oddly enough

oddly enough

Norway subjects viewers to 2-day stream of app terms of use

HELSINKI

A Norwegian consumers’ group took inspiration from “slow television” to produce a marathon webcast of a team of readers going through the fine print of terms and conditions of downloadable apps.

Finn Myrstad from the Norwegian Consumer Council says the idea was to point out the “absurdity” and even illegality of some of the conditions. The Runkeeper apologized to its 45 million users after the council revealed that it was tracking and sending user information to a third party even when not in use.

Myrstad said the team decided to read and analyze the small print of some 20 apps over six months, discovering that many of them broke the law.

“We got the idea from slow TV, and we wanted to expose the absurdity of the terms and conditions of when you download an app,” he told the AP. “You usually don’t read them because they’re either too long or complicated, and many of them breach consumer law and data-protection laws.”

The show began Tuesday morning, with the team reading through the terms of about 30 popular apps. It ended 32 hours later. The council later tweeted a 12-second recap of the broadcast.

Norway has popularized “slow television,” putting five hours of knitting, a fire burning itself out and minute-by-minute salmon fishing live on TV.

Firefighters rescue naked man from Iowa business’s chimney

CARROLL, Iowa

Carrie Sapp teased her husband, Brad, about being afraid of ghosts when he said he heard someone whisper “get out of here” while he was sorting cans at his Iowa recycling business. Of course it wasn’t a ghost. It was a naked man in the chimney.

Sapp said she was working the next morning at the Carroll Redemption Center when she heard a man yell for help from the chimney. She told the Daily Times Herald that the man explained, “I was playing hide-and-seek with my cousin. ... Don’t call the cops!”

The police were called, as was the fire department, which eventually managed to free the soot-covered, naked man.

Firefighters initially planned to use a rope to pull Jordan Kajewski from the chimney, but eventually opted to hammer a hole in it and pulled him out.

Though naked, the 29-year-old Kajewski had his clothes with him.

“This was definitely a first for the Carroll Fire Department,” Fire Chief Greg Schreck said.

Brad Sapp said he knew Kajewski because he’d asked three times in recent weeks for a job at the company in Carroll, which is about 75 miles northwest of Des Moines.

Kajewski was charged with trespassing. Court records didn’t list an attorney for him.

Associated Press