Roku’s Ultimatum: Surrender Jury Trial Rights or Lose Access to Your TVs
Roku’s Ultimatum: Surrender Jury Trial Rights or Lose Access to Your TVs
Did your Roku TV decide to strong arm you into giving up your rights or lose your FULLY FUNCTIONING WORKING TV? Because mine did.
It doesn't matter if you only use it as a dumb panel for an Apple TV, Fire stick, or just to play your gaming console. You either agree or get bent.
I think you're qualified for a full refund in most regions if you disagree with the new terms.
NOTHING SUSPICIOUS HERE. DO NOT FEAR. SIGN AWAY FUTURE LEGAL PROTECTION BECAUSE THERE IS NOTHING TO FEAR.
Just an FYI, although they aren't physical products like this Roku, many apps and digital services have added the very same binding arbitration clauses recently.
The McDonald's app for one. I ended up deleting the app after it tried to force me into binding arbitration and I didn't want to go through to opt-out process for marginally cheaper, shitty food, so I just deleted the app altogether and haven't eaten there since November.
Watch out for it if you drive for doordash or ubereats as well. I opted out of both, although they claimed you couldn't opt out in an new contract when you didn't before (a bunch of BS, if the current contract you are about to sign says it supercedes all others, you can't make the lack of an opt-out on a previous contract hold up).
On-going services might make sense for these shitty enough clauses, but to be strong armed into it for physical product you bought free and clear ... Disgusting.
It's like all these companies are locking themselves down to minimize legal exposure because they know that their services and products are getting more awful or something.
Did you read it? That first paragraph’s last sentence refers you to the section which tells you how to opt out.
L. 30-Day Right to Opt Out. You have the right to opt out of arbitration by sending written notice of your decision to opt out to the following address by mail: General Counsel, Roku Inc., 1701 Junction Court, Suite 100, San Jose, CA 95112 within 30 days of you first becoming subject to these Dispute Resolution Terms. Such notice must include the name of each person opting out and contact information for each such person, the specific product models, software, or services used that are at issue, the email address that you used to set up your Roku account (if you have one), and, if applicable, a copy of your purchase receipt. For clarity, opt-out notices submitted via any method other than mail (including email) will not be effective. If you send timely written notice containing the required information in accordance with this Section 1(L), then neither party will be required to arbitrate the Claims between them.
I just got that on my Roku device and clicked through it without even realizing because it was the exact type of pop-up and position and timing as when it informs me that the micro SD card has successfully mounted, and it took my brain a second to register that 1) the pop-up was much larger, and 2) I briefly saw a word that looked like "arbitration"
How can this be a legally enforceable contract?! Especially considering if I didn't agree, my device that I've already paid for and have been using would cease functioning and they sure as hell aren't going to refund my purchase from years ago if I refuse
I thought I linked to my blog post about it, but it just used the image
Roku’s Ultimatum: Surrender Jury Trial Rights or Lose Access to Your TVs
I'm really surprised about this. Amazon got called on their arbitration clause so much that they removed it because it was so expensive.
Roku is practically asking for people to do the same to them. They could even do it about this clause, IMO. (I am not a lawyer.) This is a really dumb clause to have these days.
Once again, Stallman was right. (Also Corey Doctorow)
Smart TV's are stupid scams. I quit watching the big screens in 2018. My phone is larger, at the distance I am comfortable laying down, than the 72in screen on the wall in front of me right now in my family's living room. In the USA, without LUFS regulations, I'm not interested in watching any content embedded in corporate media advertising streams. (Tom Scott LUFS YT, Wikipedia: LUFS)
It should be illegal to make some give up the right to litigation.
Sections 1(F) and 1(L) seem like the only ways out/around of this. (IANAL; the bolding emphasis was done by me.)
F. Small Claims. You or Roku may pursue any Claim, except IP Claims, in a small-claims court instead of through arbitration if (i) the Claim meets the jurisdictional requirements of the small claims court and (ii) the small claims court does not permit class or similar representative actions or relief.
L. 30-Day Right to Opt Out. You have the right to opt out of arbitration by sending written notice of your decision to opt out to the following address by mail: General Counsel, Roku Inc., 1701 Junction Court, Suite 100, San Jose, CA 95112 within 30 days of you first becoming subject to these Dispute Resolution Terms. Such notice must include the name of each person opting out and contact information for each such person, the specific product models, software, or services used that are at issue, the email address that you used to set up your Roku account (if you have one), and, if applicable, a copy of your purchase receipt. For clarity, opt-out notices submitted via any method other than mail (including email) will not be effective. If you send timely written notice containing the required information in accordance with this Section 1(L), then neither party will be required to arbitrate the Claims between them.
Any lawyers out there who can speak towards the three bolded parts?
The bigger thing here is no class arbitration or other representative proceeding. A lot of law firms do arbitration now against companies either with class arbitration or just thousands of individual arbitrations filed en masse. I wonder if this protects them from even the latter approach? It would be shitty if it forced you to do all the legwork on the arbitration yourself.
In any case I get this is happening now and why it's such a huge ultimatum is they know they're about to get hit with a ton of Video Privacy Protection Act suits. Turns out in the late 80s the US made video service providers that share video watching/rental/purchase history open to actual damages of $2500. So in the last year or two a ton of law firms have started filing class actions and arbitrations against all the streaming services and platforms.
Recommendations to purchase a smart TV but never connect it to a network are futile, as well. Just like Amazon devices, smart TVs will find an open SSID and then phone home for updates without your knowledge.
My recommendation, when these kind of topics come up, is: either exchange your smart TV for a dumb one, or go to an electronics repair shop to have a board or two exchanged (depending on the make and model, older dumb components may be direct-ish replacements for smart ones).
EDIT: Another option? Try a projector! I was looking for dumb TV options online after writing up this comment, and someone on an old Reddit post recommended it. Great idea.
2nd EDIT: Someone else also recommended buying digital signage, another solid dumb display option.
My Roku TV's been reset to factory and not allowed on the internet for a few years now. It's a TV. It displays shit that I give it over HDMI. If you desire more than that you're part of the problem. I work in IT and that's why my home has physical locks, a 30 year old thermostat, and cameras I own with recordings on a DVR I own.
I just posted about this in another community. I'll just include the link below so I don't double post.
I haven't connected mine to the internet for a long time
This sort of thing isn't new but I've seen this particular one all over the place. Was there something different from this experience compared to the times that people have agreed in the past?
My muscle memory is to hit power-right-ok to open youtube when I turn the tv on, most of the time without looking at it. The other day, it ended up still sitting on the default menu item after I did that. This must have popped up then. Something that can be dismissed without ever actually seeing it is certainly not enforceable.
That's why i use a LCD TV with a generic TV Box with Linux installed on It, lol.
I work for a streaming cable company and we keep getting calls about this. It's not us, its Roku. You have to use your tv remote. Sorry you threw it away. We emulate the basic functions, but why would we emulate an asterisk? You're cancelling because we can't fix a third party issue... gotcha.
I'm so disappointed in Roku lately. I still have a few streaming sticks in my house and one TV (I went all in), and I'm going to slowly replace them with something else.
I have an apple tv and that is nice, but I would love a little open source player that isn't an htpc or super pricey.
What about the one sided ability to change a contract??
A year from now Roku pop up says "Click to Accept" , the text says **"this contract means you'll have to give us your first born child? ** My reasoning says if they can do one then they can do the other. There is nothing that would prevent them from adding 'fees', or 'subscriptions' or simply turning off the device. (!)
This is egregious. We bought something. In normal commerce, the contract was set in stone at that moment. The seller can't roll up 2 years later, change the contract, force you to agree before you can use your device, and then say , well maybe if you beg, you can opt out.
So Roku is also a piece of shit too eh? I knew that their device I bought wasn't great but I thought it was just a cheap one. Glad I'm creating a media PC on Linux
Just do a judge trial instead of a jury trial. Lol
Pray they don’t alter it further
Is it even possible to like reflash certain TVs cuz it kinda seems like you may be better off buying a large ass monitor with a pi or potato PC attached.
I'm putting together a parts list for a new living room set up. We're getting a giant digital signage display and connecting it to my htpc.
Happy I stuck with my older Samsung dumb TV. Great screen, decent size, flat enough to mount on a wall, and does everything I need it to do regarding hooking up my little i5/8GB baby office PC turned media hub. I don't care that it's only 1080p, looks just fine when I'm in bed and watching movies on it. Even when smart devices were first becoming THE thing to have, the idea of having to download updates for my TV got me thinking about the more nefarious aspects of such tech the future may hold.
I think a lot of it comes down to me just not being very materialistic, or needing my household devices to be internet ready with installed apps and no way of managing permissions or data harvesting. Even my cars are older, and were made well before integrated SIM cards and constant data collection, and I've no plans to upgrade any time soon. I guess I just never 'got' the appeal of having a smart device that wasn't just my phone (and even then, I barely use any apps on my phone outside a web browser (which eliminates the need for most apps anyway) and the camera.)
TV is a TV. Nothing changed at all.
Or follow the directions in section 1(L), as shown in your screenshot. That section says you can opt out by sending a letter to Roku with your name, contact info, product, Roku account email address, and receipt (if applicable). If you feel so strongly about this, opting out is not hard.
Also those terms have been published since 2019 so I don't know why people are only making a stink about it now. I'd bet that the dispute resolution agreement was in the same terms you agreed to the last time they changed, or when you first set it up.
Cool. Can you buy something else and stop talking about it for days now?