About this Site
The Small Print Project began as a graduate project for Cory Doctorow’s Set-Top Cop course at The University of Southern California’s Annenberg School for Communication.
The purpose of this project is to document experiences — both good and bad — presented by the millions of EULAs (End User Licensing Agreements) as they are both designed and encountered, knowingly or otherwise. This project will only last 8 weeks or so as an academic endeavor, however, this site is designed with the hopes of fostering discussion, suggestion, exposition and implementation of EULAs (electronic and otherwise) in an effort to help define, describe and mediate the nature of agreements in the digital age.
Any and all input is invited from individuals and businesses on both the consumer and products/services site.
Who’s Project is This?
Andy Sternberg graduated with a Master’s degree in Online Journalism in May 2007 from the University of Southern California’s Annenberg School for Communication. Sternberg is committed to the sensible and practical proliferation of all things digital and believes that consumerism and capitalism can continue to thrive most especially if technology advances with a high level of transparency and social collaboration. He tracks his passions and reveals his obsessions on his blog.
This was for a class?!?
PUBD510: Set-Top Cop was a one-semester-only course in the USC Annenberg Master’s in Public Diplomacy program taught by Cory Doctorow. Cory is currently teaching a course called “Pwned: Is Everyone on Campus a Copyright Criminal?”
PRESS & AWARDS
The Small Print Project placed second in USC Webfest 2007 for Best Academic Web Site.
The Small Print Project has been featured on:
– Ciudad.com — “The Small Print Project: El alma por un click,” 15 feb 2007
– TWiT (This Week in Tech) — “ReasonableAgreement,” 12 feb 2007
–Information Week — Cory Doctorow, “Shrinkwrap Licenses: An Epidemic Of Lawsuits Waiting To Happen, February 3, 2007.
– USA TODAY — Andrew Kantor, “‘User agreements’ to disagree with” November 10, 2006.
– CBC Radio One’s “Freestyle” November 8. (listen).
– Smith Magazine’s Smith List, “Read the Fine Print,” November 30.
– Boing Boing on Oct. 17 and Oct. 30.
– Consumerist on Oct. 25
CONTACT:
[...] This sort of thing is what makes the internet a wonderful place. One of Cory’s students set up a blog to collect egregious EULA’s that people find, just walking around in meatspace, and opened it to the internet to collect examples from other people. I’m bookmarking it now, on what looks like day one of the project, becuase I’m sure it will be increasingly useful in the future. [...]
Nice idea for a blog. I think I may enjoy it while it lasts.
But, um,
“Who’s Project is This?”
?!
-Me
[...] Trackig down the best and worst in Small Print A collaborative document of experiences with agreements in the digital age as they are designed and encountered. (tags: smallprint licences) Posted by zeroinfluencer Filed in del.icio.us links [...]
[...] Interesting project which aims to “document experiences — both good and bad — presented by the millions of EULAs (End User Licensing Agreements) as they are both designed and encountered, knowingly or otherwise”. Seems like a good and noble idea as a more permanent site/volunteer group - as it is the project will last 8 weeks or so as an academic endeavor [sic]. [via] [...] [...]