Whoever Reads the T&Cs Anyway?

Can a teacher enrol the whole class in an online service? Is she obliged to read the terms and conditions and legally agree on behalf of the students? What if the associated privacy policy sends data overseas? Should all the parents/guardians approve instead – and how long would that take? Copyright and copyleft concepts are contested, with each of them subject to disparate terms and conditions (T&Cs). With airlines, shops and even governments providing services online, these legal agreements pose an increasing burden on the populace. This paper traces the historical invention of copyright legislation, global agreements such as the Berne convention, and subsequent dissolution of that situation. The auto-ethnographic data from 48 online services over an entire year tracks the T&Cs presented to a single individual, and the estimated professional cost of their perusal. From these data can be deduced a AU$9b per annum cost burden to Australia alone, and a more global estimate can be made of the reading burden of such agreementsworldwide. This is important to busy teachers who provide access to online educational resources in their classrooms, since their time is particularly valuable.