Terms & Conditions of Use
Here are your terms of use:
Acceptance
If you do not agree with the Terms, do not use the Site or its resources.
It is your responsibility to regularly review the Terms.
User Content; Posting on Forums, Photo Galleries & Other Public Areas
Intellectual Property Rights
Conduct of Users
Your right to access and use the Site is subject to the following prohibitions:
User Accounts; Security
You are responsible for keeping your email address accurate and up-to-date.
Third-Party Websites
Subscriptions and Paid Services
Digital Millennium Copyright Act DMCA
You acknowledge that if you fail to comply with all the requirements of this Section, your DMCA notice may not be valid.
Legal Age & Ability to Accept Terms:
Childrens Online Privacy & Protection Act (COPPA)
Notices
Account Suspension & Termination
This final action is irreversible--and any former member who joins again later will not inherit or be granted any former privileges or account status.
DISCLAIMER OF WARRANTIES AND LIMITATION OF LIABILITY
Indemnity
Reservation of Rights
General
Posted 03/23/2023 v1
We encourage the sharing of ideas and opinions on the topic of photography, however, FotoFora.net is not an image storage or display buckets such as Instagram, Flickr, SmugMug, or similar. All images are downsized for the purposes of discussion, commentary, and quality display of member images and are subject to upload quotas that vary by subscription level. FotoFora.net users come from all locations and backgrounds and have diverse thoughts, beliefs, and feelings. Keep this in mind when you participate in the community and treat others with consideration.
We respect our users' intellectual property and claim no copyright to anything posted on the site by our users. However, as a stipulation of using FotoFora.net, we retain the right to keep and display anything posted by active users on FotoFora.net as part of the site unless you elect to delete your account in accordance with Art.17(2) of the GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation). If you are not prepared to accept this, please do not upload or contribute anything to FotoFora.net.
Here are your terms of use:
Acceptance
By visiting or using this website, FotoFora.net, including all content and functionality available through the FotoFora.net domain (collectively, the "Site" or "FotoFora.net", "we", or "us", as appropriate), you agree to be bound by the following Terms of Use, our Privacy Policy, & and any other guidelines or rules found within sections of the forum, which are incorporated by reference into the Terms of Use (the "Terms").
By your acceptance of the Terms and your continuing use of the Site, you consent to FotoFora.net election, use, and disclosure of your information or registration data in accordance with our Privacy Policy. You also agree to follow our existing "Community Rules & Guidelines" also as a FAQ in this section, and any future Guidelines that we may issue.
These Guidelines are published on FotoFora.net and incorporated into the Terms by reference. References to the "Terms" include the Privacy Policy and any applicable Community Guidelines that are issued now or in the future. The Terms apply to all visitors and users of the Site, including users who contribute content or information and subscribers to other services on the Site. The Terms also apply to individuals or entities on whose behalf a user accesses the Site.
If you do not agree with the Terms, do not use the Site or its resources.
We may revise, modify or change the Terms at any time at our sole discretion with or without notice. Your continued use of the Site after we post changes to the Terms constitutes acceptance of the Terms as modified.
It is your responsibility to regularly review the Terms.
User Content; Posting on Forums, Photo Galleries & Other Public Areas
FotoFora.net includes information, images, photos, commentary, content, opinions & material that our users upload ("User Content"). You agree to upload and post only User Content that you have created yourself. FotoFora.net is not responsible for the accuracy, usefulness, safety, or intellectual property rights of or relating to User Content. We don't test or verify any User Content on the Site. While we do not knowingly accept User Content that violates another's rights, we are not responsible if it happens.
You are responsible for your own User Content, whether posted in the chat rooms, forums, groups, photo galleries/albums, or other public posting areas on the Site. You agree to conform to Site policies and guidelines concerning the size, length, format, subject, content, and relevancy of User Content. Submitting User Content that violates our rules or any applicable local, national, or international laws or regulations is not acceptable, and may subject you to sanctions, including termination of your user rights.
User Content may include nude photos or other images or material that an individual might find offensive, indecent and/or objectionable. We will determine, in our sole discretion, whether User Content containing nudity is within community standards and acceptable. Our decision is final even if an individual user disagrees with our judgment.
We reserve the right (but assume no obligation) to edit, redact or delete User Content that we consider unacceptable or inappropriate, or for any other reasons, which we need not disclose, at our discretion and convenience. When removing images that are contained in User Content, we may remove only the images to which we object, all the images in a folder, or all the images in the User's portfolio, at our convenience and discretion.
We reserve the right to edit, redact or delete any User Content that you upload to the Site, at our sole discretion. FotoFora.net also contains material from experts, organizations, and advertisers ("Third Party Content"). FotoFora.net is not responsible for the accuracy, reliability, or usefulness of Third-Party Content.
Intellectual Property Rights
FotoFora.net owns all rights to the Site, its services, the technology, information, documents, files, webpages, and other products developed in connection with the Site or available on the Site. Submitting User Content to any area of the Site does NOT transfer ownership rights to any native site content or the content of others. You retain the ownership rights to your User Content. By submitting User Content, however, you give certain limited rights to both FotoFora.net and other FotoFora.net users.
You grant to other FotoFora.net members permission to download a lower resolution copy of images contained in your User Content to make such alterations and markups for the purpose of commentary as they see fit and to attach the modified images to their comments on your User Content. An example of this would be the "PhotoShop Challenge" topic board. You also grant other Site users the right to quote your User Content in their own postings on the Site.
Second, you grant FotoFora.net the right to edit, modify, quote, or reformat your User Content on the Site. You also grant us a perpetual non-exclusive worldwide royalty-free license to use, reproduce, adapt, publicly perform and publicly display your User Content on the Site and to promote the Site unless you have requested exclusion under the provisions of the GDPR or applicable state regulations or acts. This action is to remove your content from FotoFora.net and delete your account.
Other than User Content or Third-Party Content, we, and/or our software suppliers, own or license all text, graphics, logos, icons, images, photographs, audio clips, video clips, digital downloads, data compilations, and software we use to provide for user services, and such content is protected by U.S. and International copyright and other intellectual property rights. FotoFora.net action, coordination, and arrangement of content on the Site are the exclusive property of FotoFora.net and are protected as a compilation by U.S. and international copyright laws. All software used on the Site or in conjunction with its operation is the property of FotoFora.net and/or its software suppliers and is protected by U.S. and international copyright laws.
Conduct of Users
Your right to access and use the Site is subject to the following prohibitions:
- You may not use the Site to advertise services, solicit users to buy or sell products or services, or make donations of any kind, without first obtaining the express written approval of FotoFora.net. The sole exception to this rule is that private parties may use the classified section of the forums (The Trading Post) to sell personal property that is photography related, subject to additional Rules & Guidelines found there.
- You may not reproduce or distribute, or cause to be reproduced or distributed, any image or material that you retrieve from the Site, without the express prior permission of both FotoFora.net and, in the case of copyrighted materials, the copyright owner, except for such reproduction as occurs in the ordinary course of viewing or commenting on others' User Content using a web browser in accordance with FotoFora.net guidelines and the Terms.
- You may not use the Site to violate anyone's copyright, trademark, intellectual property rights, or privacy rights. The User Content that you submit must be your work in its entirety.
- You may not use or launch any automated system, including "robots," "spiders," or "offline readers," that access the Site in a manner that sends more request messages to our servers in a given period of time than a human can reasonably produce in the same period by using a conventional on-line web browser.
- From time to time, you may have access to other users' email addresses. You may not gather these email addresses for purposes of spamming or for any purpose other than personal communication. You agree not to collect or harvest any personally identifiable information, including account names, from the Site, nor to use the communication systems provided by the Site (e.g. comments, email) for any commercial solicitation purposes.
- You may not post obscene, pornographic, degrading, harassing, or humiliating User Content on the Site. Please refer to our Community Guidelines for further explanation of what is acceptable in this regard. You may not post or transmit any false, defamatory, abusive, threatening, or illegal User Content or User Content that infringes on the rights of others or the ability of others to enjoy the Site. We have the right to determine, in our sole discretion, whether User Content violates these restrictions or is otherwise unfit for the Site. We have the sole right to delete, modify or edit any such User Content that you upload to the Site.
User Accounts; Security
As a User, you must create an account to access certain features of the Site. You are responsible for making sure that your account is accurate and up-to-date, particularly if you change email providers. If you forget your password and do not have access to the email account that we have on file for you, you may not be able to gain access to your FotoFora.net account. You are also responsible for maintaining the confidentiality of your password and account.
You are responsible for all activities that occur on your account, whether or not you authorize them You acknowledge that we rely on your email address to keep you apprised of certain information on the Site. If we attempt to contact you and find that your email address is inoperable, your FotoFora.net account may be suspended until you log in again and provide a valid email address.
You are responsible for keeping your email address accurate and up-to-date.
You agree to manage your account in a safe and reasonable manner. You agree to notify FotoFora.net immediately of any unauthorized use of your password or account, or any other breach of security. You expressly agree that FotoFora.net will not be liable for any loss or damage arising from your failure to comply with these requirements.
We use all reasonable security measures to protect against the loss, misuse, and alteration of the information under our control. Although we make a good faith effort to store the non-public information collected by the Site in a secure operating environment that is not available to the public, we cannot guarantee complete security. Further, while we make every effort to ensure the integrity and security of our network and systems, we cannot guarantee that our security measures will prevent third-party "hackers" from illegally accessing the Site.
If you live outside the United States of America, you understand and agree that FotoFora.net stores and processes your information on computers located in the United States of America, and by providing any data to FotoFora.net, you consent to the transfer of such information to the United States of America.
Third-Party Websites
The Site may contain links to third-party websites that we do not own or control, including sites that may appear within User Content. FotoFora.net does not review or edit the content of any third-party links, and FotoFora.net has no control over what happens at any third-party website. FotoFora.net assumes no responsibility for the content, policies, or practices of any third-party websites. You expressly agree to release FotoFora.net from any liability that arises from your use of a third-party website.
Subscriptions and Paid Services
Certain of our services are offered as a benefit of paid annual subscriptions. We use third-party payment processors such as PayPal and Stripe to process your financial information through a link on the Site. Our subscription program may be altered, revised, or modified at any time, with or without notice.
If we change a subscription program, we will endeavor to provide subscribers with comparable services for the duration of their subscription period. If your subscription is terminated by you or by FotoFora.net for any reason, you will not receive a refund of any subscription fees.
Digital Millennium Copyright Act DMCA
If you believe that any content on the Site infringes upon your copyrights, including but not limited to User Content, you may submit a notification pursuant to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act ("DMCA") by providing our Copyright Agent with the following information in writing:
- A physical or electronic signature of a person authorized to act on behalf of the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed;
- Identification of the copyrighted work or works claimed to have been infringed,
- Identification of the material that is claimed to be infringing or to be the subject of infringing activity and that is to be removed or access to which is to be disabled and information reasonably sufficient to permit the service provider to locate the material;
- Information reasonably sufficient to permit the service provider to contact you, such as an address, telephone number, and, if available, an electronic mail;
- A statement that you have a good faith belief that use of the material in the manner complained of is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law; and
- A statement that the information in the notification is accurate, and under penalty of perjury, that you are authorized to act on behalf of the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed.
Patrick Thrush
DMCA Agent, PapaTango Productions
219 East Steuben Street
Bath, NY 14810, U.S.A.
You acknowledge that if you fail to comply with all the requirements of this Section, your DMCA notice may not be valid.
Legal Age & Ability to Accept Terms:
Childrens Online Privacy & Protection Act (COPPA)
The FotoFora.net website is not intended for children or those under the age of 18. By using the Site, you affirm that you are at least 18 years of age and are fully able and competent to enter into the terms, conditions, obligations, affirmations, representations, and warranties set forth in the Terms and agree to comply with the Terms. If you are under 18 years of age, please do not register as a user, post User Content or otherwise use this Site.
Notices
From time to time, FotoFora.net uses its users' email addresses to send email notices about matters relating to the Site. These include content alerts you have set, account notices, & site/system announcements. Users are responsible to keep email addresses current. FotoFora.net shall not be responsible for any failure of notice due to an out-of-date email address.
Account Suspension & Termination
FotoFora.net reserves the right to suspend or terminate your account or your access to and use of FotoFora.net services at any time, at FotoFora's discretion for any reason, with or without cause. If you violate these Terms, FotoFora.net, in its sole discretion, may also require you to remedy any violation of the Terms, and/or take any other actions that we deem appropriate to enforce our rights and pursue all available remedies. We shall not be liable to you or any other person if we terminate your account or your access to or use of the Site.
Additionally, FotoFora.net allows registered members to cancel and remove their account and any content through their own actions. A "Delete Account link is provided in a member's user profile panel to effect this. See the applicable FAQ for more information. A 24-hour 'cooling off' period is provided in which the member has an opportunity to reverse their choice. After the expiration of that time, the account will be automatically deleted, and any associated content be purged from the system within 12 hours.
This final action is irreversible--and any former member who joins again later will not inherit or be granted any former privileges or account status.
DISCLAIMER OF WARRANTIES AND LIMITATION OF LIABILITY
THE SITE IS PROVIDED BY FOTOFORA.NET ON AN "AS IS" AND "AS AVAILABLE" BASIS. FOTOFORA.NET MAKES NO REPRESENTATIONS OR WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, AS TO THE OPERATION OF THIS SITE OR THE INFORMATION, CONTENT, MATERIALS, PRODUCT DESCRIPTIONS, OR PRODUCTS INCLUDED ON THIS SITE. YOU EXPRESSLY AGREE THAT YOUR USE OF THIS SITE IS AT YOUR SOLE RISK.
TO THE FULL EXTENT PERMISSIBLE BY APPLICABLE LAW, FOTOFORA.NET DISCLAIM ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. TO THE FULLEST EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW, FOTOFORA.NET DISCLAIM ANY WARRANTIES FOR THE SECURITY, RELIABILITY, TIMELINESS, ACCURACY, AND PERFORMANCE OF THE ITS WEBSITE AND THE SERVICES, AND DOES NOT WARRANT THAT THE PRODUCT DESCRIPTIONS OR OTHER CONTENT ON ITS WEBSITE ARE ACCURATE, COMPLETE, RELIABLE, CURRENT OR ERROR-FREE OR THAT THIS SITE, ITS SERVERS, OR E-MAIL SENT FROM FOTOFORA.NET ARE FREE OF VIRUSES OR OTHER HARMFUL COMPONENTS.
UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES SHALL FOTOFORA.NET BE LIABLE ON ACCOUNT OF YOUR USE OR MISUSE OF THE FOTOFORA.NET WEBSITE OR THE SERVICES, WHETHER THE DAMAGES ARISE FROM THE USE OR MISUSE OF THE FOTOFORA.NET WEBSITE OR THE SERVICES, FROM INABILITY TO USE THE FOTOFORA.NET WEBSITE OR THE SERVICES, OR THE INTERRUPTION, SUSPENSION, MODIFICATION, ALTERATION, OR TERMINATION OF THE FOTOFORA.NET WEBSITE OR THE SERVICES, OR VIEWING THE PHOTOS IT HOSTS, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, PUNITIVE, AND CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES.
FOTOFORA.NET CANNOT BE HELD LIABLE FOR THE ACCIDENTAL LOSS OF PHOTOS ON ITS SITE, OR THE COPYING OF PHOTOS BY ITS USERS. NO ADVICE OR INFORMATION, WHETHER ORAL OR WRITTEN, OBTAINED BY YOU FROM FOTOFORA.NET OR THROUGH OR FROM THE FOTOFORA.NET WEBSITE OR THE SERVICES SHALL CREATE ANY WARRANTY NOT EXPRESSLY STATED IN THE TERMS OF SERVICE.
THE LAWS OF CERTAIN COUNTRIES DO NOT ALLOW LIMITATIONS ON IMPLIED WARRANTIES OR THE EXCLUSION OR LIMITATION OF CERTAIN DAMAGES. IF THESE LAWS APPLY TO YOU, SOME OR ALL OF THE ABOVE DISCLAIMERS, EXCLUSIONS, OR LIMITATIONS MAY NOT APPLY TO YOU, AND YOU MIGHT HAVE ADDITIONAL RIGHTS.
Indemnity
You agree to indemnify and hold FotoFora.net, its subsidiaries, affiliates, successors, assigns, directors, officers, agents, employees, administrators, volunteer administrators, volunteer editors, volunteer moderators, service providers, and suppliers harmless from any dispute that may arise from your breach of the Terms or violation of any representations or warranties contained in the Terms. You also agree to hold said parties harmless from any claims and expenses, including reasonable attorney's fees and court costs, related to any User Content you post on the Site.
Reservation of Rights
You may access FotoFora.net content, including user content, only as permitted under the Terms. We reserve all rights not expressly granted in and to the Site.
We reserve the right to modify, expand, suspend, or discontinue any aspect of the Site at any time.
General
The Terms and this Agreement shall be governed by and construed in accordance with the laws of the State of New York, exclusive of its provisions on conflicts of laws. The Terms & Guidelines contain the entire agreement between you and us and govern your use of the Site. FotoFora.net may also assign any rights and licenses granted in the Terms without restriction. You also may be subject to additional terms and conditions that may apply when you use or purchase certain other FotoFora.net.com services, affiliate services, third-party content, or third-party software.
In the case of inconsistencies between the Terms and any information included in off-line materials, the Terms shall take precedence. Any claim or dispute with FotoFora.net arising from your use of the Site shall be decided exclusively by a court or agency of competent jurisdiction located in the State of New York.
Further, you agree that any such dispute is subject to election of arbitration on the part of FotoFora.net, its heirs, assigns, or agents. By registering and using this site you agree to enter into binding arbitration with an independent, neutral arbitrator who hears and examines the facts of an appeal and makes a decision that is binding on both parties. As with a civil suit, all costs of initiating the arbitration process are the responsibility of the plaintiff.
If any provision of the Terms shall be deemed unlawful, void, or for any reason is unenforceable, then that provision shall be deemed severable from the remaining Terms and shall not affect the validity and enforceability of any remaining provisions. You understand and agree that if you have any claim or dispute with the Site or FotoFora.net, you are required to initiate any cause of action arising from or related to your use of the Site within one year from the date that the dispute first occurred. If you fail to bring an action within that one-year period, your claim against the Site and/or FotoFora.net is permanently barred.
Posted 03/23/2023 v1