Since 2006 — Harvard Berkman Klein Center

You own
your data.
Full stop.

ProjectVRM is building the tools, standards, and movement that put individuals in charge of their own digital lives — starting with MyTerms (IEEE 7012), the standard that kills surveillance at the root.

Get MyTerms What is VRM? VRM Day 2026
The Problem

The web turned you into a gullet with a wallet and eyeballs. Every click tracked. Every preference harvested. Every "privacy choice" a theater designed by the people stealing from you.

Cookie notices aren't consent. They're corporate protection rackets dressed in legalese. You have no record. You have no recourse. You have no real choice.

Regulations failed. GDPR failed. CCPA failed. They all aimed at reducing corporate power — none gave you independent agency. That changes now.

"The only way we will get privacy is with contracts — laws that two parties make for themselves."

— Doc Searls, ProjectVRM
$742B
Global adtech surveillance economy — built on your data, without your real consent
8 yrs
Years in development — IEEE 7012 (MyTerms) published January 2026
0
Cookie notices that actually give you an auditable, enforceable record. Zero.
∞
Possibilities when free customers transact on their own terms
Live Now — IEEE 7012-2025
The Solution

Meet MyTerms

The standard that flips the script. You proffer your privacy terms. Companies agree. Contracts. Not theater.

How MyTerms Works

MyTerms (IEEE P7012) creates machine-readable privacy contracts that you initiate as the first party. Companies respond as the second party. Both sides use agents — browser plugins, AI agents — to reach and record binding agreements. No more one-sided cookie notices. No more naked browsing.

01 / PERSON

You Proffer

Your agent presents your chosen MyTerms agreement — e.g., "Service Delivery only. No tracking. No third-party sharing."

02 / HANDSHAKE

Machine Agrees

The company's agent accepts (or counters). Both sides sign electronically. Both keep auditable records.

03 / CONTRACT

Relationship Begins

You get the service. They get a trustworthy customer. Enforced by plain contract law. No new legislation needed.

Explore MyTerms IEEE Standard → Customer Commons →
Mission

Three Goals.
One Movement.

ProjectVRM began in 2006 with a simple thesis. MyTerms makes it real.

⚡

VRM as a Business Category

Vendor Relationship Management — tools that work for you in your relationships with businesses — welcomed and engaged by CRM and CX functions on the sell side of every market.

🔓

Free > Captive

Proof — real, market-tested proof — that free customers are worth more than captive ones. To companies. To markets. To themselves. The data will be undeniable.

🌐

The Intention Economy

When voluntary signals from customers outperform surveillance as the primary means for companies to learn about demand, the fecosystem collapses. Markets work again.

From the Blog

Latest Writing

Doc Searls and contributors on VRM, MyTerms, privacy, and the future of markets.

MyTerms Privacy VRM VRM+CRM Advertising AI Customer Commons Identity Freedom Events
Featured April 7, 2026 • Doc Searls

Shooting for the World

There is no organisation on Earth with a more audacious purpose than Customer Commons. This isn't shooting for the Moon — it's shooting for the whole world of business. Customer Commons wants to restore not just what was lost when the Internet got real, but the personal agency lost when Industry won the Industrial Revolution. That's when jobs replaced work, labour replaced teams, and customers became consumers — or as Jerry Michalski explains, "gullets with wallets and eyeballs." MyTerms is required for everything. Here's how we build the movement.

Read full post
Privacy Mar 27, 2026

Without Privacy, VRM Can't Happen

Nor can CRM. Not really. The middle name of both is Relationship, and relationships require respect for boundaries. Helen Nissenbaum on why obfuscation is still needed — and why MyTerms goes further.

Read more
News Mar 23, 2026

Making a New News Business

The news galaxy has shrunk to white dwarfs in empty deserts. How do we re-institutionalize journalism with MyTerms, personal AI agents, and value exchanges that reward everyone — readers and publishers alike?

Read more
MyTerms Jan 13, 2026

The Only Way to Get Privacy Online

No regulation will work. GDPR failed. CCPA failed. They reduce corporate power but never gave you independent agency. Contracts are the only answer. And you must be the one proffering them.

Read more
Research Dec 27, 2025

Writings on the Failings of Notice & Consent

A comprehensive collection of scholarly sources — from USENIX to CMU — documenting how cookie notices fail, how GDPR is gamed, and how the adtech machine keeps running regardless of your "choices."

Read more
Branding Dec 22, 2025

When Branding Means Relating

"Madison Avenue fell asleep, direct response marketing ate its brain, and it woke up as an alien replica of itself." What brand means now — and why VRM+CRM is the answer.

Read more
MyTerms Dec 8, 2025

A MyTerms Summary

MyTerms gives strength to the Internet's fabric of human connections. Contracts replace consents. Mutual agency replaces coercion. Civilization requires privacy — and we finally have the standard to create it.

Read more
Events Oct 13, 2025

Gathering the MyTerms Troops

Consumer Reports. Sir Tim Berners-Lee. MyData Global. Kwaai. The coalition is forming. VRM Day, IIW, and AIW — this is where the work gets real. Here's what's happening and who's involved.

Read more
Protocols Sep 6, 2025

Protocols for MyTerms

A2A, ActivityPub, AT Protocol, DIDComm, GNAP, JLINC, MCP, NANDA, Nostr, OAuth, Solid, UMA — the full alphabetized map of how MyTerms plugs into every protocol layer of the emerging agentic web.

Read more
Older Posts →
Before vs. After

The World MyTerms Builds

Same web. Completely different power structure.

Feature ☠ Current Surveillance System ✦ MyTerms World
Privacy Corporate "consent" — you click Accept or get nothing Your contract, your terms, machine-enforced, auditable
Agency Dependent "users" — gullets with wallets Independent persons with loyal AI agents working for them
Data Harvested without real consent, sold to thousands of parties Voluntarily shared under mutually agreed terms only
Advertising Surveillance-fed targeting — junk mail at machine scale Intentcasting — you signal what you want, companies respond
Relationships "Loyalty" programs designed to trap and manipulate Genuine relationships built on mutual respect and value
Enforcement Corporate promises worth the pixels they're printed on Plain contract law. Auditable. Enforceable. Real.
Markets Walled gardens, paywalls, coerced subscriptions Open exchanges where value flows both ways
Take Action

Jump In. Now.

The work is real. The standard is published. What are you waiting for?

Standard

MyTerms.info

The homepage for IEEE 7012. Learn the standard. Find the draft agreements. Start building.
Organization

Customer Commons

The nonprofit that spun out of ProjectVRM. Doing for privacy terms what Creative Commons did for copyright.
Manifesto

Privacy Manifesto

The foundational argument for personal privacy as a human right, not a corporate grace.
Wiki

VRM Development Work

The living directory of projects, tools, companies, and efforts in the VRM ecosystem.
Event

VRM Day 2026

April 27 at the Computer History Museum, Silicon Valley. Free. In-person and online.
Event

IIW — Internet Identity Workshop

The unconference where identity, VRM, and MyTerms work gets done. April 28–30, 2026.
Foundation

About ProjectVRM

Started at Harvard's Berkman Klein Center in 2006. The original mission, the full history, the vision.
Book

The Intention Economy

Doc Searls' 2012 manifesto that named the goal and inspired Tim Berners-Lee's Solid Project.
Personal AI

Kwaai

Open source Personal AI — your agent, loyal only to you. The infrastructure MyTerms needs.
April 27 – May 1, 2026

Show Up.
Change Everything.

Three events. One week. Computer History Museum, Silicon Valley. This is where MyTerms implementation begins — in rooms full of builders, thinkers, and people who refuse to be gullets.

Register for VRM Day (Free) Agentic Internet Workshop
Free VRM Day Monday, April 27 IIW Internet Identity Workshop Apr 28–30, 2026 New Agentic Internet Workshop Friday, May 1

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