Draft Guidance 5 - Sample Terms and Conditions

Posted by Barry Griffiths on January 29th 2007

During Digital Dialogues, information about copyright, terms and conditions, discussion rules and moderation policies were developed to be appropriate to online consultation via the platforms used in the case studies.

The following provides drafts of this content. This is drawn predominantly from the forum sites but is also relevant to blogs and webchats. This should be adapted dependent on need and where there is doubt consult with departmental web and legal support teams.

Data Protection

X is strongly committed to protecting the privacy of users of its interactive products and services as well as to respecting the Data Protection Acts 1984 and 1998. We do all that we can to protect information about participants and will never pass on individuals’ information to third parties.

This privacy policy applies to this specific online consultation website. The purpose of this privacy policy is to inform you, cover what kinds of information we may gather about you when you visit and register, how we may use that information, whether we disclose it to anyone, and the choices you have regarding our use of, and your ability to correct, the information.

In general, our site automatically gathers certain usage information like the numbers and frequency of visitors to the site and its pages. We only use such data in aggregate form. This collective data helps us determine how much visitors and participants use specific parts of our site, so we can improve its operation and appeal.

Information about specific users

This site requires registration to use its functions, such as posting a comment. At registration we specifically ask you for personal information. Certain information is mandatory – such as your name, valid email address, screen name, password. We would also appreciate you filling out the rest of the registration form to enable us to conduct a thorough evaluation.

Disclosure

We do not use or disclose information about your individual visits to the site or information that you may give us, such as your name, address, email address, to any third parties.

Terms and Conditions

Copyright and neighbouring rights

The material featured on this site is subject to Crown copyright protection unless otherwise indicated.

The Crown copyright protected material (other than departmental logos) may be reproduced free of charge in any format or medium for research, private study, web-based discussion, or for internal circulation within an organisation. This is subject to the material being reproduced accurately and not used in a misleading context.

Where any of the Crown copyright items on this site are being republished or copied to others, the source of the material must be identified and the copyright status acknowledged.

The permission to reproduce Crown protected material does not extend to any material on this site which is identified as being the copyright of a third party.

For further information on Crown copyright policy and licensing arrangements, see the guidance at www.opsi.gov.uk.

The copying and use of X logo is not permitted without prior approval of X.

Virus protection

The site operators make every effort to check and test material at all stages of production. It is always wise for users to run an anti virus program on all material downloaded from the internet.

X cannot accept any responsibility for any loss, disruption or damage to your data or your computer system which may occur whilst using material off this website.

Your privacy

Cookies are pieces of data that are often created when you visit a website and are stored in the cookie directory of your own computer.

Cookies are used to store a session ID which allows you to log-in and make comments. No personal information is stored in the Cookie.

Other websites linked from this site are not covered by this privacy policy.

Links to and from other websites

X is not responsible for the contents or reliability of the external websites and does not necessarily endorse the views expressed within them. Links to external sites should not be taken as endorsement of any kind. We cannot guarantee that these links will work all of the time and we have no control over the availability of the linked pages.

X encourages users to establish hypertext links to the site. You do not have to ask permission to link directly to pages hosted on the website. We do not object to you linking directly to our information, but you should obtain permission if you intend to use our logo.

Commenting/Discussion/Posting Rules

Rules for participants should be provided at the point of registration and require acknowledgement

By registering with this site you agree to abide by the following rules.

These are standard web discussion rules that are designed to ensure participants feel safe, keen to take part and the discussion meets its objectives:

1. Debate should be lively but also respectful.
2. Stay on-topic. Please don’t post messages that are unrelated to this online forum.
3. Stay relaxed – though this deliberation is important and influential, taking part should be a positive experience.
4. Don’t incite hatred on the basis of race, religion, gender, nationality or sexuality or other personal characteristic.
5. Don’t swear, use hate-speech or make obscene or vulgar comments.
6. Don’t break the law. This includes libel, condoning illegal activity and contempt of court (comments which might affect the outcome of an approaching court case).
7. Please don’t post personal information addresses, phone numbers, email addresses or other online contact details either relating to yourself or other individuals.
8. Don’t engage in ‘spamming’. Please don’t add the same comment to more than one forum.
9. Don’t advertise. You can mention relevant products and services as long as they support your comment.
10. Don’t impersonate or falsely claim to represent a person or organisation. Please don’t mislead other users by abusing our registration procedure.
11. Don’t post in a language other than English. We hope in the future to be able to support translation.
12. Avoid being party political – this site is about consensus-building, not party political point-scoring.
13. If you are aged 16 or under, please get your parent/guardian’s permission before participating in this online forum. Users without this consent are not allowed to participate or provide us with personal information.

If a comment contravenes the discussion rules it will not be published or removed from the forum.

Posts may be returned to the participant by email, along with a reference to the broken rule(s). The participant will be invited to make appropriate changes in order that the post can be reconsidered. However, if a participant repeatedly breaks the rules that participant’s user account will be suspended and may be permanently revoked.

Moderation Policy

Will X consultation/policy team be participating in the discussions?

Yes, relevant team representatives intend to regularly visit the forum discussions and where appropriate submit posts to encourage discussion.

What is moderation?

‘Moderation’ is the practice of:

Facilitating online consultations to ensure that everyone can take part in discussion, get their views across and that the consultation meets its objectives;
Maintaining the flow of the discussion by checking all posts in relation to the terms and conditions of the site.

What does a moderator do?

‘Moderator’ is internet jargon for somebody who is responsible for making sure that the forum discussion rules are respected.

A moderator is:

Similar to a chair of a face-to-face meeting;
There to encourage debate by asking questions but will not offer opinions;
There to make sure everyone feels comfortable and equal in the online discussion.

Who are the moderators of this forum?

This forum will be moderated by the X consultation/policy team.

The moderators always aim to be fair and objective. Moderators are concerned with the quality of the discussion not the interests of one individual, group or idea over another.

Direct communication between the participants and the moderators can take place via email. The moderators’ email address is…

What form of moderation will be used in this forum?

There are two types of moderation available:

Pre-moderation: where all posts are checked against the terms and conditions before they are published;
Post-moderation: where all participant posts are checked against the terms and conditions after they are published.

This forum will employ a X strategy. This means that posts will/will not go live instantly. They will be checked regularly by the moderators.

During the week all posts will go live within 24 hours of submission. Posts made during the weekend will go live on the following business day.

Forum spaces are readable at all times and you can submit a post at any time.