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!!! New privacy policy seems to say PRIVATE MESSAGES may be PUBLISHED by MJ at any time !!!

Late Bloomer

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4(B). Permission to Use Content

.... Furthermore, by posting and submitting "Content" to TFF, either directly or indirectly, responding to posts, threads, private messages, or other means for providing "Content" to us, you grant us a perpetual, non-exclusive, fully paid, royalty-free, irrevocable, sublicenseable, worldwide license and right to display, use, perform, reproduce, modify, distribute and create derivative works of the Submission or information submitted in any media, publication, software, or technology of any kind now existing or developed in the future. You agree that we are free to use any "Content" posts, comments, information, ideas, concepts ....

It appears this literally says that MJ and his companies claim the right to read private messages, publish them, use any ideas contained in them to build new businesses, set them to a danceable tune that becomes the new viral pop music craze, etc. That's disconcerting. I request that "private messages" be removed from the policy statement; even Facebook doesn't claim the right to "publish and perform" the content of private messages.

I suspect this wasn't some privacy-hating underhanded intention, but just some legal boilerplate from someone else that has this unfortunate wording. I trust MJ to respect the privacy of users. My concern is that if he sells the forum or takes on business partners, they might be less ethical, including scraping/grabbing information users thought they were sharing individually, privately with other particular users only.

Not sure if GPDR mandates clarifying this when some users are European?
 
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Late Bloomer

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True, but is it any different than Facebook or Telegram?

Just a thought.

I dont think MJ has the time to sort through PM's all day looking for new ideas.

:bored:

I edited to clarify while you were responding. Actually, I'm pretty sure FB and Telegram don't claim the right to publish private messages. And I trust MJ, but he might sell the forum or sublicense some of the rights to others, who later turn out to have shaky ethics.
 

Argue

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I don't know. If you got something private to say and you trust them, then the workaround is simple. Just exchange cells or emails. Right?
Right... but how many people actually read the tos?

I agree it’s a boilerplate thing whatever but private messages should remain private.

Just my $0.02
 

Xeon

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lewj24

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Doesn't seem like a big deal. To me it looks more like he's covering both sides of his a$$ cheeks than trying to share your personal info. So if something did happen (whether he knew it or not) he's legally covered in case someone tries to sue him.

"OMG MJ stole my business idea I messaged him about! That's my money!" "OMG MJ wrote in his book that idea I told him about. He's making money off of me! I'm suing!"

The Commandment of Control in action. Take notes.
 

Fastlane Liam

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Hmm doesn't seem to bother me, I messaged someone on MJs site. The message is stored on his database. Maybe I just don't care.
 

eliquid

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Seriously?

How about you don't send something, you don't want others to know, in PM's?

Unless your selling state secrets, or the whereabouts of J Edgar Hover... I think you're going to be just fine.

Everything else is just BS.
 
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mtnman

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Well this was 30 seconds I'll never get back.

You seem to have too much time on your hands. Perhaps you should be working on something?

Btw, it's pretty naive to think anyone with root access to a server... eh nevermind.
 

MJ DeMarco

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First let me state that in the 10+ years of owning the forum I have NEVER, repeat NEVER, read anyone's private messages except in cases of error, that is explained here:

IMPORTANT! - Keep your PRIVATE MESSAGES... Private!

Second, there is no easy way for me to read anyone's private messages. To do so, I would have to hack into the database or hack passwords. Both require significant effort and time.

Third, this passage is not new. And it exists for my own personal private messages where I used to invest a lot of time and effort in responses to various inquiries, from "what do you think about this idea?" to success stories from readers. If I was spending hours and hours of time into responding, I wanted to use those responses in future books, or posts.

However, since I have shut down PM's (due to unmanageable volume), there probably isn't much need for this phrasing any longer, so I can investigate on removing it.
 
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Late Bloomer

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I don't know. If you got something private to say and you trust them, then the workaround is simple. Just exchange cells or emails. Right?

True, but this could affect people who are already using private conversations here to work on collaboration. Account info, pricing and cost details, customer details, business model details, technical settings details, code files, etc. could be flying back and forth between entrepreneurs who got to meet and trust each other through the forum, as a convenience to have those discussions within the same login here. If all of that info is no longer confidential, they should definitely use the message feature here only for light chit-chat, with anything substantial in a different offsite channel.
 

Late Bloomer

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First let me state that in the 10+ years of owning the forum I have NEVER, repeat NEVER, read anyone's private messages except in cases of error, that is explained here:

IMPORTANT! - Keep your PRIVATE MESSAGES... Private!

Second, there is no easy way for me to read anyone's private messages. To do so, I would have to hack into the database or hack passwords. Both require significant effort and time.

Third, this passage is not new. And it exists for my own personal private messages where I used to invest a lot of time and effort in responses to various inquiries, from "what do you think about this idea?" to success stories from readers. If I was spending hours and hours of time into responding, I wanted to use those responses in future books, or posts.

However, since I have shut down PM's (due to unmanageable volume), there probably isn't much need for this phrasing any longer, so I can investigate on removing it.

Thank you, MJ!

That makes a lot of sense. I've read that Hollywood agencies won't even open an envelope from someone that hasn't signed a standard disclaimer, which says the sender won't sue if they happen to think their idea was used by a studio. I can see how you'd face that same risk, when someone sends you a note about their business concepts, or a personal story about how you influenced their life.

I didn't think you'd waste your time reading anyone else's mail. But with GDPR going into effect now and the recent Facebook hearings, and the ability for sites to be sold, online privacy is a hot issue. I think these items in the news are a good reminder to take a close look at what terms actually say... both as a user, and for those who run sites, as vendors and webmasters.

Also, it's part of the standard Scripting of life to say, "Don't bother reading the fine print or terms. It's all meaningless anyway, or else it's there for your own good. Like everything from The Rule-making Authorities, none of it's ever negotiable, and nobody will both giving you an answer if you even ask." It seems some people who challenge Scripting in other areas of life, still accept it when it comes with an online account. Somehow if it's online and digital, following the Script is still the thing to do.

Thanks for looking into whether the clause can be tossed, now that you're off of private messages here.
 

Late Bloomer

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You seem to have too much time on your hands. Perhaps you should be working on something?

The same day I posted this, I wrote and sent a ten page proposal to be the outsourced marketing director for an ecommerce company, based on one founder's 200 page book which I read and annotated in the last two weeks. This proposal resulted in an immediate invitation to a conference call with the founders as soon as they're available. I also had some other productive activities. But, even if I didn't, ad hominem attacks aren't proof of anything, and weren't enough to dissuade MJ from deciding to respond. Perhaps he didn't have time to check with you about whether I'm busy enough so that others are able to choose to respond to the actual contents of what I asked about, rather than to someone else's speculations about my schedule.
 

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#landfill
 

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