The deal you never made
It changes who writes the contract.
First party, second party
In contract law, the party who proposes the agreement is the first party. On today’s web, that’s always the company. You are, at best, a second party who can take it or leave it — and leaving it usually means leaving.
MyTerms inverts the roles. You proffer a term. The site accepts it, or proposes one of the alternatives from the same public roll. Both sides sign. Both sides keep the record.
Why a roll, not a free-for-all
If everyone wrote their own terms, no site could ever agree to them at scale. So the terms come from a short, public roll maintained by a neutral nonprofit — the same reason Creative Commons has six licences rather than six million.
A site can implement support for the whole roll once, and then honour whichever term each visitor brings.
THE MECHANISM, IN ONE PARAGRAPH
The first party points to a preferred agreement from the roll. The second party accepts one of them. The contract is signed electronically by both parties or their agents. A matching record is kept by both sides, in a form that can be retrieved, audited or disputed later.
WHAT IT IS NOT
Not a consent banner. Not a browser setting. Not a request you hope is honoured. It is a contract, formed the way contracts are formed, with evidence on both sides.
QUESTIONS PEOPLE ASK
Do I have to read legal code?
Can I have different terms for different sites?
Yes. Most people will set one default and make exceptions — your bank may reasonably need to keep more than a news site does.
Do I need an AI to use this?
No. An agent can be as simple as a browser extension. As agents get more capable they’ll handle more of the negotiation, but the standard works without one.