Read fine print: win money, cure syphilis!

Two recent stories show it sometimes pays to read the fine print.

First, a software maker buried a $1,000 prize in its clickthrough "end user license agreement," free to the first person requesting it. Only after 4 months and over 3,000 downloads did anyone collect.

Now it turns out that for years, the Los Angeles Gay & Lesbian Center was dispensing the wrong penicillin formulation for syphilis -- one that had only half the recommended dosage. After 5 years and more than 650 undertreated patients, someone finally "read a package insert stating the medicine he received was not intended for the treatment of syphilis.". Astounding!

Read -- or at least skim -- the fine print every once in a while!

Technorati Tags: clickthrough, eula, penicillin, fineprint, syphilis, legalese

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