Google has launched a browser: Google Chrome.
It’s a browser, but it is also a platform for web applications. Uses Webkit (like Safari). Open Source.
Maybe you would like to write a blog entry about it. Everyone else will.
Update:
BBC coverage with a video clip in which Google’s Jessica Powell demonstrates the new features of Chrome.
View in conjunction with the comic-style documentation above for a fuller explanation of how it works.
I know I am going off the original topic here, but I thinks this is important.
Granted that most people probably don’t actually read the EULA, for those of us who do ( and I am one of those sad people in the main), how many of us [em]actually[/em] understand what we are being told…?? I am confident that I don’t – yes, I will look for the obvious points at the top of the page, but usually you are in a hurry to install the package.
Let’s assume that you have forked out a considerable amount of cash for a product, in the process of installing it, you realise that the EULA is totally unaceptable for you and you cannot go further, what do you do? You can’t take the product back because, unlike any other product, there is no guarantee covering software if it is not fit for purpose, and once you have opened the package you have forfited your rights to a refund…
Looks like it was a mistake rather than a conspiracy.
“Google may have screwed up in attaching such an overzealous EULA to Chrome but to the company’s credit, it acted quickly to rectify the situation. At just before 3:00 p.m. on Wednesday, Ars Technica ran a story with the following quotes from Rebecca Ward, Senior Product Counsel for Google Chrome:
Google’s Rebecca Ward, Senior Product Counsel for Google Chrome, now tells Ars Technica that the company tries to reuse these licenses as much as possible, “in order to keep things simple for our users.” Ward admits that sometimes “this means that the legal terms for a specific product may include terms that don’t apply well to the use of that product” and says that Google is “working quickly to remove language from Section 11 of the current Google Chrome terms of service. This change will apply retroactively to all users who have downloaded Google Chrome.”
As it turns out, the Google Chrome EULA controversy is just another case of a high-profile company lazily copying and pasting together a EULA with little regard for the terms therein. And as humorous as the entire 24-hour fiasco might be, Google’s misstep reminds us yet again why it’s important for end-users to read the EULAs that come attached to software and services and why it’s doubly important for companies to run a fine-tooth comb over the language in their EULAs before releasing them into the wild. In all honesty, though, end-users shouldn’t have to dig through every EULA for fear that something like this might be buried inside. If a EULA requires that a user relinquish significant rights in order to use a piece of software or a service, that fact should be made abundantly clear to the user, through some means other than a condition buried deep inside a click-through EULA.”
Via Mehan Jayasuriaya @ Public Knowledge
http://www.publicknowledge.org/node/1726
Comment from Dragonmaster.
Unfortunately, this product is not available for Linux users, so I am
unable to comment on it in that respect. However, what is interesting is
the slashdot row that is in progress concerning the EULA (refer to
[url]http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/09/03/0247205&from=rss[/url].
What is interesting here is that the Chrome is being released under the
BSD open source agreement which effectively makes any EULA prety well
null and void – the man controvesy is over this statement:
[blockquote]”By submitting, posting or displaying the content you give
Google a perpetual, irrevocable, worldwide, royalty-free, and
non-exclusive license to reproduce, adapt, modify, translate, publish,
publicly perform, publicly display and distribute any content which you
submit, post or display on or through, the services. This license is for
the sole purpose of enabling Google to display, distribute and promote the
services and may be revoked for certain services as defined in the
additional terms of those services.”[\blockquote]
If I am reading this correctly, it would imply that any code I upload
using their browser would immediately become their property! I think this
needs a bit more research before I make a final judgement call…