The LiveJournal Terms of Service was originally word for word ripped off from one of [[Yahoo!]]'s. Though written in legalese, it is easier to understand than many click-through EULAs. Its words often completely conflict with the [[secret policy document]] that [[LJ Abuse]] uses to enforce the TOS. This leads many to believe it is a [[bullshit|mysterious]] and subjectively enforced thing. Its inconsistent and arbitrary enforcement by LJ Abuse has caused somewhat of an exodus from [[LiveJournal]] including such [[internet celebrity|internet celebrities]] as [[jameth]].
[[LJ Abuse]] likes to claim the LJ TOS protects LJ from legal liability. However, none of the [[LJ Abuse]] staffers has studied law and obviously don't understand law; although Brad's mom likes to watch Matlock reruns. Neither the TOS nor the [[secret policy document]] have ever been reviewed by an actual attorney.
Upon the [[Livejournal_Buyout|buyout]] of LiveJournal by Six Apart [[Brad]] had this to say:
Why is the TOS and privacy policy changing?
Our old TOS and privacy policies apparently sucked, from a lawyer point-of-view. We never had lawyers create or really even review the old ones... they were just a hodge-podge of misc lawyer-sounding things people had collected over time. A lot of the things that were changed are actually now better for the users. We just needed to clean things up.