Ask HN: Terms of Conditions, EULA, Privacy Policy, etc. What to do?

[PakG1]

Hey guys,

My friends and I are hoping to launch an app soon, but we haven't even incorporated yet. We will eventually.

We're only going to be in beta for a couple of months, does it make sense to have things like a Privacy Policy, Terms of Conditions, etc, on the site? If we should have them, do we need them written up by a proper lawyer? What are your experiences?

We're just playing around, but if user engagement is good, we seriously want to try to run with this. We've already got some companies on board for trial use during our alpha stage, which starts next week. But we have no clue if it makes sense right now to invest in a proper lawyer to write up proper Terms of Conditions, Privacy Policy, etc.

[latch]

Automattic (the company behind WordPress) has their Privacy Policy and Terms of Service under a creative commons specifically for this reason:

http://automattic.com/privacy/

http://en.wordpress.com/tos/

[dctoedt → latch]

Be extremely careful about using WordPress's terms of service; there's a real danger, IMO, that they could self-destruct. I posted an analysis a while back at http://www.ontechnologylaw.com/2010/05/using-wordpress-coms-...

[PakG1 → dctoedt]

Well, that would certainly suck, and I'd trust a quality lawyer and law professor more than other folks. What would you recommend as an alternative? Just investing in the services of a real lawyer? Trying to write up the darn thing ourselves in a simplified manner with bullet points? Fact is, we still don't even know what we'd do with this service long-term, so hard to envision what the Terms of Service should be, huh? :) We only know our short-term goals right now.

[PakG1 → latch]

That is great news, thanks! :)

[AmberShah → PakG1]

Yep, this plus look at the ones for sites that are similar to yours. Of course, you cannot copy those but they can give you ideas of areas specific to your app that wouldn't be covered in the WordPress ones.

This is one of those things that took longer than I expected and still am not sure I got right.

[jhack]

I don't know the legalities necessary, but I'd say if you're going to be storing or collecting any sort of user data a privacy policy is a must.