|
Effective as of April 23, 2006,
Terms of Use
Like the game of hockey, hockeymetro.com has playing rules. This document is designed to clarify those playing rules and how they are enforced. Please read it and become familiar with it, as you agree to adhere to these rules when using hockeymetro.com.
Penalties and Policing
If you break the rules in hockey you are assessed a penalty and receive associated consequences. Hockeymetro.com works the same way. Penalties for misuse or abuse of hockeymetro.com content and services include:
• "Minor Penalty": A warning of a potential violation.
• "Major Penalty": A temporary suspension ranging from 1-10 days. A Major Penalty will usually not be assessed until after 3 warnings have been made.
• "Match Penalty": A temporary, indefinite suspension. A subsequent review by the hockeymetro.com administrative team will determine duration of the suspension.
• "Zero Tolerance": Permanent ban from hockeymetro.com
Our normal policing methods will include:
• For most issues, users will first be assessed up to three Minor Penalties. If the need arises for a fourth penalty, then a temporary suspension of privileges for 1-10 days will be implemented.
• Arguing with the hockeymetro.com administrative team after having received a penalty will lead to an immediate additional warning.
• Users who feel they have been unfairly warned are welcome to contact the hockeymetro.com administrative team .
• Any attempt to circumvent a suspension will result in a permanent suspension. Circumvention includes re-registering under a non-banned username, IP addresses, or registering a new email account. Circumvention also includes posting as an anonymous user.
• If a rules violation is considered by hockeymetro.com to be severe enough to merit significant and immediate penalty, hockeymetro.com reserves the right to assess any penalty level it deems appropriate for the infraction. We do not have to exhaust 3 Minor Penalties first.
• Permanent suspensions are always a last resort and great thought is given to an infraction before implementing permanent suspension. It is a very rare occurrence for a permanent suspension to be lifted once enforced.
Playing Rules
As a member of hockeymetro.com, you agree to abide by the following playing rules:
• You agree NOT to post, email, or otherwise make available content that is unlawful, harmful, threatening, abusive, harassing, defamatory, libelous, invasive of another's privacy, or is harmful to minors in any way;
• You agree NOT to post, email, or otherwise make available content that is pornographic of any kind.
• You agree NOT to post, email, or otherwise make available content that harasses, degrades, intimidates or is hateful toward an individual or group of individuals on the basis of religion, gender, sexual orientation, race, ethnicity, age, or disability;
• You agree NOT to post, email, or otherwise make available content that includes personal or identifying information about another person without that person's explicit consent;
• You agree NOT to post, email, or otherwise make available content that impersonates any person or entity, or falsely states or otherwise misrepresents your affiliation with a person or entity;
• You agree NOT to post, email, or otherwise make available content that is false, deceptive, misleading, deceitful, misinformative, or constitutes any form of "bait and switch" tactics;
• You agree NOT to post, email, or otherwise make available content that infringes any patent, trademark, trade secret, copyright or other proprietary rights of any party, or Content that you do not have a right to make available under any law or under contractual or fiduciary relationships;
• You agree NOT to post, email, or otherwise make available content that constitutes or contains "spam" of any kind;
• You agree NOT to post, email, or otherwise make available content that includes links to commercial services or web sites;
• You agree NOT to post, email, or otherwise make available content that advertises any illegal service or the sale of any items the sale of which is prohibited or restricted by any applicable law, including without limitation items the sale of which is prohibited or regulated by California law.
• You agree NOT to post, email, or otherwise make available content that contains software viruses or any other computer code, files or programs designed to interrupt, destroy or limit the functionality of any computer software or hardware or telecommunications equipment.
• The administrative team of hockeymetro.com reserves the right to edit or remove any post at any time. The determination of what is deemed indecent, vulgar, spam, etc. as noted in these points is up to hockeymetro.com and not to visitors nor members.
• The above playing rules and penalties where applicable apply to all services provided by hockeymetro.com, not just our talk forums. Examples of other services include:
• Private Messaging
• Signatures
• Avatars
Expected Etiquette:
• Members are expected to post and communicate through hockeymetro.com using "normal writing" methods. Examples of NON-normal writing are (but not all-inclusive):
• Excessive use of emoticons, large, small or colored text
• "Shouting" through excessive text capitalization
• Using excessive punctuation (e.g. ! and ?)
• Using vague and/or inappropriate titles for postings (e.g., "Help me!" or "I've got an error!" or "This Sucks").
|
PRIVACY AND INFORMATION DISCLOSURE
Hockeymetro.com has an established Privacy Policy and Security Statement that explains to users how their information is collected, protected and used. The complete Privacy Policy is located at the following web address: Privacy Page
Your use of the hockeymetro.com web site and its offered services signifies your acknowledgement of and agreement to our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.
You further acknowledge and agree that Hockey Metro, LLC may, in its sole discretion, preserve or disclose your posted content, as well as your information, such as email addresses, IP addresses, timestamps, and other user information, if required to do so by law or in the good faith belief that such preservation or disclosure is reasonably necessary to:
• Comply with legal process; or,
• Enforce these Terms of Use; or,
• Respond to claims that any Content violates the rights of third-parties; or,
• Respond to claims that contact information (e.g. phone number, street address) of a third-party has been posted or transmitted without their consent or as a form of harassment; or,
• Protect the rights, property, or personal safety of HockeyMetro,com, its users or the general public. |
