The USER's Guide to X's Terms of Service: What You Need to Know About Ownership, AI, and "Everything Nice"

This is not a writing about X-men 97. I recently watched a couple of episodes of it and i immediately thought of it as the thumbnail to this post. I do recommend you watch it (not a paid promotion), its what i call a pretty watch, colorful and just nostalgic feeling. I digress.

You know that section at the bottom of the sign up page where you tick that says "i agree to the terms and condition", yup that is what we will look at with this one. We will breack down the clauses of the terms of services and rules of X formerly known as Twitter. We will doing a couple of these in the coming weeks but i figures starting with X is appropriately sinces it one of the platform the author uses.

The idea for this blog post came about from the production of the previous blog post about a sports betting company enforcing the provisions of its terms and conditions against the users of their platform. For ease of reference see The Glitch Giveth, and the Court Taketh Away: How 160 'Lucky' Gamblers Lost Their R13 Million Free Ride- Its an interesting read. Anyway i thought about what really do we bind ourselves to when we use these social media platforms like X. And thats how we ended up here. Let begin

1. INTRODUCTION: X TERMS OF SERVICE- A QUICK SUMMARY

   Social media has become such an everyday piece of our everyday lives that we dont realize that by using it, we have entered into a commercial transaction wherein we agree with the social media platform to the rights and obligation that exist between the user and the platform. That box we thick when we sign up agreeing to the terms and condition, without reading their implications to my life is the contract we entere into with the platform. I took the time to go through the terms of service or X and the Rules of Use and i am here to tell, your contractual relationship with these platforms goes beyound just being a user.

   
   

   The terms of services touch on Who may use the Service, Privacy, Content on the Service, Your Right and Grant of Right in Content, License, Misue of Service, Ending of Term, Using the Service . Lets break down what these clauses mean:

   
   

   1. Who May Use the Service:

      According to the terms of service, only those 13 years and older may use the service. In terms of South African contractual law, a 13 year old is a minor considered to noy have full contractual capacity. Therefore with that premise in mind, if south african laws are applicable, X contract with any minor is voidable in a circumstance where the under 18 year old thick on that "i agree to the terms and conditions" box. But as you will see later, the governing laws applicable to the users binding contract with X are the laws of TEXAS, USA. Maby 13 year that side may enter into such contract freely at that age without the possibility of the agreement being voidable.

      So as long as you older than 13 years of age, you may use the Platform. But lets be real, its apparent that X is being used by user younger than that. The terms of service actually point out that they don't monitor the platform. Therefore this clause is redundant.

      
      

   2. Your Account:

      You may essentially only use the Service by having an account. The account holder is responsibility for ensuring the security of that account throught strong password and authentication mechanism to ensure that your account does not get breached. Basically in terms of the agreement, you are responsible for your account and its security.

      Stopping using "Password" as your login password, you basically breaching the contract by doing that.

      
      

   3. Missue of the Service:

      This clause details things that would constitute a user misusing X. And when found to be misusing, its essential that you know you get you account Kanye West'd, that code for removed, suspended , banned. X is basically saying that dont do the following or else we will delete your account, but still keep your data to use for our personal gain (more to come on that). Okay, The following constitute Misuse of X:

      1. Interfering with or accessing the service other than through the provided interface. Dont try jail break or access it throught indexs or backdoor chanells or whatever your hacker friend recommended one time during a smoke session. Basically if you not logining in through X.COM (Not a paid promotion- actually not a promotion at all) then you breaching your contract with X and that can get your situation deleted, and no more twitting about 50/50 on dates.

      2. Scraping or crawling without prior written consent is expressly prohibited. This refers to using a software or some hacker tool or script to assess a website and extract large amounts of data from you. I know some of you guys' marketing departments are scraping and crawling, looking to see what the trends are so they can tailor their campaigns around those trends. I am here to tell you, that is in breach, and the terms of this agreement can be enforced against you or the company you work. Stop or get in contact with the higher ups of X and get permission, you will probably need to pay but thats better than the headach of losing your source of customers.

      3. Reverse engineering, decompiling, or disassembling the software. Do not, do not try and press right click on your and do the whole inspect site then take whatever you see there and create your own very similar version of X and passing of as your own. Not only are in breach of contractually but in violation of intellectual property law, basically you can branded as a thief. Dont try and manipulate the system basically. Basically unless authorised to do so by X, stop snooping, and fiddling arround with the source code.

      4. Bypassing security measures, spamming, platform manipulation, and distributing malware. This refers to Jail breaking basically. Users are prohibited from action that involve to circumvent, disable, or interfere with the technical and administrative safeguards put in place by X to protect its systems and users. For example, attempting to break into databases or servers not authorised to access, using VPN to access the service from regions where it is prohibited. Dont do that in Russia, i think. Just dont access stuff in a country where access that stuff is prohibited and using tools to bypass account login pages and access accounts authorized. No Spamming all X users with your mixtape or your Herbal life affiliate link unsolicited, unprovoked. Its not cute and its in breach of your legally binding contract with X. I can actually report you for doing that. Finally those links user post of free online sports viewing website that lead to your computer getting a virus, those are a serious breach and can get your IP blocked from accessing your X account. Just so you know it can be regarded as dissemination of a malware and that is a no no in terms of the Terms of service.

         
         

         Now we get to the juicy part of the Terms of service. i wanted to save the best for last because these next clauses raised my heart rate as i was reading them. Lets start with Privacy.

         
         

   4. Privacy.

      That paranoia you have gotten once whereby you found yourself questioning, "what do they do with my data" . By using the platform, you consented to the following regarding your data and privacy.

      1. You have consented to the collection and use of your information, all your information, even information you not thinking about. For example say your twitting patterns are found to illustrate a certain psychological trait about you, that information can be collected and used for whatever purpose x deems fit. Actually that information can be transferred to third parties at a price. It now makes sense as i am writing this why its said that "data is a commodity". That account of yours on X is a commodity and can be obtained by the highest bidder for whatever purpose they deem fit. But hey, that what we as users signed up for, thats what we bound ourselves to.

         Go read the Privacy polic yourself, the information they collect on you goes beyound just what you post and that post of that women or man that you liked, they even collect your clicks. What do you click on? They collect the links you click on when using the platform. To the Gooners, they know..... And you have granted X the license to do as dou wilt with your information. You not paying in money, you paying in data and your attention which means more data. I could go on and on on the privacy policy of X, so please just go take a look at it X Privacy Policy

      2. You also consent to the transfer of your information to USA, IRELAND and other countries for processing and storage. ALSO just to note, deactivating your account does not delete your processed and stored data. Privacy part of your agreement with X survives termination of your time as a user of X.

      3. That Dm you sent shooting your shot to the shorties, that between you and shorty and X. They see those and have access to those text for "security" purposes. I am just the messenger.

         
         

   5. Your Rights and the Grant of Right to your Content:

      What this clauses communicates to you as a party to a contract with X is that you retain ownership of the content you post, your posts, photos, videos and so forth. But in return you grant X a broad, global, royaly free sublicensable license to use, copy, modify, distribute, and publish your content in any media for any purpose. First do you know what that means? X can basically open a instagram account and use your content on instagram as their own for any purpose, that is what that means. That is what that means, and the media in which they can publish that content, your content, does not need to be media that exists today, it can be a future platform in the future which you have consented now that X can use every single thing you post on X. I am not bashing X, i am just translating. Essentially you are the rightful owner of the content you post and by signing the agreement through your use have also granted a license to X to do what dou wilt with your content. It can use it for itself for whatever reason, but they do cite that one of the uses of your content will be to train is AI model, that includes its Generative AI model. Like it or not, you are feeding "Grok" your data so it can be a better Artifical Intelligence and possibly one day take over the world like how those machines did in the movie "The Matrix".

      Also, this clause explains how Chris Excel was able to use that ladies photo as his profile picture because the terms of service enable that your content may be used aby someone else. The line is drawn when your are impersonating, that is a breach, but that Chris Excel dude did not impersonate, he just used her profile picture and it was okay with the platform and dude was allowed to accumulate monies from his account that used a picture of another person as his profil picture. Note, that picture was not of a celebrity or athlete, it was a picture of just a lady. I always wondered how that user got away with that one.

      "Whats legal is not always Right"- we see the seperation between law and morality.

      
      

   6. Your License to Use the Service:

      Now in return for giving X your content, data, personal information and your digital self basically, all you receive is a license to use the platform. That its a license to use, meaning a license to post content so X can use that content for whatever reasons it deems fit. You dont get the license to analyse the code and replicate it or the license to modify your X code. You just the license to be able to use X all arround the world, unless its the part of the world where X is prohibited. The Intellectual property remains with X. So no selling merchandise with X logos on it that can be inferred as referrign to X the platform formerly known as Twitter(Not a paid promotion- actually not a promotion at all).

      
      

   7. General terms:

      Not much to see on the general terms. Its details the governing law of the users agreement with X which is the laws of Texas USA and the court with jurisdiction is a court is Texas. Not bashing but if what i have heartd about Texas courts are true, then any grievance you experience with X, swallow it and take that L. Check this Youtube video to know what i am referring to when i touch on my views regarding Texas courts- Why the U.S. Patent System is literally SCAM! | The Patent Scam | FD Finance.

      But there is something that caught my attention under that General and that is Users are prohibited from participating in Class Action Lawsuites as members of a class of a member. Yes we reading the same thing, X's terms of service stipulate and i quote " To the extent permitted by law, you also waive the right to participate as a plaintiff or class member in any purported class action, collective action or representative action proceeding". It is through an informed guess and interpreting throught the sprit, purport and object of the Bill of Right that i am concluding that this provision applies only to disputes with X. It isnt a general waiver from X users from participating as members of a class action, any class action. I cant be that. Its confusing because that portion of the provision does not quality by stating "class action related to disputes with X". But that is a wild thing to read. Watch out for that one. Also i guess through interpreting the part that reads " To the extent permitted by law" - South africa does not play that game, although we dont have a codified document on class action lawsuites, our constitution would never allow a waiver of exercising your right to participating as a qualifying member of a class action. But remember the laws applicable in terms of this agreements are the law of Texas so i am sure if our constitution applies in this. (For further research to be conducted- i do welcome insights from the reader on this)

   8. Ending these Terms:

      You terminate your agreement with X by deactivating your account. Your legally binding relationship, atleast aspect of it, may end upon X terminating your account, suspending or putting your account on "time-out" where its found that your have violated the terms of service.

      Note note note, Some of the terms we throught above survive the ending of the agreement between the user and X. Can you guess which terms survive? Yes you guessed right the Privacy, Content provisions and License provisions survive the ending of terms- all those that enable X to retain the license over your content, to retain the data it has collected from your use of the platform.

CONCLUSION:

Read your terms and conditions, know what you getting yourself into and what you are signing up for. This will enable you to make informed decision on how you use these social media platforms.

DISCLAIMER

This does not constitute as legal advise nor legal authority for what your terms and conditions with your use of the X platforms mean. These are essentially my opinions based on how i interpretated the documents I engaged with. Please do further research, consult your lawyer if you are that much interested.

References:

Rules and policies

X Privacy Policy