Vultr new terms and conditions

[MattW]

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[Ozzy47]

That's insane

 

[RobinHood]

Saw this earlier and meant to post it. Was curious as to the impact this might have on the XF cloud customers.

 

[Joe Link]

 

[RobinHood]

Are they trying to cover their bases so they can hoover up customer data and sell it to train AI perhaps?

Now that user generated content finally has a wholesale value

 

[MattW]

Saw this earlier and meant to post it. Was curious as to the impact this might have on the XF cloud customers.

Was thinking the same myself, as I know the XF cloud is built on Vultr.

 

[RobinHood]

Such a weird decision, that would clearly receive backlash.

The company is only 10 years old (as a host) and has only received one round of seed funding. Are they looking for an exit?

Do they see the opportunity to use their customer data as just too lucrative to pass up, even if it means burning their reputation?

From this article 6 months ago it seems they launched their own GPU AI farm across 32 different locations across the globe.

Perhaps they don't plan to sell the data, but use the data to train their own models? Seeing as they're an nVidia Elite Partner, the highest possible status, they have access to the hardware.

 

[Chris D]

This is indeed concerning so I wanted to get in here early to clarify that this is not something we were aware of, nor is it something that was communicated with us when it was added nor is it something we agree to, as written.

We immediately contacted our account manager for clarification and in the interest of balance I am posting their reply in full below:

Hey Chris!

Thanks for the note, totally understand your unhappiness and we agree that our lawyers were overzealous with that language (it was actually added to our ToS 15 months ago but has just now had attention drawn to it via social media).

That said, Section 12.1(a) of our ToS ends with the following language: "for purposes of providing the Services to you." This is intended to make it clear that any rights referenced are solely for the purposes of providing the Services to you.

We want to ensure our customers understand they own their content and we are currently reviewing and updating the language to make it more clear. Anything you own remains yours, this was put into place to cover publicly available user content (something you posted on Vultr's forums for instance) incase we wanted to use it for marketing purposes.

Does that make sense?

Again totally understand your frustration.

Best,

Mark

This doesn't automatically make this okay and we will pursue this and review our options.

As far as we are concerned, the data hosted on XenForo Cloud is yours. Not ours, and certainly not Vultr's. Rest assured that if this cannot be legally qualified in a satisfactory manner, there will have to be serious conversations about our ongoing relationship with Vultr.

 

[MySiteGuy]

Before everyone panics, this has been in their TOS since at least 2022:

Terms of Service

We are simplifying the cloud. One Login, 19 Countries, 32 Cities, Infinite Possibilities.

web.archive.org

And the difference:

Vultr TOS - Diffchecker

Vultr TOS - Products Features Marketplace Pricing Partners Company Log in Sign up Contact Sales Legal Terms O

www.diffchecker.com

 

[Chris D]

That almost makes it worse. But ultimately it doesn't matter how long it's been there - it shouldn't be.

 

[MattW]

I’ve just logged into my account, and you can’t do anything without accepting the update

 

[Vercingetorix]

Excuse my ignorance, I'm unsure, yet it seems as if suggestive of this vulture cloud having been maneuvering towards siphoning off our data..?

Better not be...

Spoiler: ...Vultr...

Well.

Sounds as though we best launch the 'Xenforo - Xeniverse' fundraising campaign, so we may heartily pester, I mean -motivate expedient development of the official XF-Veniverse Cloud.

Spoiler

 

[Arantor]

Having a licence to store, reproduce, transmit etc. is normal - they would need those things to service an account.

However in spite of what the account manager says, how exactly does “their ability to commercialise your content” become a requirement to service your content in the first place? The whole “our legal team were a bit enthusiastic” doesn’t cut it.

Especially as the account manager isn’t saying Vultr won’t monetise your content, they’re simply confirming it’s your content. Weasel wording at its finest.

 

[duderuud]

I am not remotely a pro in legal matters but whatever the account manager of Vultr says has no value. At all.
All that counts are the legal documents and right now they are not in the best interest of the customers.

Vultr needs to change those terms. If they don't, every customer should leave asap.

 

[FTL]

If they haven't yet, every other hosting provider is gonna follow suite when they see Vultr getting away with it.

 

[James]

That becomes a bit difficult when you have thousands of XF cloud installs on Vultr servers.

You'd assume that if XF has a contract with Vultr that they'd have signed their own bespoke contracts for the services provided which may supersede their boilerplate TOS?

 

[Slavik]

That becomes a bit difficult when you have thousands of XF cloud installs on Vultr servers.

You'd assume that if XF has a contract with Vultr that they'd have signed their own bespoke contracts for the services provided which may supersede their boilerplate TOS?

We cant discuss our commercial agreements, however should this situation not be satisfactorily be resolved we will obviously ensure our Cloud customers are taken care off correctly.

FWIW I dont think there is anything intentionally malicious going on, but its quite a huge lapse in their legal department to put something so ambiguous there that should not be there.

 

[James]

We cant discuss our commercial agreements, however should this situation not be satisfactorily be resolved we will obviously ensure our Cloud customers are taken care off correctly.

Understandably. I just meant if XF has bespoke terms then while this is ongoing the XF cloud customers can be reassured that they're covered under a separate arrangement as peace of mind.

 

[MySiteGuy]

I suggest people read the entirety of it. Like recently pointed out in a tech blog I frequent, Reddit has serious authority/expertise failings. There are some cooler heads in the the topic, but the sky is falling crowd shouts loudest.

That section of Vultr's clause ends with:
"for purposes of providing the Services to you."

So, if it isn't in connection to providing you services, that clause doesn't not apply.

And it has a sidebar explanation:
"Also, you grant us permission to use your content as necessary to provide you with the Services."

Their wording is poor, but I don't see any intentional dirty business. Read Vultr's own words responding to it (again, with the conspiracy theorists shouting the loudest):

Vultr is now claiming full perpetual commercial rights over all hosted content - Page 2

There seems to be a bit of a disconnect between the legal language and our trust and safety’s team intention.

lowendtalk.com

 

[Chris D]

Just had word that Vultr are aiming to get a communication out tomorrow. It sounds like that could be a revision to the terms of use. So likelihood is, this will be satisfactorily resolved, but we'll obviously review the changes and report back once we've digested them.