Marriage Advocates'
Terms of Service
Marriage Advocates' Terms of Service,
sometimes referred to as "TOS," govern your use of and
access to our Forums. The terms are dynamic and Marriage Advocates
reserves the right to revise them at any time. Said revisions
will become effective upon posting of the modified terms on the
Marriage Advocates' website.
By registering as a Member, you agree
to abide by these terms as revised from time to time. Any violation
of these terms may result in the suspension or termination of your
right to access the Forums and/or such other remedies as contained
herein.
These Forums are a free discussion
place where you can exchange information about marriage programs with
other Members, offer support and advice about marriage, and discuss
opportunities to promote marriage and strong families. Please note
that the Forums were launched so that our Members can interact and exchange their experiences and
marriage resources with one another. These are English language
Forums, but Members from all over the world are welcome.
Registration
No person is obligated to register in
order to access the Forums and read the message boards, with certain
exceptions. However, registration (via provision of a valid email
address, Member name and password) and login are required in order to
post to the message boards and adjust Member settings.
Marriage Advocates will handle all
information received from you in accordance with Marriage Advocates'
policy, but does reserve the right to release information as set
forth herein.
When you register, you will also be
asked to enter personal information. When choosing a Member name and
filling out your profile, bear in mind that whenever you post to a
message board, your Member name, link to your profile, and online
status will appear when you are on Marriage Advocates' site. Your
profile may display historical information such as “joined,”
“last visit” and number of posts.
Marriage Advocates may refuse to grant
you, and you may not use, a Member name (or email address) that is
already being used by someone else, impersonates another person,
belongs to another person (without his or her prior consent),
violates the intellectual property or other rights of any person, is
vulgar or otherwise offensive, or that Marriage Advocates rejects for
any other reason at its sole discretion.
Marriage Advocates' Moderators and
Screening Process:
Although the Marriage Advocates' Member
Forums are moderated and Marriage Advocates does permit members to
give advice in the Member forums, this is not a replacement for
individual or marriage counseling and accordingly, there is no
guarantee that the advice will be helpful or that your questions will
be answered.
Please note that Marriage Advocates
does not warrant or guarantee the accuracy, reliability,
completeness, usefulness, non-infringement of intellectual property
rights, or quality of any content on the Marriage Advocates Forums,
regardless of who originates that content. You expressly understand
and agree that you bear all risks associated with using or relying on
that content. Marriage Advocates will not be liable or responsible in
any way for any content posted including, but not limited to, any
errors or omissions in content, or for any losses or damage of any
kind incurred as a result of the use of, or reliance on, any content.
Marriage Advocates does not assume any
obligation to screen, verify or edit the content posted by Members in
the Forums. Marriage Advocates may at its sole discretion, screen,
verify or edit content posted by Members in the Forum in accordance
with these Terms of Service and Moderators' Manual which are subject
to amendment from time to time. Marriage Advocates and its agents
reserve the right to investigate any violation of the Marriage
Advocates' Terms of Service and to take appropriate action.
Marriage Advocates has absolute
discretion and right to enforce these terms, including, but not
limited to: warning Members of violations, disabling or suspending
message privileges and/or Forum access, deleting, screening or
editing any content, or prohibiting any behavior that does not comply
with these terms, including the rules set forth below, or which is
otherwise inappropriate for the Forums, harmful, objectionable, or
inaccurate.
The determination of what conduct is
violative of these Terms of Service and the remedy imposed are at the
sole discretion of Marriage Advocates and its agents.
If you want further information on the
moderation policies of Marriage Advocates, the Moderation Manual is
posted in the Welcome Forum.
Links
Marriage Advocates permits Members to
post hypertext links to content hosted and maintained by third
parties. Although linked sites may or may not be reviewed by Marriage
Advocate moderators, links are subject to treatment like any other
type of content posted to the Forums. You may not include a link,
including embedded video/audio links, in the Forum that directs
Members to any content or information that, if posted in the Forum,
would constitute a violation of these terms without
an appropriate warning issued by the member posting. Our Administrators and Moderators are not responsible for posting warnings for a
member.
As a Member, be advised that when
leaving the Forums using any link provided by a Member, Marriage
Advocates' terms and policies no longer govern, and, therefore, you
should review the applicable terms and policies of the linked site.
If you access a linked site and find the materials to be in
violation of these terms, you may report the link as described below.
Marriage Advocates makes no claim or representation regarding, and
accepts no responsibility for, the quality, content, nature or
reliability of sites accessible by hyperlink from the Forums.
Thunderdome Rules
Marriage Advocates provides a specific
forum where controversial subjects may be discussed. Thunderdome has
been created to discuss and debate issues and topics not appropriate
for other Forums, specifically but not limited to meta debates and
discussions that tend to erupt in threads meant to provide advice to
those in need.
Entrance to Thunderdome is automatic
upon signature to this Marriage Advocates Terms of Service and will
activate after the posting of at least 25 posts in other Forums.
Members read and participate in Thunderdome discussions at their own
risk.
Moderation rules are specifically
different in Thunderdome from those applicable in other Forums and
are as set out at the top of that forum and in the Moderator Manual, the link to which is provided
elsewhere in this Terms of Service.
General Rules
We encourage you to use caution and not
reveal information that you do not want to make public in your
postings. Any personal information that you post can be obtained and
used by others. Anything you post in the Forums, you post at your own
risk. You use the Forums at your own risk. In any online Forum like
the Marriage Advocates Forums, it is not possible to be sure that
other Members are who they say they are, know what they say they
know, or are affiliated with whom they say they are affiliated.
By participating in the Forums,
including the posting of content and sending of messages, you agree
that you will not upload, post, embed, or otherwise transmit any
content (including text, links, communications, software, images,
videos, sounds, data, or other information) that:
(i)is unlawful, harmful, threatening,
abusive, harassing, defamatory, libelous, invasive of privacy,
vulgar, profane, sexually explicit, obscene, racially or ethnically
offensive or otherwise objectionable;
(ii)reflects personal information of
any kind, from whatever source derived, about any Member not publicly
disclosed by that Member without the express written consent of that
Member secured prior to such disclosure;
(iii)infringes on any patent,
trademark, trade secret, copyright, or other proprietary rights of
any party;
(iv)constitutes advertising or
promotion, junk mail, "spamming," chain letters, or any
other form of unauthorized solicitation;
(v)contains software viruses, Trojan
horses, worms, time bombs, cancelbots or any other computer code or
files that are designed to disrupt, damage, or limit the functioning
of any software or hardware;
(vi)intentionally interferes with the
operation of the Forums or attempts to turn help threads into venues for meta-discussions;
(vii)impersonates any person or entity,
or forges any TCP-IP packet header, e-mail header or any part of a
message header;
(viii)attacks or insults another Forum
Member by any method including, but not limited to, ridicule, badgering,
slander, innuendo, insinuation or any technique intended to
discredit, defame or slander another member or person;
(ix)suggests or encourages illegal
activity; or
(x)violates US or international laws or
regulations.
In plain English, this board is not,
and never will be, a place to engage in name calling, personal
attacks or accusations of a personal nature. Characterizations of
someone's posts as not worthy are specifically prohibited.
Alternative
opinions are encouraged, but not in the form of disparaging or
discrediting the opinions of others.
You agree to indemnify and hold
Marriage Advocates, its subsidiaries, officers, and agents,
Administrators, Moderators, and Advisory Board members harmless from
any claim, including reasonable Attorneys' fees, made by any third
party due to or arising out of content you submit, post, transmit or
make available through the Forums, your use of the Forums, your
violation of these terms, or your violation of any rights of another
Member.
Release of Information
Marriage Advocates may release
information concerning your use of the Forums (including posted
content, registration information, and network records) when Marriage
Advocates believes release is appropriate to comply with any
applicable law, or:
(i)to protect Marriage Advocates'
rights or property, or;
(ii)to protect Marriage Advocates'
Members from fraudulent, abusive, or unlawful use of the Forums or;
(iii)if Marriage Advocates reasonably
believes that an emergency involving immediate danger of death or
serious physical injury to any person requires disclosure of
communications or justifies disclosure of records without delay.
Any deliberate attempt by you or
someone on your behalf to evade or circumvent your suspension or
termination of your rights to use the Forums violates these terms,
constitutes an unlawful trespass, and may result in legal action, or
such other remedy as Marriage Advocates shall seek or apply.
This is Marriage Advocates' Terms
of Service as approved by the Board of Directors of Marriage
Advocates, Inc. a Texas Non-Profit Corporation
and is subject to the laws of the State of Texas and for all legal
purposes, is located in Dallas County.
September 20, 2011 replaces previous version.
|