The Vanguard Group is an investment company which manages over $1,500,000,000,000 (one and a half trillion dollars) of other people's money.
They look after people’s life savings, so it’s understandable that their Terms and Conditions of Use are strict. First, in this excerpt they deny users the right to do almost anything. The bold is theirs.
Except as otherwise stated in these Terms of Use or as expressly authorized by Vanguard in writing, you may not (or enable others to):
That’s a long list, but let me extract one example from it: “You may not enable others to display materials obtained from this Site.” The wording is hard to interpret, but it sounds like even linking is disallowed unless otherwise noted.
Then they “generously” allow some exceptions.
You may not link to this Site unless you comply with these linking conditions ("Linking Conditions"). Vanguard grants you a limited, revocable, nonexclusive right to create a hyperlink to this Site ("Link"), provided you comply at all times with the following conditions:
If you have created a Link that conforms to these Linking Conditions, then you also may include one or more Links to any internal or subsidiary page of this Site that is located one or several levels down from the homepages (known as "deep links"), provided, however, that all such deep links must be in close physical proximity to the Link that conforms to the Linking Conditions. You may not maintain numerous or pervasive Links to this Site.
Also complicated, but here’s how it boils down: If you link at all, you must have a link to the front page. Once you have a link to the front page, you can link to inside pages (“deep linking”) with some restrictions.
Having a link to the front page is good practice anyway. What’s so silly about requiring good practice? Well, how are they going to enforce it? I see two cases.
Case 1. Suppose you have no account with Vanguard. How will they enforce the linking restrictions? Threats of legal action might make some people reconsider. If they actually sue you, for the TOS to apply at all they have to argue in court that linking to the website constitutes using it. Is a judge going to buy that? And even more basically, how could unapproved links be more costly to Vanguard than a lawsuit?
Case 2. Suppose you do have a Vanguard account, and you want to use the Vanguard website to (say) manage your investments. Then Vanguard has more leverage: You’re in violation of the TOS, so they can deny you access. But why would they? The major reason they provide the website, and the only reason that they promote it so much, is that it’s cheaper for them to provide a fully-automated service through the web than a partially automated service by phone and U.S. mail. How bad does a link have to be before it’s more costly than a phone operator?
Maybe Vanguard has thought of all this, and just wants to scare people into being nice. How do you prefer to think of them, stupid or nasty?
The terms relating to RSS feeds are silly too.
Vanguard grants you a limited, revocable, nonexclusive right to view, store, bookmark, access, download, display, create hyperlinks to and use the Really Simple Syndication and podcast feeds (collectively, the "Feeds") offered by Vanguard solely for your personal, informational and noncommercial use or as otherwise authorized by Vanguard in writing, provided you comply at all times with the following conditions:
Again extracting one example from the long lists: “Vanguard grants you a revocable license to bookmark” the RSS feeds. Bookmarks are particularly silly to restrict, because they’re entirely private. If Vanguard revokes your bookmarking license and you bookmark anyway, how are they going to find out?
This version of Vanguard's TOS downloaded 26 November 2011.