Wikipedia:Terms of use (proposal)

Please note this is still a draft of a proposed terms of use on Wikipedia. Changes and discussion of this text are greatly appreciated. While this is an attempt to codify what is generally accepted and acceptable not everything here is resolved policy. Please see Wikipedia:Terms of use (a) for a non-controversial version of this page.

SUMMARY

This page describes the general terms and conditions upon which you may use the Wikipedia site. If you do not agree with these terms we ask that you leave this site. Thank you. This is a summary of these terms and conditions:

1. This is an agreement between you, the Wikipedia community and Wikimedia Foundation Inc., and it also includes the Wikipedia:Submission Standards, Wikipedia:Copyrights and disclaimers and other policies and guidelines that are applicable to everyone who gains access to these sites.
2. You agree that disputes with Wikipedia or other Wikipedians regarding the activities here will be covered by an internal mediation and arbitration process as long as they do not involve legal or judicial elements.
3. The agreement is to be interpreted under the laws of California (that is where our servers are) and any confirmation of arbitration must be brought in Pinellas County in the State of Florida (St. Petersburg is Wikimedia's home city).
4. Even if you don't spend the time to read this you are still bound by it and if you find material that has been removed from the site for some reason it is suggested you contact the original copyright owner to find out if they will give you a copy to release under the GFDL, if you wish.
5. You undertand that certain things like page histories and mailing list archives are archives as defined under the US Copyright Act. You should be aware of the copyright limitations that may exist on those archival materials.
6. You accept the modification and change procedures as outlined; you accept that you have notice of this page and its changes even if you do not take care to read this material; and that if one part of this agreement is not binding, you agree that the other parts are binding and that none of the section headings are part of the agreement, they are just to describe the different parts.

What follows is the unavoidable legal text. We hope you spend the time to read it and if you have any questions you can post them on the talk page, write on the mailing list or go to the Village Pump:

General terms

These Terms of use, the Submission Standards, the Copyrights and Warranty Disclaimers and other policies as set forth and time to time revised by Wikipedia volunteers are a binding agreement between you and Wikimedia Foundation, Inc., a not-for-profit corporation founded in Florida.

Arbitration

You specifically consent to allow any matter arising under this agreement to be resolved by binding arbitration as defined by the conflict resolution, mediation and arbitration rules and policies of Wikipedia or any other arbitration process authorized by Wikimedia. All arbitration decisions are final and may not be appealed to any court. If you file any lawsuit against Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation Inc. or any of its agents, officers or volunteers regarding Wikipedia and/or concerning this agreement if you have not gone through the internal arbitration proceeding you agree that any such court case shall be dismissed at cost to you.

Choice of law and venue

The law that is applicable to this contract is the law of California without reference to the conflicts of law provisions. Once any arbitration decision is final you may only seek to have the arbitration award recognized in a court in St. Petersburg, Pinellas County in the State of Florida at your own cost. You specifically agree that the Florida Courts in Pinellas County have exclusive jurisdiction over any and all disputes you may have with Wikipedia and/or Wikimedia Foundation and any subsequent modification or policies to which it is subjected. If you bring any suit against Wikipedia or the Wikimedia Foundation Inc. in any other jurisdiction you agree to have such suit dismissed at cost to you including any attorneys fees that Wikimedia Foundation Inc. has to incur, if you attempt to enforce any such court proceeding.

Extent of the agreement between you and Wikipedia/Wikimedia

By using the Wikipedia site in any manner you are deemed to be aware of this agreement and have notice that it applies to you even if you do not contribute here or maintain a user account under your own name or use an account of any other person. You understand that all text available is released under the GFDL, but that not all material that is available on this site may be considered current. If material was previously available in an article and it is no longer available for any reason you may be able to license it from someone that currently releases it, otherwise we suggest that you either seek the original copyright holder or see if there is any more recent version of material here that includes such retired material. That includes mailing list archives, various materials that have been released into the public domain and other materials that cannot obviously be licensed under the GFDL because they are in violation of some law.

Title 17 United States Code § 108 archive notice

You understand that the Wikipedia is only the current version of each article, all prior edits have been retired into the page history archives and any previous edit of a page has been superseded by the current edit, which is what is being distributed by Wikipedia. The Wikipedia does not intend to distribute them any longer except to the extent they are needed by contributors for building the Wikipedia and as "history" files under the terms of the Free Documentation License (GFDL). You accept that the Wikipedia may limit distribution of prior versions to logged in contributors or may split portions of history into live and inactive or old versions.

Archives on Wikipedia are also considered a not-for-profit educational archive under § 108 of Title 17 of the United States Code which concerns copyright under United States law. This law is specifically applicable to your contribution because that is where the archive is maintained. You understand that if you copy anything from page histories of prior versions of pages that you are copying from an archive and you specifically understand that you are hereby being given notice under Title 17 USC that it is your responsibility to comply with the copyright laws in regards to this archival material and your copying it may be considered infringement (specifically if any of the materials being stored in those prior versions are copyrighted materials that were submitted to Wikipedia without the author/authors or copyright holder's/holders' permission(s)).

Misc. terms

Changes, modification and amendments

This is a protected page which means that changes to it will only be made if they are done by a systems operator (sysop). Sysops agree only to change this page if the change is minor, and not a change from the generally accepted principles and policies under which the Wikipedia community operates, or as approved by the following modification procedure: any proposed changes to this text should be made on the Wikipedia:mailing lists and posted on the talk page here. After such discussion such change will be made to this text, an additional twenty days will pass until such change takes effect, in any case any changes to these terms shall not take effect until they are posted a minimum of thirty days; during the second period additional discussion may take place on the mailing lists and the board of directors of Wikimedia Foundation Inc., may then revoke any changes as they see fit. See the page history for details on when changes are made.

Constructive Notice Provision

It is the user's responsibility to check this page for changes. All members of any and all Wikipedia projects and/or Wikimedia Foundation are deemed to have notice of this page irrespective of their actual notice of this page. These terms and the submission standards apply to any and all contributions you make to Wikipedia irrespective of date or the then status of the terms and conditions of your submission.

Severability Clause

If any term, condition or clause of these terms of use is found to be invalid then the remaining terms, conditions and clauses, shall remain valid.

Titles not significant

The titles of each section are for descriptive purposes only and do not change the meaning of the sections.

Last Modified: January 25, 2004