Right now, these have to be part of a contract, and no Cloud provider will agree to these terms...

What's Needed For Freedom In the Cloud?

"Georg Greve from Free Software Foundation Europe has often been asked to explain what he considers necessary prerequisites for an open, free, sustainable approach toward what is often called 'The Cloud,' or also 'Software as a Service.' He gives 7 ingredients that are necessary for freedom in the cloud. For example, 'it should be illegal to change privacy policies on users without their explicit consent. They need to know what is changing, and how, and what will be the resulting level of privacy they enjoy – in the same clear, transparent and understandable manner.'"

Interesting advice in the Comments section. Short Version: “You're screwed”

Ask Slashdot: Dealing With the Business Software Alliance?

"We've just gotten a letter from an attorney representing the Business Software Alliance stating someone (we're certain it's a disgruntled former employee) submitted information we are using illegally copied software. The thing is... we're not using illegally copied software. We have licenses for all the commercial software we are using. Still, according to articles on the BSA, that's irrelevant and they'll end up suing us anyway. So we now need a lawyer to deal with their claims and we don't have the money — this will surely be the end of the company into which I've sunk all my savings and three years of my life. Has anybody dealt with the Business Software Alliance before? What action should I take? Is there any sort of financial recourse, or at least a way cover our legal fees?"

Backup your desktop to the Cloud, then backup the Cloud...

http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/cloud-export-online-data-hard-drive-windows-ubuntu/

Cloud Export: Back Up Your Online Data To Your Hard Drive [Windows & Ubuntu]

,,,The cloud is great, but it’s out of your hands. Most of the time that’s fine, but there is always the chance that something goes wrong cloud-side. As such, if you really want to know that your information is safe, you should back it up yourself. That’s why the Data Liberation Front, a service provided by Google, offers guides for backing up Google products.

Guides are nice, but automated software is better. CloudExport is based on what Data Liberation offers; it’s just automated.

… Get started by downloading Cloud Export.

If this works as well as the “speech to search” feature, I can finally start writing my Great American Novel...

Speech to Text in Google Chrome

Speech recognition software can be very pricey, but adding a speech recognition option to your computer doesn't have to be expensive. If you use Google's Chrome web browser one of the apps you can add it to is a Speech Recognizer. The Speech Recognizer available through the Chrome Web Store is free and easy to use.

To use the Chrome Speech Recognizer just install it from the Chrome Web Store, launch it, then click the microphone to start taking and recording your voice. The Speech Recognizer will type out your text when you finish recording. You can then copy and paste your text to the paragraph box below the Speech Recognizer or to a document you have open in Google Docs.