EQSQ.com Poll Confirms Internet Users Disregard End User License Agreements
Recent poll results from EQSQ.com's The Pollitzer found that the majority of Internet users agree to End User License Agreements (EULA) without reading the terms and conditions. Only ten percent of respondents answered that they had read every word of the terms and conditions. It seems that users do not consider that when they agree to EULA's carelessly they may be unwittingly giving away important legal rights. There is evidence that this "click to continue" mentality has become an addiction for many Internet users. Perhaps they need the immediate gratification of reaching information or completing the transaction NOW, and cannot take the time out to read terms and conditions that, as far as they are concerned, are all the same.
(PRWEB) October 31, 2006 -- EQSQ.com's The Pollitzer recently found that more than 60 percent of Internet users click on the End User License Agreement (EULA) "I Agree" box without reading the terms and conditions. EQSQ.com (http://eqsq.com) features articles and resources about how the mind works and how different personality traits apply to educational and career choices. This recent poll highlights the fact that half of Internet users agree to EULAs just to get their information immediately, a behavior that the journal CIN: Computers, Informatics, Nursing (CIN) labels a developing dependency.
The EQSQ.com poll asked users "when you check the 'I Agree' box online it means you" and offered four possible choices. Ten percent "read every word" of the terms and conditions, and 29 percent claim to "have read others and they're all very similar." Eleven percent admitted to not reading the agreement at all. The largest response group, 50 percent, agreed just so they could "complete the transaction."
The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), a donor-funded nonprofit dedicated to confronting cutting-edge issues on the Internet, recently published a report warning consumers about online EULAs, "Dangerous Terms: A Users Guide to EULAs."
"It's time that consumers understood what happens when they click 'I Agree.' They may be inviting vendors to snoop on their computers, or allowing companies to prevent them from publicly criticizing the product they've bought. They also click away their right to customize or even repair their devices," the EFF reports.
The Pollitzer's EULA poll raises questions about what would compel consumers to overlook their legal rights. A study published in CIN researched the experiences of Internet users and recognized participants' dependency on the Internet. "The participants recognized the potential for addictions to the immediate gratification of the Internet information. One participant wrote, 'Once you sit down and just look up a piece of information [... it is too hard to stop once you start because you find all kinds of interesting things, which remind you of other things you want to know about and it goes on and on--it's addicting.'"
EQSQ.com features polls, quizzes, articles, and educational and career resources centered on the Empathizing-Systemizing (EQ SQ) theory of Professor Simon Baron-Cohen and assist users in making career decisions based upon their personality traits. Systemizers and empathizers can find information and resources related to education, educational programs, and career choices.
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