About Karmasphere


Terms of Service

1. Acceptance of Terms

By accessing the karmasphere.com website, or using the computer servers operated by Karmasphere or any successor (collectively the "Karmasphere Service"), you ("You" or "Your" as applicable) are agreeing to the following terms and conditions, to any service-specific terms as posted and to our Privacy Policy (located at http://www.karmasphere.com/privacy/). If You do not accept all terms and conditions, please do not use the Karmasphere Service.

We reserve the right to alter these terms and conditions at any time. Such modifications shall become effective immediately upon posting at http://www.karmasphere.com/corp/legal/termsofservice.html. Please review this agreement regularly.

2. Use of the Karmasphere Service

Subject to these Terms of Use, our Privacy Policy, and terms and conditions of any separate licenses or other agreements You may be required to accept in order to use certain portions of the Karmasphere Service, You are authorized to access and make use of the Karmasphere Service as set forth below.

(a) You may use the sections of the karmasphere.com website to which You have been given access by Karmasphere. You may obtain our products and register for our services, provided You pay any applicable charges and agree to the terms and conditions of any license agreement or other agreement governing those products and services. You may use the Karmasphere Service to which You have been given access, to interact with Karmasphere and other users of our products and services in ways that do not violate these Terms of Use.

(b) The Karmasphere Service enables You to make data available to other users of the Karmasphere Service, and to access data made available by other users of the Karmasphere Service. All such data made available by You or other users is referred to as "User Data." You are solely responsible for any User Data that You publish to the Karmasphere Service, including compliance with these Terms of Use. For purposes of these Terms of Use, User Data shall include, without limitation, data feeds, data feedsets, text, communications, software, scripts, graphics and images, and information.

(c) You expressly acknowledge and agree that any User Data that You mark as public on the Karmasphere Service may be made available by Karmasphere through the Karmasphere Service, including without limitation for use by other users, and that this permission is made and granted in consideration of Your use of the Karmasphere Service and is nonexclusive, perpetual, royalty-free, irrevocable and transferable. You represent and warrant that You have all rights necessary to publish and distribute any User Data made available by You through the Karmasphere Service and that such User Data conforms to the requirements and restrictions contained herein. You agree to indemnify and hold Karmasphere harmless from and against any liability, claims, losses, demands or damages arising out of or relating to Your violation of these Terms of Use.

(d) You acknowledge that Karmasphere does not endorse or guarantee any User Data and You may not state or imply any such endorsement or guarantee. Karmasphere does not guarantee that any User Data will be made available on the Karmasphere Service, whether continuously or at all.

(e) Karmasphere shall have no obligation to monitor any User Data. However, Karmasphere and its agents shall have and do reserve the right to monitor any User Data from time to time for any lawful purpose. Karmasphere may, without notice to You, remove or block any User Data from the Karmasphere Service, including disabling access to such User Data that You query through the Karmasphere Service.

(f) You acknowledge that certain data feeds on the Karmasphere Service are made available under Open Source licenses. All such data made available is referred to as "Open Source Data". All Open Source Data is clearly identified on the Karmasphere web site and is made available on a "pass through basis" under the terms of the original license.

(g) You acknowledge that the data on the Karmasphere Service including without limitation, the data feeds, data feedsets, text, communications, software, scripts, graphics and images ("Data") and the trademarks, service marks and logos contained therein ("Marks"), are owned by or licensed to Karmasphere, subject to copyright and other intellectual property rights under United States and foreign laws and international conventions. Data on the Website is provided to you AS IS for Your use only and may not be used, copied, reproduced, distributed, transmitted, broadcast, displayed, sold, licensed, or otherwise exploited for any other purposes whatsoever without the prior written consent of the respective owners or the provisions of an explicit Open Source license associated with such Data. Karmasphere reserves all rights not expressly granted in and to the Website and the Data. You agree not to circumvent, disable or otherwise interfere with security related features of the Karmasphere Service or features that prevent or restrict use or copying of any Data or enforce limitations on use of the Karmasphere Service or the Data therein.

(h) You agree that Karmasphere has no responsibility or liability for the deletion or failure to store any Data maintained or transmitted by the Service. You acknowledge that Karmasphere reserves the right at any time to modify or discontinue the Service (or any part thereof) with or without notice, and that Karmasphere shall not be liable to you or to any third party for any modification, suspension or discontinuance of the Service.

(i) Karmasphere may establish limits to or terminate Your access to all or any part of the Karmasphere Service at any time, with or without cause, with or without notice, effective immediately. You may terminate Your use of the Karmasphere Service at any time, provided that all provisions of these Terms of Use which by their nature should survive termination shall survive termination, including, without limitation, ownership provisions, warranty disclaimers, indemnity and limitations of liability.

3. Registration

As a condition to using certain components of the Karmasphere Service, You may be required to register with Karmasphere and select a password and login name ("Karmasphere User ID"). You shall provide Karmasphere with accurate, complete, and updated registration information. Failure to do so shall constitute a breach of these Terms of Use, which may result in immediate termination of Your Karmasphere account. You may not (i) select or use as a Karmasphere User ID a name of another person with the intent to impersonate that person; (ii) use as a Karmasphere User ID a name subject to any rights of a person other than You without appropriate authorization; or (iii) use as a Karmasphere User ID a name that is otherwise offensive, vulgar or obscene. Karmasphere reserves the right to refuse registration of, or cancel a Karmasphere User ID in its sole discretion. You are solely responsible for activity that occurs on Your account and shall be responsible for maintaining the confidentiality of Your Karmasphere password. You may not share Your Karmasphere password with any third party. You may never use another user's account without such other user's express permission. You will immediately notify Karmasphere in writing of any unauthorized use of Your account, or other account related security breach of which You are aware.

4. Rules and Conduct

The Karmasphere Service (including without limitation, any data feeds, data feedsets, documents or other information made available through the Karmasphere Service) is provided only for Your use and may not be used in connection with any commercial purpose(s) except as specifically approved in writing by Karmasphere. Any unauthorized use of the Karmasphere Service is expressly prohibited.

As a condition of use, You promise not to use the Karmasphere Service for any purpose that is unlawful. You agree to abide by all applicable local, state, national and international laws and regulations, including, without limitation, all intellectual property laws (such as, U.S. copyright laws).

By way of example, and not as a limitation, You agree not to (a) take any action or (b) upload, download, post, submit or otherwise distribute or facilitate distribution of any data using any communications service or other service available on or through the Karmasphere Service, that:

Additionally, You agree that You will not: (i) take any action that imposes, or may impose in Karmasphere's sole discretion an unreasonable or disproportionately large load on Karmasphere's infrastructure; (ii) interfere or attempt to interfere with the proper working of the Karmasphere Service or any activities conducted on the Karmasphere Service; (iii) bypass any measures Karmasphere may use to prevent or restrict access to the Karmasphere Service, other accounts, or computer systems or networks connected to the Karmasphere Service; or (iv) interfere with any other user's use of the Karmasphere Service.

You shall not (and You shall not permit others to), directly or indirectly, modify, translate, decompile, disassemble, or reverse engineer any part of the Karmasphere Services or any content available through the Karmasphere website (except to the limited extent applicable laws specifically prohibit such restriction).

With the exception of Open Source Data made available within the Karmasphere Service under the terms of the original license, you shall not copy, rent, lease, distribute, or otherwise transfer any of the rights that You receive hereunder. In addition, You shall not remove any proprietary notices or labels.

You shall not launch or otherwise use any robot, spider, scraper or other automated means to access the Karmasphere Service in a manner which sends more request messages to the Karmasphere server in any given period of time than a typical human would normally produce in the same period by using a conventional web browser to read, view, and submit materials. Notwithstanding the foregoing, we grant the operators of search engines permission to use robots to copy materials from the site for the sole purpose of creating publicly-available searchable indexes of the materials, but not caches or archives of the materials; provided that, we reserve the right to revoke these exceptions either generally or in specific cases.

You shall not harvest or collect information from the Karmasphere Service, including, without limitation, information about other users of the Karmasphere Service. The use of any information learned through the Karmasphere Services or while in the Karmasphere website is limited to the express purposes set forth in these Terms of Use; all other uses are strictly prohibited.

Unless expressly authorized, You shall not frame or otherwise display any portion of the Karmasphere.com website or any of its contents. No hyperlinks to any password protected web pages on the Karmasphere.com website are allowed. Hyperlinks to non-restricted pages are allowed, subject to review and termination by Karmasphere in our sole discretion.

6. Privacy Policy

As explained above, Your use of the Karmasphere Service is subject to Your acceptance of our Privacy Policy. Please read the Privacy Policy carefully for disclosures relating to the collection and use of Your personal information.

7. Links to Third Party Websites

As a convenience for its users, Karmasphere may provide links on this website to other websites owned by third parties. Unless otherwise stated, Karmasphere does not endorse or control these third parties and takes no responsibility for them or their websites.

8. No Warranties

THE KARMASPHERE SERVICE IS PROVIDED BY KARMASPHERE "AS IS" AND "AS AVAILABLE". KARMASPHERE MAKES NO REPRESENTATIONS OR WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, ABOUT THE KARMASPHERE SERVICE OR ITS CONTENT, AND KARMASPHERE DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES REGARDING THE KARMASPHERE SERVICE AND THEIR CONTENTS, WHETHER EXPRESS, IMPLIED OR STATUTORY, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO, WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, ACCURACY OR COMPLETENESS OF CONTENT, NON-INFRINGEMENT, OR THE AVAILABILITY OR QUALITY OF ANY PRODUCTS OR SERVICES AVAILABLE VIA THE KARMASPHERE SERVICE (EXCEPT AS MAY BE SET FORTH IN ANY LICENSE OR OTHER AGREEMENT RELATED TO THOSE PRODUCTS OR SERVICES).

9. Limitation on Damages

TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT ALLOWABLE UNDER APPLICABLE KARMASPHERE AND ITS SUPPLIERS SHALL NOT BE LIABLE TO ANY PARTY FOR DIRECT, INDIRECT, SPECIAL OR OTHER CONSEQUENTIAL OR INCIDENTAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO ANY LOST PROFITS, BUSINESS INTERRUPTION, LOSS OF PROGRAMS OR OTHER DATA ON YOUR INFORMATION HANDLING SYSTEM OR OTHERWISE) ARISING DIRECTLY OR INDIRECTLY FROM THE USE OF THE KARMASPHERE SERVICE, OR ANY PRODUCTS OR SERVICES DISTRIBUTED ON OR PROVIDED THROUGH THE KARMASPHERE SERVICE, WHETHER AS A RESULT OF ERRORS, OMISSIONS, LOSS OF DATA, DEFECTS, VIRUSES, INTERRUPTIONS OR DELAYS IN OPERATION OR TRANSMISSION, OR ANY OTHER CAUSE, EVEN IF KARMASPHERE OR ITS SUPPLIERS HAVE BEEN EXPRESSLY ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES.

SOME JURISDICTIONS RESTRICT THE LIMITATION OF LIABILITY OR DAMAGES, SO THE ABOVE EXCLUSIONS AND LIMITATIONS MAY NOT APPLY TO YOU. IF ANY PART OF THE LIMITATION OF DAMAGES SET FORTH ABOVE IS UNENFORCEABLE UNDER APPLICABLE LAW, KARMASPHERE'S AND ITS SUPPLIERS' AGGREGATE LIABILITY WILL BE LIMITED TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT

10. Export and International Use

The Karmasphere Service is controlled and offered by Karmasphere from its facilities in the United States of America. Karmasphere makes no representations that the Karmasphere Service is appropriate or available for use in other locations. Those who access or use the Karmasphere Service from other jurisdictions do so at their own volition and are responsible for compliance with local law.

11. Governing Law

These Terms of Use shall be governed by and construed in accordance with the laws of the State of California, without regard to or application of choice of law rules or principles. You expressly consent to the personal and exclusive jurisdiction and venue of the state and federal courts located in Santa Clara County of the State of California for any claim or action arising out of or relating to these Terms of Use or Your use of the Karmasphere Service. The prevailing party in any litigation will be entitled, in addition to any other relief granted to it, to recover reasonable attorney's fees, expenses and costs incurred in connection with the litigation.

12. Miscellaneous

You may not revise or amend these Terms of Use without the prior written authorization of an officer of Karmasphere. If any provision of these Terms of Use is found illegal or unenforceable, it will be enforced to the maximum extent permissible, and the legality and enforceability of the other provisions of these Terms of Use will not be affected. No delay or failure by Karmasphere to exercise or enforce any of its rights under these Terms of Use will act as a waiver of such rights.

13. Notification of Claims of Infringement

Subject to the procedures outlined in the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (http://lcweb.loc.gov/copyright/legislation/dmca.pdf), it is Karmasphere's policy to (1) block access to or remove data that it believes to be copyrighted material that has been illegally copied and distributed by any of our users; and (2) remove and discontinue service to repeat offenders.

If you believe that your work has been copied in a way that constitutes copyright infringement, or your intellectual property rights have been otherwise violated, please notify Karmasphere's designated agent for notice of claims of copyright or other intellectual property infringement ("Designated Agent"), at:

copyright-notice@karmasphere.com

or

Copyright Agent,
Karmasphere, Inc.
15466 Los Gatos Blvd. #109-293
Los Gatos, CA 95032-2550

1. Procedure for Reporting Copyright Infringements:

If You believe that data residing on or accessible through the Karmasphere web site or service infringes a copyright, please send a notice of copyright infringement containing the following information to the Designated Agent listed below:

(a) A physical or electronic signature of a person authorized to act on behalf of the owner of the copyright that has been allegedly infringed;

(b) Identification of works or materials being infringed;

(c) Identification of the data that is claimed to be infringing including information regarding the location of the data that the copyright owner seeks to have removed, with sufficient detail so that Karmasphere is capable of finding and verifying its existence;

(d) Contact information about the notifier including address, telephone number and, if available, e- mail address;

(e) A statement that the notifier has a good faith belief that the data is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law; and

(f) A statement made under penalty of perjury that the information provided is accurate and the notifying party is authorized to make the complaint on behalf of the copyright owner.

2. Once Proper Bona Fide Infringement Notification is Received by the Designated Agent:

It is Karmasphere's policy:

(a) to remove or disable access to the infringing data;

(b) to notify the data provider, member or user that it has removed or disabled access to the data; and

(c) that repeat offenders will have the infringing data removed from the system and that Karmasphere will terminate such data provider's, member's or user's access to the service.

3. Procedure to Supply a Counter-Notice to the Designated Agent:

If the data provider, member or user believes that the data that was removed or to which access was disabled is either not infringing, or the data provider or user believes that it has the right to post and use such data from the copyright owner, the copyright owner's agent, or pursuant to the law, the data provider or user must send a counter-notice containing the following information to the Designated Agent listed below:

(a) A physical or electronic signature of the data provider, member or user;

(b) Identification of the data that has been removed or to which access has been disabled and the location at which the data appeared before it was removed or disabled;

(c) A statement that the data provider or user has a good faith belief that the data was removed or disabled as a result of mistake or a misidentification of the data; and

(d) Data provider's or user's name, address, telephone number, and, if available, e-mail address and a statement that such person or entity consents to the jurisdiction of the Federal Court for the judicial district in which the data provider's or user's address is located, or if the data provider's or user's address is located outside the United States, for any judicial district in which Karmasphere is located, and that such person or entity will accept service of process from the person who provided notification of the alleged infringement.

If a counter-notice is received by the Designated Agent, Karmasphere's may send a copy of the counter- notice to the original complaining party informing that person that it may replace the removed data or cease disabling it in 10 business days. Unless the copyright owner files an action seeking a court order against the data provider, member or user, the removed data may be replaced, or access to it restored, in 10 to 14 business days or more after receipt of the counter-notice, at Karmasphere's discretion.