Post-purchase EULA modification

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Main article: End user license agreement

Post-purchase end-user license agreement (EULA) modification is when the terms that govern a customer’s use of a product or service are modified after the initial purchase. Rejecting these contractual changes are often impossible without the consumer either losing access to the product or service they paid for^{[citation needed - give example]} or losing substantial functionality^{[citation needed - give example]}. In some cases, no ‘reject’ option is given, other than to power off the product and never use it again (such as the case of the Roku smart TV,^{[citation needed]}) or the deletion of an account (such as with PayPal^{[citation needed]} and Nintendo^{[citation needed]}).

EULA modifications may sometimes work in the consumer’s favor (such as Valve removing forced arbitration Steam's terms of service) or simply serve to clarify or correct terms in a reasonable way and which does not adversely affect the consumer.

Responses to, and defenses used for, post-purchase EULA modification

Many arguments intended to defend post-purchase EULA modification cite the legitimate reasons for such an action, as described above^{[citation needed]}. They argue that it would not be practical to maintain a long-running service without being able to occasionally change or clarify their terms. Others will attempt to defend their actions by deflecting from the issue, such as in [this] case, where Repairshopr defended their decision to alter their EULA to allow them to collect user interaction logs for AI training by simply pretending that they would never do such a thing, and acting as if there were no substantial changes to their EULA which would allow them to collect and process data in that way (of course, this was done without explicitly stating that no such change had occurred)^{[citation needed]}.

A common argument against the importance of this issue is that any user still needs to accept the changes^{[citation needed]} in order to be bound by the new EULA, and that the previous EULA may have included language stating that the company may alter the terms of the EULA after purchase. This argument, however, fails to account for the situation the user will typically find themselves in. In most cases, users are given a simple ‘tickbox’, without proper summarisation of the changes contained in the EULA update^{[citation needed]}. If the user does not accept this change, they will be unable to use the product which they purchased. Many users may simply accept the EULA changes in order to regain access to their product.

In extreme cases, companies may take a lack of action as consent, as was the case in this incident [link to that sock company thing], where non-response to an email was considered by the company to be appropriate consent for a change to the EULA^{[citation needed]}.

Particularly insidious examples of this practice include Adobe’s EULA changes, which required users to accept the use of their art and media for the training of AI, or face the loss of access to Adobe products^{[citation needed]}. It was felt by a number of prominent creative professionals that this amounted to a substantial changing of the ‘deal’ they were offered at the time of purchase, effectively amounting to the theft of their creative efforts, particularly for controversial issues such as AI training. Many creative professionals are deeply entrenched in the Adobe ecosystem, and would suffer substantial financial harm if they were to suddenly stop using Adobe products, as the time taken to learn alternative tools would directly correlate to lost work and payment. Combined with Adobe’s practice of charging a premium for the privilege of early subscription cancellation^{[citation needed]}, users who did not want their art used for AI training were unethically forced into choosing between their livelihood and their integrity.

Because of the nature of the agreements, legal professionals[who?] have argued that many cases of such contract changes are unenforceable when the users have not been properly informed of contractual changes, and those changes are beyond what would be expected in a typical contract of this type^{[citation needed]}. The reality for the average user, however, is that they cannot realistically challenge such a change, because of the costs involved with litigation, and instead must accept the choice they are offered: accept the new terms or lose the product or service they already own.

Types

Revoking perpetual license

Some companies change the language of their End-user license agreements to revoke the rights of the consumer for products they've paid for, such as revoking a perpetual license and, oftentimes, replacing it with a subscription model^{[citation needed - give example]}.

“License euthanasia” is the practice of revoking perpetual licenses under the pretext that the company is looking out for the user’s best interest by forcing them to update to a later version. This term was coined by consumer-rights advocate Louis Rossmann, who observed that Final Draft’s description of an older version of its software as being “of advanced age” “made it sound like they’re doing the kind thing” by putting old software out of its misery.

The viability of a lifetime license is dependent on the product's operational costs and its monetization plan.

Products that require recurring operational costs for their necessary advertised functions (backend service upkeep, staff involvement, etc.) can't function on their own without income. Lifetime license users may be serviced at a loss compared to subscription-based users who meet the recurring revenue operational cost demand. The price difference between a lifetime license and a subscription-based license only offsets the threshold of when a lifetime subscription customer becomes unprofitable to service.

Hidden EULA language

Main article: Hidden EULA language

The use of the colloquial term ‘EULA roofie’ stems from comparisons between the practice of hiding EULA terms, and the practice of spiking a drink – where consent is sought and given for the consumption of the drink, but not for the consumption of whatever it has been spiked with. The most common association with this term is when a company retroactively amends their terms to introduce forced arbitration, such as with Nintendo in advance of the release of the Nintendo Switch 2^{[citation needed]}.

Retroactive policy enforcement

Main article: Retroactive policy enforcement

Retroactive policy enforcement occurs when companies or platforms introduce new rules, policies, or enforcement mechanisms and apply them to agreements, content, or actions that predate the policy change. This practice has significant implications for consumers, ranging from loss of access to purchased goods or services, to privacy violations, and even irreversible consequences.

Legislative action

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See Also

• Retroactively amended purchase