With a supreme court decision earlier this year making it legal for companies to include do-not-sue clauses in their user agreements, the only recourse for customers of companies like Sony and Electronic Arts is to opt-out of the clause via written letter. Now there's a website that does it for them.
In an age where electronic communication is king and digital distribution is a core focus, requiring customers to send in a written notice to opt out of a specific clause in a user agreement is a strategic inconvenience. Sony and EA obviously don't want customers to dodge these clauses. Otherwise they would have included a check box for it, just like the check box used to agree to the terms of service in the first place.
Gamers Opt Out was formed to take some of the inconvenience out of the process.
Gamers Opt Out is a collective of gamers who are sick of absurd EULAs from game companies. These EULAs have clauses preventing class-action lawsuits, though you can opt out of the clauses by sending a letter. We want to make it easier for everyone to opt out because Sony, EA, et al, believe most people won't bother to. Let's show them they're wrong.
Via a convenient form located on the Gamers Opt Out website, Sony and EA customers can quickly generate their own opt out letters, which the donation-powered website will then mail completely free-of-charge. What a beautiful idea.
Even if you don't feel the need to Opt Out, I urge you to visit the website and perhaps drop a couple bucks in the donation slot to help cover postage. This is the kind of community spirit gamers really need to foster.
Gamers Opt Out [Official Website via Boing Boing]
Update: Commenters Googling about the internet have discovered the website is registered to one Matthew Jakubowski of Michigan. That is true. They also believe it's the same Matthew Jakubowski that is an attorney for Brooks Kushman, PC. That is false.
Here's Gamers Opt Out's Matt's LinkedIn. Here's a completely different Matt Jakubowski that used to live near him (he also works on the project). The lawyer makes a third. Three different guys.
The real Matt (at least one of the real Matts for our purposes) assures us his motives are pure. "We aren't trying to get any data, we are just collecting what we need to send to Sony\EA and will send it and then wipe the data from the database. We have no other sort of motives for this. We just want to help and we felt this is the best way to do it."
So don't worry folks, it's the real deal. The internet just makes us all paranoid.
You can contact Michael Fahey, the author of this post, at fahey@kotaku.com. You can also find him on Twitter, Facebook, and lurking around our #tips page.