Subscriber Agreement
This legal agreement (hereinafter "Agreement") between you and Open Source Laboratories, Ltd. (hereinafter "Company") shall serve as the sole authority by which you may access and utilize the online forum service to which it pertains (hereinafter "Service") under any and all applicable statutes governing the act of remotely accessing a computing system and its resources, as well as any other related statutes.
1. OVERVIEW
(a) By subscribing to the Service, you shall legally acquire permission to access the Service (hereinafter "Subscription"). This Subscription shall be granted to you on a temporary, non-exclusive basis.
(b) The software used to operate the Service (hereinafter "Software") is licensed; not sold. No assignment of copyright by the Company may be presumed to have occurred pursuant to the terms herein.
(c) The terms of the Subscription shall apply equally to all parts of the Software and its accompanying material, whether taken separately or as a whole. When taken separately, any viable fragment of the Software or its accompanying material shall constitute a single copy of the Software for licensing purposes. When taken as a whole, a single Subscription shall encompass that entire copy of the Software.
2. GRANT OF LICENCE
(a) The Service operates two distinct tiers of Software: the server-side and the client-side (hereinafter "Server-Side Software" and "Client-Side Software," respectively).
(b) You may cause to be run on your behalf the Server-Side Software by way of the the Client-Side Software.
(c) You may cause to be run on your behalf the Client-Side Software by way of interacting with the Service through its web-based user interface; accessible through your web browser by navigating to the https://www.speaktoamerica.com website (hereinafter "Website").
(d) Any other rights to the Software, not explicitly granted herein, shall derive from the licensing terms covering that portion of the Software. No such derivative right shall in itself confer upon you any rights or responsibilities under the Agreement.
3. GRANT OF SUBSCRIPTION
(a) You may access the Service by way of the user account generated by the Company (hereinafter "Account").
(b) An Account shall be automatically generated on your behalf at the time of initial subscription. Account credentials in the form of a username and a password shall be communicated to you as part of your receipt of purchase.
(c) You shall have the ability to change your password from the account control panel, located on our Website, at any time throughout your Account's lifetime.
(d) Your username shall remain unchanged for the duration of your Account's lifetime.
(e) You shall be responsible for safeguarding your Account credentials. Any reasonable attempt to recover your Account in the event of credential loss on your part shall occur solely at the Company's discretion.
(f) Each Account shall have associated with it a duration of validity (hereinafter "Duration") and a token count (hereinafter "Tokens").
(g) Upon initial subscription, your Account shall be preset to 500 Tokens and 365 days of Duration.
(h) An Account bearing a valid Subscription (per clause 4(a) of the Agreement) may make forum posts and cast upvotes/downvotes on existing posts (hereinafter "Posting") to the extent that its Tokens allow.
(i) Each act of Posting shall expend a single unit of Tokens. Exceptions include such upvotes/downvotes whereby more than one unit of Tokens will have been used.
4. SUBSCRIPTION RENEWAL
(a) A Subscription shall remain valid until its associated Account no longer has any remaining Duration and/or Tokens.
(b) With prejudice to clause 4(d) of the Agreement, a Subscription may be renewed if its associated Account has a remaining Duration of no greater than 30 days.
(c) Should a Subscription be renewed pursuant to clause 4(b) of the Agreement, its associated Account shall gain 500 additional Tokens and 365 additional days of Duration.
(d) Without prejudice to clause 4(b) of the Agreement, a Subscription may be renewed if its associated Account has no remaining Tokens.
(e) Should a Subscription be renewed pursuant to clause 4(d) of the Agreement, its associated Account shall be reset to 500 Tokens and 365 days of Duration, with additional credit of up to 30 days given for any Duration remaining at the time of renewal.
5. RIGHT OF NON-CENSORSHIP
(a) Without prejudice to any clause contained herein and to the extent permitted by law, the Company shall refrain from censoring, deleting, or otherwise obfuscating (hereinafter "Censorship") any user-generated message (hereinafter "Content"), except as set forth in clauses 5(b) through 5(f) of the Agreement.
(b) All Content must conform thematically to the topic or message thread in which said Content is posted. The Company may move any non-conforming Content into a topic to which said Content may reasonably conform. Alternatively, the Company may delete such Content in lieu of a suitable alternate topic.
(c) All topics which make up the forum shall be created, enumerated, and administered by the Company. No topic may be created directly by you and no topic shall be created on your behalf, except at the Company's sole discretion.
(d) Without prejudice to clause 5(b) of the Agreement, all Content must be made in the English language and be free of artifacts deliberately injected for the purpose of disrupting the Service or any component thereof, including, but not limited to ASCII art not thematically related to the topic in which said Content is posted; ASCII-based character floods intended to obscure the viewable window area; and/or any other such character sequences that are intended to disrupt, harm, or overload the Service and/or to hinder its lawful use.
(e) All Content must be of a lawful nature and must be legal to disseminate within the Untied States of America. Any Content in violation of this clause may be subject to Censorship by the Company. The Company may reasonably impose such Censorship at its own discretion or upon being legally compelled by a court of law or law enforcement agency.
(f) All Content must be free from any form of commercial solicitation, including, but not limited to product advertisement, service announcement, enrollment in a paid program or curriculum, or invitation to a paid venue or event. Content in violation of this clause shall be subject to Censorship by the Company without further clarification, warning, or recourse pursuant to the terms herein.
(g) With prejudice to clause 5(a) of the Agreement, all Content posted to an existing message thread (hereinafter "Secondary Content"), to the exclusion of the thread-starting message (hereinafter "Primary Content"), shall be included in any acts of Censorship applied to the Primary Content, without recourse or further consideration, even if said Secondary Content should not in itself be censorable pursuant to the terms herein.
(h) Without prejudice to clause 5(b) of the Agreement, you shall have the right to edit your Content for up to one (1) hour following its Posting (hereinafter "Editing"). No such Editing shall be permitted for any Content having been replied to, voted upon, or subjected to Censorship.
6. RIGHT OF NON-INFRINGEMENT
(a) You may flag for Censorship by the Company (hereinafter "Flagging") any Content that infringes upon your intellectual property rights, provided that such a pertinent claim of infringement should fall under the legal jurisdiction of the United States of America.
(b) You may request the Flagging of any Content that infringes upon any legal right(s) within the jurisdiction of the United States of America, provided that you are lawfully charged with the task of enforcing, administering, or assisting in the enforcement or administration of said legal right(s); there exists a documented and lawful basis for your request (e.g., a warrant or court order) OR you possess statutory authority in lieu of such a warrant or court order; AND you are properly credentialed.
(c) Upon receiving a Flagging request pursuant to clauses 6(a) or 6(b) of the Agreement and without prejudice to clause 6(f) of the same, to the extent permitted by law, the Company shall make a reasonable effort to apply means of Censorship to the Content in question, which shall render said Content invisible to all users.
(d) Upon having subjected to Censorship any Content pursuant to clause 6(c) of the Agreement, to the extent permitted by law, the Company shall cause to be displayed to its staff and to the requesting party (hereinafter "Requestant") any and all information contained in the relevant Flagging request in place of said Content and to the exclusion thereof.
(e) You may request the removal of Censorship previously applied to your Content (hereinafter "Unflagging"), provided that there exists a lawful basis for the request and that no violation of any part of the Agreement should occur therewith. You must communicate to the Company said basis at the time that such an Unflagging request is made.
(f) Upon receiving an Unflagging request pursuant to clause 6(e) of the Agreement, without prejudice to any other rights and to the extent permitted by law, the Company shall make a reasonable effort to remove all relevant means of Censorship applied to the Content in question.
(g) It shall be your exclusive responsibility to monitor and verify the current status of your Content, including its Censorship status.
7. RESTRICTIONS
(a) You may not rent, sublet, or sublicense any aspect of your Subscription, whether in whole or in part, without express written authorization by the Company.
(b) You may not engage in the Posting of Content in violation of clauses 5(b) through 5(f) of the Agreement.
(c) You may not engage in the Posting of Content intended to mirror, repost, restate, or otherwise copy any Content previously subjected to Censorship pursuant to clause 5(a) of the Agreement, until such a censored post has been marked as uncensored.
(d) You hereby agree and acknowledge that any and all acts of Posting which should incur a token cost shall not be refundable, even if the Content in question is subjected to Censorship or deletion by the Company pursuant to the terms herein.
(e) You hereby agree and acknowledge that any and all Flagging requests issued in bad faith or with malicious intent shall constitute acts of abuse against the Service for purposes of clause 8(a) of the Agreement.
(f) The Company may display third-party commercial advertisements upon the Website, well outside of its main content area. No part of the Agreement shall serve to absolve you from viewing said advertisements; nor serve to legally compel you to purchase any products or services thus advertised; nor serve to preclude you from discussing, in any manner of personal disposition, any of our third-party advertisers, their products, or services, provided that such a discussion should occur consistent with clauses 5(b) through 5(f) of the Agreement.
8. ACCOUNT TERMINATION
(a) The Company shall have the right to suspend or terminate any Account engaged in an ongoing pattern of abuse against the Service.
(b) The suspension or termination of an Account shall have no impact on the integrity of any Content associated with said Account, which shall remain undisturbed consistent with the terms herein.
(c) Unless terminated pursuant to clause 8(a) of the Agreement, the Company shall make a reasonable effort to maintain your Account for at least one (1) calendar year following its most recent login timestamp.
(d) You hereby agree and acknowledge that any and all Duration and/or Tokens associated with an Account terminated pursuant to clauses 8(a) or 8(c) of the Agreement shall not be refundable.
9. LEGAL ACTION
(a) Without prejudice to any part of the Agreement, you hereby acknowledge that your use of the Service is subject to the laws of the United States of America. You further agree and acknowledge that no part of the Agreement shall in itself serve to absolve, excuse, or indemnify you in regard to any legal responsibilities incurred therewith.
(b) You hereby agree to indemnify and hold harmless the Company in regard to any and all legal claims of wrongdoing on your part, whether intentional or unintentional, which may arise in any way from, out of, or in connection with your use of the Service or any of its components. In no event shall the Company be held liable for any legal expenses or obligations incurred either by you or any interested third party in the course of such a legal proceeding.
10. SCOPE OF AGREEMENT
(a) The scope of this Agreement shall extend exclusively and in equal measure to all parts of the Service to which you will have purchased access.
(b) All Content shall be governed by that respective version of the Agreement under which its Posting will have occurred.
(c) In the event of subscription term overlap, any and all affected Content shall be governed by the more recent version of the Agreement.
11. DISCLAIMER OF CONTENT OWNERSHIP
THIS SERVICE OPERATES AS A "PLATFORM" RATHER THAN A "PUBLISHER" AND HEREBY DISCLAIMS ANY AND ALL OWNERSHIP OF THE CONTENT PUBLISHED, STORED, SERVED, OR TRANSMITTED, WHETHER IN WHOLE OR IN PART, BY WAY OF ITS WEBSITE, SERVERS, OR NETWORKING INFRASTRUCTURE. UNLESS EXPLICITLY MARKED OTHERWISE, ANY AND ALL CONTENT SO PUBLISHED SHALL BE PRESUMED TO HAVE BEEN RELEASED INTO THE PUBLIC DOMAIN FOR PURPOSES OF COPYRIGHT, TO WHICH YOU HEREBY AGREE AND CONSENT TO THE FULLEST EXTENT OF THE LAW.
12. LIMITATION OF LIABILITY
THIS SERVICE AND THE SOFTWARE UNDERLYING IT ARE PROVIDED BY THE SERVICE OPERATOR(S) AND COPYRIGHT HOLDER(S) "AS IS" AND ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, ARE HEREBY DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE SERVICE OPERATOR(S), COPYRIGHT HOLDER(S), AND/OR THE ORIGINAL AUTHOR(S) BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE), ARISING IN ANY WAY FROM, OUT OF, OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE USE OF THIS SERVICE AND/OR SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE.
