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agreement by proxy

A proxy server that "agrees" to stupid licensing agreements
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In the United States, the The Electronic Signatures in Global National Commerce Act recently took effect. According to this Act, activities in a gray area, like on-line licensing agreements, can now become valid, as clicking "ACCEPT" is construed as an agreement.

My idea is to create a proxy server that maintains the locations of these agreements on the web, or detects them. Typically, these agreements consist of a form with only two buttons with text like "I AGREE" and "I DO NOT AGREE", and possibly a text field containing the agreement. When the proxy server notices a page like this, it generates a POST indicating agreement, and returns the result of that page to the browser.

ipsin, Oct 25 2000

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       ... the idea being that since you didn't actually click the button, you aren't actually bound by the agreement? (One could argue that by installing such a proxy you implicitly agreed to be bound by *any* such agreement... but that would be a fairly weak argument.)   

       I find that in an amusingly large number of cases, the text field in question remains editable. I generally delete the text, replace it with a contract I like better, and happily click "ACCEPT".
egnor, Oct 26 2000
  
      
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