Vultr Tries to Grab Copyrights for Material Hosted on Its Hardware
canopic jug writes:
The hosting provider Vultr had tried to quietly change its Terms of Service (TOS) to try to pull the same trick which Microsoft has pulled with its GitHub project and hope that no one would notice. That is to say they are trying to grab "perpetual, irrevocable" license to use content hosted there in any way, including modifying it and commercializing it "for purposes of providing the Services to you." They've since backpedaled - but only a little. Most the reaction from Vultr regarding the negative push back has been spin.
I suppose the hip kids would say this is enshittification, but it's certainly a betrayal.
According to their new Terms of Service:
You hereby grant to Vultr a non-exclusive, perpetual, irrevocable, royalty-free, fully paid-up, worldwide license (including the right to sublicense through multiple tiers) to use, reproduce, process, adapt, publicly perform, publicly display, modify, prepare derivative works, publish, transmit and distribute each of your User Content, or any portion thereof, in any form, medium or distribution method now known or hereafter existing, known or developed, and otherwise use and commercialize the User Content in any way that Vultr deems appropriate, without any further consent, notice and/or compensation to you or to any third parties, for purposes of providing the Services to you.
This is unacceptable. No other hosting company does this.
- Vultr Just Betrayed Us, Michael W Lucas' blog.
And
This is very similar to changes thatGithub made to their TOS in 2017.Since then, Github has beenrebranded as "The world's leading AI-powered developer platform".The language in their TOS now clearly lets them use content stored inGithub for training AI. (Probably this is their second line ofdefense if the current attempt to legitimise copyright launderingvia generative AI fails.)
Vultr is currently in damage control mode, accusing their concernedcustomers of spreading "conspiracy theories"(-- founder David Aninowsky)and updating the TOS to remove some of the problem language.Although it still allows them to "make derivative works",so could still allow their AI division to scrape VPS imagesfor training data.
- the vulture in the coal mine, Joey Hess' blog.
Hosting providers seem to be adding a new disaster to deal with.
Previously:
(2022) Give Up GitHub: The Time Has Come!
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