Originally posted by roflwaffle Could someone modify FB's TOS to not waive their CMI rights, provide notice of this change to FB, and assuming FB let them continue to use service after some reasonable amount of time, have cause if/when FB stripped out the EXIF data from copywritten images?
No, both parties have to accept any revisions or addendums to a legal agreement. Which leads to my next point.
Terms of service that have not been fully explained to the satisfaction of the individual who agrees to them do not take away existing rights from that individual. Until Facebook pays posters for the rights to images posted and posters agree to accept payment, posters retain those copyrights, even if the terms of service they agreed to says that they have waived those rights. The value of copyright varies by jurisdiction and it may be that American photographers who sue Facebook for violating their copyright won't get much compensation and it may be that Facebook only violates those copyrights when a third party uses a posted image without attribution, but what terms of service mean in cases where an unwitnessed mouse click substitutes for a signature and there is no reasonable expectation that the person "signing" the TOS is fully aware of all the implications of those terms, is diddly squat. Terms of service can't take away rights from an unwilling and/or uninformed victim. Of course it will cost victims time and money to recover damages from perpetrators with much greater resources, so a degree of injustice remains.
Now for my mea culpa: I'm not familiar with enough of the details of this case in Germany to know whether the paragraph above that I posted is relevant or not. I could read the linked article, but that's no guarantee the writer of the article understood the relevant issues or not. If someone tries to profit by violating unenforceable agreements like terms of service, the situation changes because that attempt to profit from contravening an agreement implies an understanding of that agreement. Which, in my opinion, is the real purpose of asinine terms of service such as Facebook's and iTunes, to prevent competitors from exploiting the services Facebook and Apple provide for free. Joe and Jane Public are just stooges.