The term `cloud computing' conveniently lacks a certain intuitiveness. It's a hot topic in lots of industries; Dell even tried unsuccessfully to trademark the term. For now, Google's aggressive embrace of the cloud computing concept is having the most direct impact for most of us out there on the interweb. Anyone who uses Google's Gmail and Google Docs is essentially benefitting from cloud computing. But wouldn't ya know there had to be a potential dark side to all this `free' stuff that many don't consider when using these services. Consider this fascinating story in the Houston Chronicle, describing how under the services' terms of use, Google reserves unlimited rights to use your content. E-commerce attorney and Vogel IT Law Blog author Peter Vogel says attorneys should think twice about communicating via gmail accounts because the terms could be interpreted as waiving the attorney-client privilege.

According to the Chronicle: Google, which prides itself on not being evil, offers a few more protections in its online legal agreement that everyone accepts before using its products. The agreement states that users retain the copyright to content they post, submit or display using Google's services. But Google gets "perpetual, irrevocable, worldwide, royalty-free and nonexclusive license to reproduce, adapt, modify, translate, publish, publicly perform, publicly display and distribute" any of the content. What's more, Google can make that content available to any companies or organizations it chooses.

"Most people do not pay any attention to what the terms of use are, but courts all over the world enforce those terms of use," said Peter Vogel, an attorney with Gardere Wynne Sewell in Dallas who teaches a course at Southern Methodist University on the law and e-commerce.

So the problem remains: What you put in cloud services such as Docs and Gmail, Google's free Web-based e-mail, isn't really yours anymore. Google doesn't make money by giving us gigantic e-mail accounts. Its profit comes in part from selling ads tied to the content of messages sent with those accounts. In other words, it's sifting through our messages, looking for sales leads. And it's not just Google. "When one uses an online service - Google, Yahoo, AOL - there's a click agreement that nobody ever reads. Somewhere embedded in the agreement you waive all sorts of ownership issues," Vogel said.