Re-read your Disney+ and ESPN+ Subscriber Agreement. (You’ve read it before, right?) This time, read it a bit more closely. A man named Jeffrey Piccolo is learning this lesson the hard way — as if his life as of late has not been hard enough already.
Piccolo is suing the Walt Disney Company after his wife, Kanokporn Tangsuan, died following an allergic reaction to food served at Disney World’s Disney Springs restaurant Raglan Road. Piccolo says in a lawsuit (obtained by IndieWire) that he and Tangsuan, who were aware of her food allergies, had repeatedly been “assured” her food as served there was “allergen free.” A medical examiner’s report found Tangsuan’s cause of death was “anaphylaxis due to elevated levels of dairy and nut in her system.”
Piccolo filed a wrongful death suit against Disney Parks. He is seeking “in excess of $50,000,” as well as attorney’s fees and other costs. First, he’s just seeking a trial by jury.
Here comes the nonsense part. Disney responded with a motion to compel for arbitration instead. Why? “In November 2019, Piccolo initially created a Disney account through the Disney+ website,” the motion (also obtained by IndieWire) reads.
We all did: Disney+ launched in the U.S. on November 12, 2019.
You might ask, what in the world does the death of his wife have to do with watching TV? Well, according to Disney, signing up for Disney+ means its subscribers can’t sue. They must resolve any “disputes” with The Walt Disney Company and any affiliates by binding arbitration.
The motion continues: “Piccolo completed the registration webform by providing personal information, including his email address, and created a password. Before registering the account, Piccolo had to select ‘Agree & Continue.’ Immediately above was a disclosure notifying Piccolo that ‘[b]y clicking Agree & Continue, you agree to our Subscriber Agreement.’ Piccolo then selected ‘Agree and Continue.’
“There may be instances in which disputes arise between us,” the Disney+ Subscriber Agreement reads, in part. “You, on the one hand, and Disney+ and/or ESPN+, on the other hand, agree to resolve, by binding individual arbitration, all Disputes (including any related disputes involving The Walt Disney Company or its affiliates).”
According to the motion, “disputes” is defined to be for practically any legal issue, at any time. There are carveouts for small-claims courts and intellectual property rights.
Spokespeople for the Walt Disney Company did not immediately respond to IndieWire’s request for comment on this story.
To recap, Disney is arguing that Piccolo (and all of us Disney+ or ESPN+ subscribers) have agreed to arbitrate any “past, present, or future” legal issues with the Walt Disney Company by accepting the streaming service’s Subscriber Agreement. That means no class-action lawsuits and no juries. Selecting “Accept” at the end of the very lengthy Subscriber Agreement legalese so we can access “Bluey” (and all other content) is called a “clickwrap agreement.”
Disney’s attorneys doubled down on their stance, stating that since Piccolo also purchased tickets online to visit Epcot Center (they never went), he was again clickwrapped into basically waiving his right for a jury trial, for basically anything Disney-related. Happiest Place on Earth, my ass.
“Whether Piccolo actually reviewed the Disney Terms is also immaterial,” Disney argues.
To be fair to Disney, it is possible that other streamers have similar shitty clauses in their own subscriber agreements. I reached out to reps for Netflix, Max, Paramount+, Peacock, Apple TV+, and Amazon Prime Video to inquire whether they have similarly insane agreements. A few says they are “looking into it.” (Of course, only Peacock parent NBCUniversal operates a theme park, so any direct comparison is imperfect.)
Disney+ plans start at $7.99 per month — or in Piccolo’s case, much, much more.
