The Terms of Service lay out pretty clearly the rights of ownership of material, but section 11.1 grants Google a "perpetual" and "irrevocable" license to deliver the content. I understand why this would be a necessary provision during the term of the relationship.
My question is does this grant of license survive termination of the relationship (as in section 13)? Section 13 defines certain provisions that survive termination (Section 4, and 20.7 for example) but does not address section 11.1. This seems contradictory to the meaning of "prepetual" and "irrevocable". If the right of Google to continue to use the material does survive termination of the relationship, that should be noted in section 13 (along with the other provisions that continue). If the rights of Google do not survive termination, then they are neither perpetual, nor irrevocable and the language should be clarified.
I understand it is easier for Google to ask for (require) a perpetual and irrevocable license, but my understanding of the values of Google as a company was that you were less interested in doing what was easy and more focused on "not being evil."
I am looking at Picassa to share some family photos, so the copyright issue is not business critical, but since I have a few extra moments this morning and I don't understand how section 11 and section 13 are reconciled, I thought I would ask.
I appreciate the quality and availability of a service like Picassa, but I've often found that "standard legal terms" found in click-through licenses sometimes require a bit of push-back from the user in order to help the environment evolve.
Thank you for the service (I hope I can agree to your terms) and thank you for your time.
Yah! Mee too! .. wonder, wonder, wonder.. (wait wait waiting)
