Quote:
Originally Posted by HarryT
Is the service "free"? It's being paid for by B&N for the specific purpose of using the B&N bookstore, isn't it? If you use it for any other purpose, aren't you making unauthorised use of a service which is costing B&N real money?
|
The TOS/EULA may or may not forbid using it for other purposes. Since B&N don't provide software for other methods of accessing the internet, they may not have put any notes about it in the user agreements. Very likely, hacking the device ends B&N's agreement to provide any service, but that doesn't mean it's against the contract, just that the user loses access to the B&N bookstore.
The Nook probably doesn't have a list of forbidden uses or a specific list of "only the following are authorized; any other use is forbidden by law." (If they could make that work, they'd insist you don't read pirated ebooks on it.)
Quote:
|
That surely constitutes obtaining a service by deception, don't you think? I'm no lawyer, so I may of course by wrong, but it certainly looks to me as though it "ought" to be a criminal act, given that such usage actually costs B&N money.
|
"By deception" probably means something other than "paid retail price for it." Most customers don't tell stores how they're going to use their purchases; B&N doesn't require a statement of intent before selling Nooks.
A user who browses the B&N store constantly and never buys, is also costing B&N money, and they don't have any rules about that. Buying a device with the intent/hope of getting more use from it than the seller expected to provide is not illegal.