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Legal documents are not usually considered exciting,
inspiring or fun. The terminology can be
dense and difficult to penetrate, the concepts can be hard to grasp and, let’s
face it, there are a lot of words. But,
if you dive in, peel back the layers, and wade through the legalese you might realize
all those words are not so scary.
The terms of service agreement or TOS is
ever present in the digital realm. As a
UX designer knowing the ins and outs of the TOS, the purpose and meaning, is
imperative.
Beyond the Shock is an app for woman struggling to understand a
breast cancer diagnosis. My current project, Little C is for the
children of newly diagnosed women. The Terms of Service agreement for Beyond the Shock seems like a
good starting point. At first glance three main issues caught my
attention.
- Liability
- Access for children
- Content ownership and privacy
Let’s dig deeper.
1. Medical Information and Liability
Beyond the Shock was
developed in collaboration with medical practitioners; doctors, experts and
researchers. Even with this high level
of collaboration, providing medical advice is tricky. The app is being provided as a resource but, users
need to understand that they must not rely on the app for all of their
information. Users need to be sure to
consult with a physician. Therefore, the
medical disclaimer states clearly that this app is not to be
used in place of medical advice. Is the
purpose of this disclaimer to protect the app or the user?
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| Beyond the Shock Medical Disclaimer |
Immediately I wonder, how would this be
dealt with in an app for children? Camp
Quality has built an app for children dealing with childhood cancers,
the Kids Guide to Cancer. The top item
in their ‘site terms’? A medical disclaimer.
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| Excerpt from Camp Quality Terms of Service |
How is this relevant to Little C? The Little C stories are being developed to
help open the lines of communication for families but they are not medical advice
or therapeutic advice. They are stories,
to read together and inspire open discussion. The stories in Little C could be misconstrued
to be therapeutic advice and users may consider using this tool in lieu of
visiting a therapist. Clearly, medical implications
need to be considered.
Children under 13 are not allowed on Beyond
the Shock, period. This is the first
item in the Terms of Service agreement.
Apparently, they feel it is the most important detail.
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| Excerpt from Beyond the Shock Terms of Service |
This lead me to wonder, how does a site
that is geared to children deal with age restrictions? Enter Animal Jam and their ‘TOS’ page.
Animal Jam is a children’s game. Their primary audience is children and
definitely children under the age of 13.
Reviewing their 'TOS' document was very informative.
Instead of restricting the use of the app
to those over the age of 13 (not their target audience) they instead require ‘parental
consent’. Animal Jam even goes one step further
and not only asks for parental consent but requires ‘verified parental consent’,
without this, you are out.
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| Excerpt from Animal Jam "TOS" |
As a game, which requires a profile and
therefore a login, this is definitely a priority for Animal Jam. Little C will be a more passive experience. Requiring verified parental consent might be a
bit extreme but, alerting parents to the need for parental involvement will
definitely be necessary. Which brings me back to the question I already asked,
who is this protecting, the app or the user?
3. Content
Content is the big
one. The Terms of Service document for Beyond
the Shock is very clear on content ownership. They own everything! There are multiple statements regarding the
use of their content. Whether it is the
logo or images or text or, well pretty much anything they are clear that they
are the owners of the content and you cannot use it, in any way, unless they
say so.
Then they go a step further and take
ownership of anything that users post on their site. As a site that encourages sharing and
community building many users will post stories and content to their
website. Once they do this, Beyond the
Shock owns that content.
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| Excerpts from Beyond the Shock Terms of Service |
This seems a bit extreme. What’s mine is mine and what’s yours is mine
too?
The reason for taking ownership is likely a
desire to avoid litigation in the off chance they reuse this content anywhere
else on their website. The purpose is probably
not intended to be over reaching but the tone is definitely there.
Further to content ownership is the issue
of appropriate or acceptable contributions.
There is a great deal of detail as to what is appropriate and acceptable
to post. Not wanting to leave any room
for confusion, Beyond the Shock is very clear, over and over, again and again.
Finally, there is the issue of privacy. If users are posting personal information to
a website, whether it is simply login details or much more sensitive personal
stories, how will they know it is safe? The
Terms of Service document explains this very clearly. How data is collected
stored and protected is all covered.
So, going back to Animal Jam, how do they
deal with content, privacy and security?
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| Excerpts from Animal Jam "TOS" |
Very similarly to Beyond the Shock, Animal
Jam owns everything, you must post appropriately and be sure to guard your
privacy. Again, I ask, who is this
protecting, the user or the app?
How does all of this information impact the
development of Little C? Little C is not
an interactive community building space, kids will not be creating profiles and
posting content but, they may create images and post them to the community
gallery. What if someone thinks it would
be funny to post sexually explicit drawings?
Who will be there to provide oversight?
Privacy and security are not a huge concern for Little C, there will not
be collection of data or personal information but users may be directed out of Little C to third party websites so there would need to be some sort of a warning
in place.
Returning to my lingering question, who is
this protecting, the user or the app, I really feel it is more likely protecting
the app, not the user.
Including a statement on the home page which
informs families of the purpose of the website is a good start but, sadly a
full terms of service document might be needed to make sure that Little C does
not draw legal fire.
The impact of the need for a terms of
service document are twofold.
1.
I am not a lawyer and I am not
familiar with legal terminology. I would
likely need to hire a lawyer to at least review any document, which would mean
money. Increased costs incurred by the
hiring of a lawyer will impact the budget.
2.
A terms of service document
needs to be included in the website, this impacts the UX. Not a huge issue but something that needs to
be considered when developing the UI.
Where will it go? How will it be discovered?
The process of reviewing terms of service
documents can seem tedious but, it is an important step when developing a
project. Medical implications and
content implications are quite important.
It would be irresponsible to put something out into the digital universe
that is targeted at children without considering these very important issues.
