Acceptable Use Policy

THIS ACCEPTABLE USE POLICY SETS OUT THE TERMS BETWEEN YOU AND US, BLIPFUTURE CIC, UNDER WHICH YOU MAY ACCESS OUR WEBSITE WWW.BLIPFOTO.COM, AND BLIPFOTO MOBILE APPLICATION SOFTWARE (“APP”), (TOGETHER “ OUR SITE”). THIS ACCEPTABLE USE POLICY APPLIES TO ALL USERS OF, AND VISITORS TO, OUR SITE.

YOUR USE OF OUR SITE MEANS THAT YOU ACCEPT, AND AGREE TO ABIDE BY, ALL THE POLICIES IN THIS ACCEPTABLE USE POLICY, WHICH SUPPLEMENT OUR TERMS OF USE.

Information about us

Our site is operated by Blipfuture CIC ("we"/"us"). We are a Community Interest Company incorporated in Scotland with company number SC522066 and have our registered office at Suite 2, Ground Floor, Orchard Brae House, 30 Queensferry Road, Edinburgh, EH4 2HS.

Prohibited uses

You may use our site only for lawful purposes. You may not use our site:

  • In any way that breaches any applicable local, national or international law or regulation.
  • In any way that is unlawful or fraudulent, or has any unlawful or fraudulent purpose or effect.
  • For the purpose of harming or attempting to harm minors in any way.
  • To send, knowingly receive, upload, download, use or re-use any material which does not comply with our Content standards.
  • To transmit, or procure the sending of, any unsolicited or unauthorised advertising or promotional material or any other form of similar solicitation (spam).
  • To knowingly transmit any data, send or upload any material that contains viruses, Trojan horses, worms, time-bombs, keystroke loggers, spyware, adware or any other harmful programs or similar computer code designed to adversely affect the operation of any computer software or hardware.
  • You also agree:
    • Not to use our site for commercial or promotional purposes (no forms of advertising are allowed).
    • Not to reproduce, duplicate, copy or re-sell any part of our site in contravention of the provisions of our Terms of use.
    • Not to access without authority, interfere with, damage or disrupt:
    • any part of our site; or
    • any equipment or network on which our site is stored; or
    • any software used in the provision of our site; or
    • any equipment or network or software owned or used by any third party.
  • Not to use our site in such a way so as to manipulate image ratings.
  • Not to hotlink (or "inline" or "direct" link) to files on our site.

Interactive services

We may from time to time provide interactive services on our site, including, without limitation:

  • Comments Pages
  • Image Ratings
  • Discussion Forums

We will do our best to assess any possible risks for users (and in particular, for children) from third parties when they use any interactive service provided on our site, and we will decide in each case whether it is appropriate to use moderation of the relevant service (including what kind of moderation to use) in the light of those risks. However, we are under no obligation to oversee, monitor or moderate any interactive service we provide on our site or any interactive service provided on a third party site, and we expressly exclude our liability for any loss or damage arising from the use of any interactive service by a user in contravention of our Content standards, whether the service is moderated or not.

The use of any of our interactive services by a minor is subject to the consent of their parent or guardian. We advise parents who permit their children to use an interactive service that it is important that they communicate with their children about their safety online, as moderation is not foolproof. Minors who are using any interactive service should be made aware of the potential risks to them.

Where we do moderate an interactive service, we will normally provide you with a means of reporting to a moderator, should a concern or difficulty arise.

Content standards

These content standards apply to any and all material which you contribute to our site (contributions), and to any interactive services associated with it.

You must comply with the spirit of the following standards as well as the letter. The standards apply to each part of any contribution as well as to its whole.

Contributions must:

  • Be accurate (where they state facts).
  • Be genuinely held (where they state opinions).
  • Comply with applicable law in the UK and in any country from which they are posted.

Contributions must not:

  • Contain any material which is defamatory of any person.
  • Contain any material which is obscene, offensive, hateful or inflammatory.
  • Promote sexually explicit material.
  • Promote violence.
  • Promote discrimination based on race, sex, religion, nationality, disability, sexual orientation or age.
  • Infringe any copyright, database right or trade mark of any other person.
  • Be likely to deceive any person.
  • Be made in breach of any legal duty owed to a third party, such as a contractual duty or a duty of confidence.
  • Promote any illegal activity.
  • Be threatening, abuse or invade another's privacy, or cause annoyance, inconvenience or needless anxiety.
  • Be likely to harass, upset, embarrass, alarm or annoy any other person.
  • Be used to impersonate any person, or to misrepresent your identity or affiliation with any person.
  • Give the impression that they emanate from us, if this is not the case.
  • Advocate, promote or assist any unlawful act such as (by way of example only) copyright infringement or computer misuse.

Contributor rules

This policy is in addition to our Be "Be excellent" community rules, with which you must also comply.

Suspension and termination

We will determine, in our discretion, whether there has been a breach of this acceptable use policy through your use of our site. When a breach of this policy has occurred, we may take such action as we deem appropriate.

Failure to comply with this acceptable use policy constitutes a material breach of the Terms of use, upon which you are permitted to use our site, and may result in our taking all or any of the following actions:

  • Immediate, temporary or permanent withdrawal of your right to use our site.
  • Immediate, temporary or permanent removal of any posting or material uploaded by you to our site.
  • Issue of a warning to you.
  • Legal proceedings against you for reimbursement of all costs on an indemnity basis (including, but not limited to, reasonable administrative and legal costs) resulting from the breach.
  • Further legal action against you.
  • Disclosure of such information to law enforcement authorities as we reasonably feel is necessary.

We exclude liability for actions taken in response to breaches of this acceptable use policy. The responses described in this policy are not limited, and we may take any other action we reasonably deem appropriate.

Changes to the acceptable use policy

We may revise this acceptable use policy at any time by amending this page. You are expected to check this page from time to time to take notice of any changes we make, as they are legally binding on you. Some of the provisions contained in this acceptable use policy may also be superseded by provisions or notices published elsewhere on our site. Your continued use of our site and service represents your acceptance of any such changes.

Additional Notes on Acceptable Use

Acceptable use of the site is covered by the terms above, and will be determined by the opinions of the moderators.  However, we would like to provide the following additional guidelines to help users keep within the acceptable use policy.  Note that what may have happened to other users or journals should not necessarily be considered acceptable use.  Those users or journals may simply not have come to the attention of the moderators. 

Copyright

Copyright law is complex and made more so by the international nature of Blipfoto users, especially as rules around “Fair Usage” and “Freedom of Speech” differ widely around the world.  Posting a photo downloaded from the internet, or text copied from a website or book (including poetry), magazine or paper is unlikely to be acceptable unless the content is demonstrably out of copyright and is not the main focus of the blip.  Referencing the originator is not sufficient, unless you have gained agreement from them to reproduce.

Posting a photograph of a TV screen, a painting, a book cover or images from a magazine or newspaper is also likely to breach copyright.  If photographs include these elements but they are not the main focus (for example a commuter holding a newpaper or a photo of the view from your armchair including your feet, a cup of tea and the TV) then they are less likely to breach copyright.

Please err on the side of caution and don’t post images or text unless you’re sure they are on the right side of copyright law!

Advertising

Advertising is the act of promoting a product, service, company or organisation and is not allowed on Blipfoto.  We would like to clarify some things we see on the site regularly and whether the moderators are likely to see them as advertising. 

The following are likely to indicate advertising:

  • Including any link (or e-mail address, phone number, twitter etc) where the apparent intention of posting that link is to make money directly or indirectly
  • Including text or watermarks on an entry showing the name of a product, service, company, or organisation
  • Providing a link on an entry through which users can buy a print or download of your photographs or other products
  • Posting image or text where the copyright belongs to a company or organisation rather than the journal owner
  • Posting links to another site regularly, including links to commercial sites, twitter, Facebook, Flickr, personal websites, etc

The following are not likely to indicate advertising:

  • Posting a link to your own website, social media or company site on your profile – other blippers may well be interested to find out about your work and what you do
  • Infrequent mentions of, pictures of, or links to products, services, companies or organisations you are involved with and which are mentioned in the context of journaling your own life or that of family or friends
  • Infrequently mentioning a product or service you have enjoyed, or a company or organisation you admire

These rules are not intended to be definitive, and in some cases context will be important.  A user who has posted regularly for months and happens to post they have just started a new company and link to the webpage may be considered to be documenting their own life (not advertising). A similar post which is the first entry on a journal containing no other content may be viewed as advertising.

Commercial Use

Most issues relating to commercial use fall within the area of advertising discussed above, however, here are some additional situations that may be considered commercial use:

  • Using Blipfoto to get feedback from customers (asking a customer to document their use of your product or service using Blipfoto)
  • Using Blipfoto to collect coursework from students (e.g. on a photography course, or asking them to produce photo essays on particular topics)
  • Using Blipfoto to document the life of a commercial organisation

Some of the above activities may be permitted on an exceptional basis with written permission from Blipfoto providing a variation to the standard terms of use and acceptable use policy.  Such exceptions will only be offered where the project can demonstrate a clear benefit to the Blipfoto community.  Potential benefits might include bringing new members to the community, offering a product or service to the community, paying membership fees for journals, fees for a specific project, or donations to help cover costs.  Such arrangements may be subject to restrictions.  For example, where a journal is unlikely to be of interest to the wider community we may require it is set up as a private journal.  Please contact info@blipfoto.com with any enquiries.