Making AI Headlines · Page 6
Meta Deletes “Train,” Leaves Businesses Reading the Rest
· New York time
Meta has removed the word “train” from revised commercial terms scheduled to take effect October 30, following criticism of the policy's reach. Legal experts had warned that the earlier language appeared to permit extensive scraping of websites linked from business pages. The company has not added language respecting robots.txt, and a spokesperson confirmed that users were not alerted to the wording change. The edit therefore makes the remaining language, rather than the disappearance of one conspicuous word, important to understanding the policy. For businesses and publishers, the practical stakes concern what maintaining a page could mean for linked material. Experts raised the possibility that the terms could affect licensing relationships. Those concerns are interpretations of the policy, not a finding that every feared use has occurred. The episode demonstrates the difference between shortening a controversy and resolving its substance. Removing a word can improve the visual appearance of a paragraph while leaving readers with substantial questions about permissions. Terms of service are already where ordinary verbs go to acquire several floors of legal architecture. A smaller paragraph is welcome, but it is not necessarily a smaller commitment.
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