I’ve been reviewing all of the hardware / software services that we use and reviewing their Terms of Conditions that we have to accept in order to take advantage of said services. Square, a credit card processor that I signed up for a while ago, just sent me a notification of update. Now, I had originally signed up so that we could take credit card payments at various locations – put a mag stripe dongle into my phone, download the app, and off we go. However, based how things have gone this past year or so, it has remained unused. However, I decided to take a look as Square has become a “Woke” company and I wanted to see if we, being a Conservative site and not bowing to the SJW nonsense now flitting around, were at risk if we had to count on their services and they told us “NO – you, being a Conservative site, have already violated our terms of services because you’re a Person of Pallor mentality and won’t agree with us on Morality”.
Or something stupid like that. And, of course, I found the “vagueness” in the update that would allow them to “nail” us:
You will not upload or provide Content or otherwise post, transmit, distribute, or disseminate through the Services any material that: (a) is false, misleading, unlawful, obscene, indecent, lewd, pornographic, defamatory, libelous, threatening, harassing, hateful, abusive, or inflammatory;
At this point in time, “hateful”, in the public parlance of the Left, covers a whole range of stuff, including:
- Upholding natural marriage is between a man and a woman
- That one’s sex and gender are determined at conception (and not that gawd awful “assigned at birth” as if some clerk with a clipboard is hunched over watching every birth)
- Disagree with the current racist idea that
- Saying that All Lives Matter instead of hewing to the Marxist one
- Demanding that voters show an ID in order to vote is raacist.
- That all White people are racists anyways – and oppressors simply due to the color of their skin
- And refuse to bow down to the Left’s demand that we should embrace and acknowledge our White Guilt and Fragility.
- The Presidential Election was stolen (even as Windham, NH has found inconsistencies with their Dominion machines and the State is doing an audit
There’s plenty more but you get the idea. But here’s the other thing I discovered that I don’t know – Square is acting like in a fascist manner (eg. in part, taking over control over the means of production and intellectual capital from its owners); reformatted, emphasis mine:
5. Your Content
You retain all rights to your content when you upload it into our services, but you do give us broad rights to use, modify, display your content in our services. You can see specifics on the rights you grant us below.
Also, anything you provide us or make available to the public through our services must not contain anything that we think is objectionable (e.g., illegal, obscene, hateful or harmful to you, our customers or us). We can remove any content at any time.
The Services may include functionality for uploading or providing suggestions, recommendations, feedback, stories, photos, documents, logos, products, loyalty programs, promotions, advertisements and other materials or information (“Content”).
And this is quite the scream:
You grant us and our subsidiaries, affiliates, and successors a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free, fully-paid, transferable, irrevocable, perpetual, and sub-licensable right to use, reproduce, modify, adapt, publish, prepare derivative works of, distribute, publicly perform, and publicly display your Content throughout the world in any media for any reason, including to provide, promote, and/or incorporate into the Services.
From my unlawyerly eyes, that basically says that while you own your Content, we can use it for whatever reason we want. In short, they’ve done a taking of your stuff for any reason they can think of. This is the absolute definition of Fascism – ownership of a thing is irrelevant if you have almost full control of that thing.
Like Square is telling everyone that cares:
You retain all rights in your Content, subject to the rights you granted to us in these General Terms. You may modify or remove your Content via your Square Account or by terminating your Square Account, but your Content may persist in historical, archived or cached copies and versions thereof available on or through the Services.
…
Although we have no obligation to monitor any Content, we have absolute discretion to remove Content at any time and for any reason without notice. Square may also monitor such Content to detect and prevent fraudulent activity or violations of Square’s General Terms. You understand that by using the Services, you may be exposed to Content that is offensive, indecent, or objectionable. We take no responsibility and assume no liability for any Content, including any loss or damage to any of your Content.
And then talk directly out of the other side of their mouths:
6. Copyright and Trademark Infringement
We respect the intellectual property rights of others and ask you to do the same. We have adopted an Intellectual Property Policy regarding third-party claims that your material infringes the rights of others. We respond to all valid notices of such infringement, and our policy is to suspend or terminate the accounts of repeat infringers.
But THEY can use YOURS any time, in any way, in Perpetuity, as they please.
Time to find a new service. And yes, we are starting to see, not just a political splitting of American into two political camps (Progressive/Woke vs Conservative/Libertarian) but economically as the Left has continued its century Long March through all of our institutions – and now are at the verge of capturing the Economics / Corporation ramparts. But we are seeing, because of it, a rise on the Right to replicate some of those services.
Almost like a “divorce in place” in which two spouses still share the same house and bed (but the Left keeps emptying the refridgerator and refusing to restock it and yanking the blankets away all night long).
