Pearls Before Swine by Stephan Pastis for July 26, 2016

He spent 3 years in law school to learn how to write that.

Sorry to hear that, Eddie. If you wrote for Windows, you’d have at least one reader right here.

You mean Apple software does that, too?

How true. We just want the freaking program!

It’s OK, Eddie. I clicked ‘Dismiss’.

I’m sorry, did you hear someone talking? I must be hearing things… my bad!

You can always write novels.

Or a baby’s arm holding an apple…………..what do you want from life…………..

Why not write a book of literary criticism about the work of Bulwer-Lytton? I’m sure it would be a page-turner!

Blah blah blah “human CentiPad” etc. etc.

Eddie? I thought his name was EULA…

I have to admit, I’ve never read one of those things either. I have better things to do than try to understand “Lawyer” language. English is tough enough. And don’t get me started on “Politicians” language.

Eddie is a really sad case. But somebody has to write that stuff so Apple can deny any responsibility for anything while holding the user responsible for everything. It’s the Big Corporation way.But I’m sure Eddie is well compensated. When he commits suicide, his widow will lead a good new life!

Eddy’s beer mug seems to be spinning around by itself.

Some days, like today, PBS is exactly right. NO ONE (except maybe my parents) reads that whole thing..

They came and took my family, seems it is in the agreemnt!

terms and conditions should be one page or less in large font…then people would read them more. the fact that they are often a 100 pages in tiny font, I don’t know anyone that has 12 hours to read that.

Is it in American English or English English? Yeah Webster is the culprit.

@opuscroakus70 YES! you HAVE to read the fine print! ahahahahah

Maybe he should move to Yahoo. Whoops!

I remember many years ago, Dilbert did an arc on the Microsoft fine print. It seems when you broke the seal on the software CD, you were agreeing to be Bill Gates’ pool boy. I told you it was a long time ago.

Ah, go read War and Peace on your Kindle.

My brain goes numb after the 1st paragraph. I’d like to see a standard EULA for all software. Then if there’s anything special to add that would require my attention.

Poor poor Eddie.

I read the first one I came across many years ago, but not in one sitting. I do skim through all of them and they are generally very similar. They should be made a lot more accessible but then consumers would understand the agreement.They also might find out that they can’t sue, that all disputes must be solved by arbitration. We can’t have that, now can we?

Can’t. Otherwise you’d have no access to Apple services.

I now scan all user agreements for a “Human Centipede” clause. (per south park)

Maybe more people would read it if some dirty jokes were hidden in it.:How about the one with the penguin and the mechanic?

Could be worse. He could be a business-book author. Something over 90% of business bestsellers are never read: the boss reads a 500-word summary (they actually have magazines containing nothing but summaries of business books, so executives can pretend at cocktail parties to have read them) and decides to buy copies for all the employees, who immediately put them on the “gift from the boss, never to be read” shelf.

Why don’t EULAs have a paragraph-long “executive summary”? All they really have to say is “This software should do what we claim it does. However, in case it doesn’t, it’s not our fault.”

Writers have no hand in that. That’s all the work of lawyers.

This one reminds me of a fun “Pearls” strip from last December …

They should just zap people that plan to do the opposite of what the terms say.