excuses for gross negligence
Error is excusable. Mistakes happen. Even failure to perform to a reasonable standard can be forgivable. However failure to even make a reasonable attempt is inexcusable.
Your intellectual property remains yours
This cuts both ways. You should carefully respect the copyrights, trademarks and intellectual property rights of others. At the same time, the operator should maintain easy-to-use contacts for intellectual property infringement notifications (not just copyrights, but trademarks as well) and respond to them no less promptly and reasonably than the operator would expect it of you, the user.
In most cases, the operator is the party who can take the most effective action, and in any intellectual property dispute will always wind up involved eventually. The operator should never assert stronger rights to their trademarks and copyrights than the rights they allow you to exercise over your own.
If the operator terminates your agreement/cancels your account, then they terminate your content.
If you cancel your account, it's reasonable that the operator maintain your content that has been onsold to other users. On the other hand, if the operator terminates your account, it is unreasonable for them to expect to continue to hold the value of your extant content. "We refuse to continue providing you with service, but we still want to get value from the things you made" is not reasonable.
The classic concept of intellectual property piracy is when your publisher cuts you off while still profiting from what you've created. Terminating your account without terminating your content is no different. Ban both or neither, but the operator shouldn't try to have your cake and eat it too.
Advance notice for new features
At least three months – and preferably six. You, the user, can spend hundreds of hours and thousands of dollars creating and developing content and business models, which the operator can effectively void in a single software update. The sooner you are notified of what to expect, the less money and time you waste in development.
Users and operators exploit the same deficiencies in platform code, features and facilities to develop features and establish revenue streams, so the two wind up in silent competition more often than not. New features should never be sudden and never, ever be a surprise.
Fairness
The user should never have to surrender a right, meet an obligation, or be subject to a liability that the operator is not willing to match. What's good for the goose is good for the gander, right?
Where there are codes of conduct, those codes should extend to the operator's staff – a parity that is sadly lacking in many places.
A reasonable expectation of privacy
Users should have a reasonable expectation of privacy. The operator should make reasonable efforts to ensure that personal and financial details of users are not accidentally or maliciously revealed.
A reasonable freedom of expression and speech
While any global operation has a wide variety of laws and standards with respect to expression and speech, the operator should not unduly interfere beyond reasonable limitations, except where it conflicts with other rights.
A reasonable expectation of liberty, use and enjoyment
The operator should enforce rules and codes of conduct swiftly and effectively insofar as is reasonably possible, as well as providing tools to allow users to assist themselves in limiting their exposure to harassment, spam, griefing and negative experiences. Rules in and of themselves do not provide significant deterrent; they must be followed through.
Sometimes it is necessary for the operator to impose unusual conditions or restrictions to comply with regulation or to keep the service operating for its users. Users generally understand this, if it is clearly explained.
Respect
Except where they are actually children, users are not children. The operator should be honest, open and forthright, and not engage in misdirection, condescension or deceit. Technically true statements that together imply misleading conclusions are to be avoided.
So, there you have my take on a basic bill of rights. Obviously, these are intended to extend whatever rights and guarantees the law would provide you for any equivalent non-virtual service, rather than replacing them.
Personally, I think they're straightforward and make good business sense. Over time, if an operator doesn't provide rights like these, then users will ultimately migrate to some operator that will.
Of course, the list may not be complete and you may quite rightly think that it is not correct. What would you add? What would you remove?
