how often do you install software on your pc? just today a bubble popped up to tell me that Windows had downloaded “critical updates”. Naturally i clicked the button to install the updates, only to be confronted by that regular (and for me, awkward) screen entitled “User agreement”. Along with all the other Windows users around the world I was asked to read 93 pages of legally binding agreement, before installing the updates…
i want to know
- who reads all that legal stuff?
- do the people who write it expect us to?
- if not, is it binding?
- why do “critical updates” for software you already paid for and legally own (along with clicking on “AGREE” when you first installed it) require further legal contract?
- do i really have a choice to NOT AGREE?
- can i click AGREE and argue later that I did so in order to gain access to the software, but not with any intention of entering into legal contract because it’s unreasonable to ask a person to read 93 pages every time their pc (automatically) downloads updates…
the more interesting thing than the challenges of living ethically in a digital and internet age is the issue of trust. we who like to think of ourselves as highly rational, never entering into a situation without consideration of the facts, display a lot of willingness to trust - perhaps not in traditional ways, like trusting a partner or trusting the divine… and yet it’s still trust.
what if we were to discover that less of our life (our choices, our circumstances, etc.) is determined by “facts” than we like to think… and much more of our life than we recognise is actually determined by trust?