Bondage.com Acceptable Use Policy

Scope

This document replaces all previous documents including to but not limited to previous registration agreements, online registrations, and any other method used or developed to grant access to Bondage.com.

This policy applies to all users of Bondage.com. The term "Bondage.com service" defines the total environment, and includes, but is not limited to, the Bondage.com web site, IRC network, email system, database, documentation, IM/AVChat and content.

Abstract

The Internet is a large network of computers that allows a user of one computer to access resources on any other computer in the network. As an Internet user, you are a member of the internet community. Further, as a Bondage.com user, you are a member of the Bondage.com community. Bondage.com's AUP serves to protect both our users and the internet community from irresponsible use of Bondage.com accounts and resources.

Bondage.com is privately owned and operated, and should be considered to be a private website. Bondage.com grants members of the general public authorization to access all public areas of the website. Gross violations of this AUP can result in Bondage.com revoking your authorization to use the website. You agree to be bound by any such revocation and to respect Bondage.com's status as a private entity which has every right to control access to any or all of the website or any associated network resources.

Bondage.com's AUP primarily forbids the following types of behavior:

• Acts which are illegal


• Acts that are contrary to generally accepted behavior on the internet


• Acts which abuse Bondage.com's resources to the detriment of other users

Definitions

• Moderator

A user who has been granted additional powers to help in the moderation of the forums or in AVChat. Moderators can be identified by the addition of the moderator icon on their profile, along with the words `Moderator' under their name in any of their forum posts.
• Senior Moderator

A user who has been granted the additional powers of a moderator and helps organise the moderation team, currently the senior moderators are Wolfspet and Asshole.
• Site Administrator

An employee of Various Inc who possesses the `hand of god' icon in their profile and forum posts.
• Support

Employees of Various Inc who answer emails addressed to the support department. The support department may be reached by emailing support@bondage.com

Site Access and Account Creation

You must be 18 or older (depending upon your jurisdiction) to access bondage.com

Bondage.com strives to provide a valuable service to the BDSM community. We realize that there are legitimate reasons for one user to have multiple Bondage.com accounts, we allow duplicate accounts.

Duplicate accounts are acceptable for:

• Couples who wish to have individual accounts and a "couples" account;


• Individuals who wish to have a less detailed public account and more detailed "private" account;

Duplicate accounts are not acceptable for:

• Individuals who wish to use a "troll" account to post inflammatory content;


• Individuals who wish to use a second account to mislead other users in any way;

Prohibited Uses

In our efforts to promote good citizenship within the Bondage.com community, we will respond appropriately if we become aware of inappropriate use of our service. In general, you may NOT use your Bondage.com account:

• In a manner which violates any law, regulation, treaty or tariff;


• To send unsolicited bulk or commercial messages ("spam");


• In a manner which violates the rules, regulations and policies of any network, server, web site, database or service provider that you access through your Bondage.com account;


• In a manner which is defamatory, fraudulent, or deceptive;


• To disclose other peoples' personal information, including real names, addresses, phone numbers, etc.


• To threaten, harass, abuse or intimidate others;


• To break security on any computer network, or to access an account which does not belong to you;


• In a manner which interferes with other customers' use and enjoyment of the services provided by Bondage.com


• In a manner that puts unreasonable load on Bondage.com servers to the detriment of other users (e.g., automated processes that perform personals searches, "hot linking" images hosted by Bondage.com, etc)


• To display personal information about oneself or a third party in a public forum. This includes posting email addresses, addresses, names, phone numbers and any personally identifiable url
  in any medium which is not considered single user to single user.




• To disclose any personal contact information in any medium which is not considered single user to single user.
  Some examples of personal contact information are full real name, physical address, phone number, email address, (not a Bondage.com email address) etc.
  
  Exceptions to this rule are as follows:
  
  
  
  • When quoting others. Non- member names are allowed to be posted to provide credit.
  
  
  • Site sanctioned contact information such as members using "IM" section under "My Profile" page.
  
  
  • Information which is provided/posted by Various to identify people who provide site support and services. To disclose other peoples' personal information, including real names, addresses, phone numbers, etc.
  
  
  
  

Commercial Use

Except where specifically noted otherwise, such as in the "For Sale" forum, you may not use the Bondage.com service to:

• Promote any commercial goods or services


• Serve images or profiles for any commercial goods or services

Forums

By using the forums you agree that any topics and replies you post may be subject to editing and the thread being moved to our non publicly visible archive by our moderation team. We continually monitor the forums for items which are in non compliance with our AUP and take actions to fix the issues accordingly.

In addition to the AUP each of the forums may be subject to further requirements. These are defined in yellow text in their description.

Failure to abide by these rules may subject the user to one of the various `punishments' as defined in the infraction area of this document.

Infractions

• Forum Timeout:

The removal of a user's ability to post in a specific forum. This can be given out by a moderator (or higher) for up to a period of 24 (twenty four) hours.
• Forum Wide Timeout:

The removal of a user's ability to post to any forum. This can be given out by a senior moderator (or higher).
• Account lockout:

The removal of a user's ability to login to their account for a period of time, this can be given out by a Site Administrator or the support department.
• Account disablement:

The removal of a user's ability to login and removal of all pictures, blog entries, preferences and emails associated with an account. This can be given out by a Site Administrator or the support department.
• Site Ban:

The removal of the authorisation given to a user to use the bondage.com services in anyway. If a site ban is placed on a user they may not try to connect to any of the bondage.com servers in any way. Failure to abide by this will be considered un-authorised access to our computer equipment and will be persued as per local laws enable, we will also contact the users ISP (Internet Service Provider) and inform them that they are allowing a user to connect to our servers without permission, this is normally dealt with by the ISP as a violation of their AUP and normally account termination occurs from this.

It is not a requirement for a user to be given these punishments in order (for example a first offence may be considered severe and a site ban is issued). All punishments may be appealed by emailing support@bondage.com with your reasons for appeal.
To ensure a reliable quality of service, Bondage.com reserve the right to issue a site ban for users who are deemed to be a deficit to the community, that is, for users who require above average time to be spent dealing with them or their accounts.

Additional Restrictions and Notices

In addition, some portions of Bondage.com including, but not limited to, IRC, Forums, and Matchmaker may have additional restrictions. See each section's detailed documentation for more information.

Whilst Bondage.com welcomes feedback and constructive criticism, we do not welcome abusive `rants', slandering the Administration/support/moderation team, or the creation of topics designed to cause `drama' on bondage.com servers. Any user doing so may be subject to the infractions portion of this document.

At any time, the site Administration staff / Support department may issue additional rules/regulations/warnings which must be adhered to be granted the continued use of the bondage.com Servers.

Bondage.com reserves the right to refuse any or all services to anyone, at any time, for any reason. Bondage.com also reserves the right to amend or alter this AUP at any time, without notice.