You may have heard of juno, the free email and internet access provider. I first heard of them a few years ago, and until I had enough money for my own real email account, I used Juno. In addition to being free, it had the nice feature of dialing up via an 800 number, and only taking up the phone lines long enough to retrieve and send email. My dad was so happy with them that he hooked our entire family up with Juno so everyone had email accounts, and I recommended them to just about everyone I knew. My parents are still using Juno for their internet access.
Those days are over. With the release of Juno’s new service contract, the company has done something absolutely stunning. The contract has the usual stuff… privacy agreements, indemnity arrangements, etc. Nothing particularly unusual. The kicker comes in section 2.5, where they let you know that they may require the users of their free services to allow Juno to install software on their computers, which will probably come in the form of a screensaver, that the users cannot disable in any way. The software will display ads, and run a distributed computing program (like SETI@home).
Doesn’t sound too bad, you say? Check this out: “…you expressly permit and authorize Juno to initiate a telephone connection from your computer to Juno’s central computers… Juno agrees that it shall exercise such right only to the extent necessary, as determined in Juno’s sole discretion, to upload the results of completed computations to Juno in a timely fashion; and you agree that… you shall be responsible for any costs and expenses (including without limitation any applicable telephone charges) resulting from the foregoing.”
Yes, you read that correctly. Juno is requiring ALL of its users to agree to the possibility that Juno will use your phone lines whenever it feels like it. The only condition is that they promise to try to only do it when necessary. But they decide when it’s necessary, and if you don’t comply by leaving your computer on all the time, they reserve the right to terminate your service or limit your access.
I strongly urge anyone with a Juno account to switch to a different company’s service plan. Most ISPs and free internet email accounts have a plan that is comparable to Juno, and won’t require you to give up your rights to your computer.
You begin to get the impression that long-time Juno users are going to start being really pissed off about this.Sort of like BIFEE.
yeah, Juno’s scared now! "Oh no, we’ve made enemies of the Vandehey boys!!" hehehe
Juno’s Motto:"Email was meant to be free."By unveiling the "Virtual Supercomputer Project" which involves selling their user’s computer power to scientists, Juno’s proved themselves beyond any previous doubt to be nothing but soulless, money-worshipping corporate zombies.And to think at first we marvelled at their commitment to customer service . . .
Aaugghhh!!!!!Juno is coming!!! Run for your lives!!!Waauuuggghhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!
After four years, I have been telling people of late that my juno address would always be there. I’ve seen my friends go through more new email addresses in a month than I have in four years.This latest bit, however, is just too much. Previous agreements, since the public unveiling of Juno’s "Virtual Supercomputer Project" had included clauses that participation would only be mandatory to free users, so me being a paying subscriber left me out of the project unless I volunteered to join in. Not so this agreement, which makes no mention anywhere of different requirements for different service levels.So, not only do you have to deal with it for their free service, but you could be PAYING them to tie up your phone line and computer any damn time they feel like it.To quote the horse from Ren and Stimpy: "No sir, I didn’t like it."As I write this, I’m using a free isp based in the NYC area, which doesn’t even have ad banners.Boo-Yah!!