mke and mkeonline.com

user agreement and privacy policy

User Agreement | Privacy Policy | Rules of Discussion | Copyright

Amended Oct. 25, 2004

User Agreement

1. Welcome to mkeonline.com. By using this Service, you agree to be bound by all of the terms of this Agreement and by the Rules for Discussion. mkeonline.com ("We"), a subsidiary of Journal Sentinel Inc., reserves the right to change the terms of this Agreement or to modify any features of this Service at any time. By registering for this Service and/or continuing to use this Service after the posting of Notices regarding such changes, you agree to be bound by such changes.

2. You represent that, if you participate in dicussion on these sites, you have read and agree to abide by the mkeonline.com Rules for Discussion.

3. This Service (including, but not limited to text, photographs, graphics, video and audio content) is protected by copyright as a collective work or compilation under the copyright laws of the United States and other countries. All individual articles, content and other elements comprising this Service are also copyrighted works. You must abide by all additional copyright notices or restrictions contained in this Service. By posting or submitting content on the Service, a user is giving Journal Interactive the right to display such content on the Service and its affiliated publications and to use such content for promotional and marketing purposes.

4. (a) Except for content you have posted on the Service, or unless expressly permitted, you may not copy, reproduce, distribute, publish, enter into a database, display, perform, modify, create derivative works, transmit, or in any way exploit any part of this Service, except that you may download material from this Service for your own personal use as follows: you may make one machine readable copy and/or one print copy that is limited to occasional articles of personal interest only. Without limiting the generality of the foregoing, you may not distribute any part of this Service over any network, including a local area network, nor sell or offer it for sale. In addition, these files may not be used to construct any kind of database.

(b) mkeonline.com has been specially designed for presentation of content in a unique format and appearance to our users. We are concerned about the integrity of our Service when it is viewed in a setting created by a third party that includes advertising or other materials that we have not authorized to be displayed with our Service. Without limiting the provisions of (5a), neither you nor any third party shall make use of the contents of the Service in any manner that constitutes an infringement of our rights, including copyright.

(c) Just as mkeonline.com requires users to respect our copyrights, and those of our affiliates and partners, we respect the copyrights of others. If you believe in good faith that your copyrighted work has been reproduced on our site without authorization in a way that constitutes copyright infringement, you may notify us by sending mail to mke central, 333 W. State St., Milwaukee, WI, 53203.

5. You will be responsible for all charges incurred while your account is being used, if any, including charges for any goods or services. You are also responsible for all statements made or materials posted under your account, including liability for harm caused by such statements or materials. You may not transfer, sell, or otherwise assign your rights or obligations under this Agreement.

6. You agree to indemnify and hold harmless mke, Journal Interactive and Journal Sentinel Inc., its directors, officers, managers, employees, shareholders, parent, subsidiaries, affiliates, agents and licensors from and against all losses, expenses, damages and costs, including reasonable attorneys' fees, resulting from any violation of this Agreement or the mkeonline.com Rules of Discussion, or the failure to fulfill any obligations relating to your account incurred by you or any other person using your account. We reserve the right to take over the exclusive defense of any claim for which we are entitled to indemnification under this Section. In such event, you shall provide us with such cooperation as is reasonably requested by us.

7. This Service is available "as is." We do not warrant that this Service will be uninterrupted or error-free. There may be delays, omissions, interruptions and inaccuracies in the news, information or other materials available through this Service. We are not responsible for the availability or content of other services that may be linked to this Service. We do not make any warranties, express or implied, including without limitation, those of merchantability and fitness for a particular purpose, with respect to this Service or any information or goods that are available or advertised or sold through this Service. We do not make any representations, nor do we endorse the accuracy, completeness, timeliness or reliability of any advice, opinion, statement or other material or database displayed, uploaded or distributed in this Service or available though links in this Service. We reserve the right to correct any errors or omissions in this Service. Although we intend to take reasonable steps to prevent the introduction of viruses, worms, "Trojan horses" or other destructive materials to this Service, we do not guarantee or warrant that this Service or materials that may be downloaded from this Service do not contain such destructive features. We are not liable for any damages or harm attributable to such features. If you rely on this Service and any materials available through this Service, you do so solely at your own risk.

8. mke, Journal Interactive and Journal Sentinel Inc., and its officers, directors, managers, employees, shareholders, parent, subsidiaries, affiliates, agents or licensors are not liable for incidental, indirect, consequential, special, punitive, or exemplary damages of any kind, including lost revenues or profits, loss of business or loss of data, in any way related to this Service or for any claim, loss or injury based on errors, omissions, interruptions or other inaccuracies in this Service (including without limitation as a result of breach of any warranty or other term of this Agreement). Any claim against us shall be limited to the amount you paid, if any, for use of this Service.

9. This Agreement may be terminated by either party for any reason at any time. Sections three (3) and six (6) through nine (9) of this Agreement shall survive such termination.

10. This Agreement shall be governed by the laws of the United States and the State of Wisconsin. BY CONTINUING TO USE MKEONELINE.COM, YOU AGREE TO ABIDE BY THE TERMS OF THIS AGREEMENT.

Privacy Policy

At the same time that mkeonline.com is committed to bringing you information tailored to your individual needs, we recognize the importance of protecting the privacy of your personally identifiable information. In adopting this privacy policy, our intent is to balance our legitimate business interests in collecting and using personally identifiable information and your reasonable expectations of privacy.

What personally identifiable information do I provide to mkeonline.com?

mkeonline.com may, from time to time, ask you to provide various types of personally identifiable information to enhance your experience on our site. During registration, mkeonline.com may ask for information such as your name, e-mail address, street address, birth date, gender, Zip code and country, and optional information. The more information you provide, the better we are able to customize your experience. We may also ask you for other information at other times - such as when you enter a contest or participate in a promotion, when you post an online ad, when you participate in our message boards, or when you order products from us. Whenever you provide personally identifiable information to us, we will make an effort to link to our privacy policy. See below about "cookies" and what other information is collected.

How does mkeonline.com use my personally identifiable information?

Our primary goal, should we collect personally identifiable information is to provide you, the user, with a customized experience on our site. This includes personalization services, interactive communications, online shopping and many other types of services, most of which are completely free to you. mkeonline.com may use the personally identifiable information you provide to us in several ways. Some examples follow.

• A user's personally identifiable information may be used by mkeonline.com for editorial purposes such as to contact you as part of an online survey. We may also use the information provided by you to contact you with legal notices, or to advise you of any material changes in our terms and conditions.

• mkeonline.com deliver targeted advertisements on behalf of advertisers. Advertisers give us an advertisement and tell us the type of audience they want to reach (for example, females over 25 years old). We take the advertisement and display it to users meeting that criteria. In this process, the advertiser never has access to individual account information. You will only receive special offers via e-mail from mkeonline.com consistent with your stated preferences. You can change your preferences at any time.

• mkeonline.com also does research on our users' demographics, interests and behavior based on the information you provide to us including upon registration, on order forms, during a promotion, as well as from our server log files or from surveys. We do this to better understand and serve our users. This research is compiled and analyzed on an aggregated basis and mke and mkeonline.com may share this aggregated data with advertisers or other businesses. In addition, under confidentiality agreements, mkeonline.com may match user information with third party data.

Do other companies or people have access to personally identifiable information I provide to mkeonline.com?

When you are on an area of mkeonline.com and are asked for personally identifiable information, you are providing that information to mke, Journal Interactive and Journal Sentinel Inc., its divisions or affiliates, or vendors providing contractual services for mkeonline.com (such as hosting vendors and list managers). If personally identifiable information is being provided to and/or maintained by any company other than these, our policy is that we will not transfer that personally identifiable information unless notice is given prior to transfer. If you do not want your information to be shared, you can choose not to allow the transfer by not using that particular service or by expressing this preference, if requested. Additional information about personally identifiable information follows.

• Promotions. Promotions that run on mkeonline.com may be sponsored by companies other than mkeonline.com or may be co-sponsored by mkeonline.com and another company. Some or all personally identifiable information provided by you during a promotion may be shared with the sponsor. If information will be shared, we will disclose such sharing prior to the transfer. You can decide not to participate in the promotion if you don't want your personally identifiable information to be shared. In certain circumstances, you may not be able to participate in a particular promotion if you chose not to share personally identifiable information. Currently, most mkeonline.com promotions are limited to Wisconsin, U.S. or North American residents.

• Advertisers and Links. mkeonline.com advertisers, or Web sites that have links on our site, may also collect personally identifiable information directly from you. The information practices of companies collecting data on our site or Web sites linked to mkeonline.com are not covered by this privacy statement.

• E-commerce. If you make a purchase or request a service from a business or another e-commerce transaction, the information you provide for that transaction (as well as tracking information and cookies as described below) is provided directly to the participating business. Businesses listed on mkeonline.com have separate privacy and data collection practices. mkeonline.com has no responsibility or liability for these independent policies. For more information regarding the business and its privacy policy, go to that business' home page and click on the appropriate link.

• Other. If we run competitions or contests on the site, you may be required to provide information such as your telephone number and address in order to participate. The exact rules may vary in each case but the specific rules for any contest will state how that information may be used. If you told us that you would be interested in receiving e-mail from us, we may send you e-mails about mke and mkeonline.com products, promotions or services as well as on behalf of other companies.
  
  We do not control the privacy policies of our advertisers, sponsors or other sites or businesses to which we provide hyperlinks or access. Please visit the sites of these businesses to review their privacy policies. mkeonline.com users should also be aware that, when you voluntarily disclose personal information in chat areas, forums or bulletin boards, that information may be collected by others and may result in unsolicited messages from others.
  
  Except as stated in this privacy policy or at the time of collection, a user's personally identifiable information will not be transferred to a party outside mke, Journal Interactive and Journal Sentinel Inc., its divisions or affiliates, or its service vendors unless notice is given at the time of collection or prior to transfer. mkeonline.com may also disclose account information in special cases when we have reason to believe that disclosing this information is necessary to identify, contact or bring legal action against someone who may be violating our User Agreement or may be causing injury to or interference with (either intentionally or unintentionally) mkeonline.com's rights or property, other mke and mkeonline.com users, or anyone else that could be harmed by such activities.
  
  
• Data Security. We have in place physical, electronic and managerial procedures to protect the information we collect online. However, as effective as these measures are, no security system is impenetrable. We cannot guarantee the security of our database, nor can we guarantee that the information you supply will not be intercepted while being transmitted to us over the Internet.

Web servers serving mkeonline.com automatically collect certain non-personally identifiable information, such as which pages each user visits and the domain name (e.g., aol.com) of visitors. This information is used for various purposes including internal review, to tailor information to individual visitors and for traffic audits. We also provide this information (as well as information from third-party market researchers) about our users on an aggregated, anonymous basis to our advertisers.

What are cookies and how does mkeonline.com use them?

mkeonline.com places a "cookie" on the browser of a mkeonline.com user's computer to store and sometimes track information about you. A cookie can be used to tell when your computer has contacted a Web site; we may also use the information for editorial purposes and for other purposes such as measuring certain traffic patterns. For example, cookies are used to ensure that you don't see the same ad too many times in a single session and that you do not have to reenter your login name or password during your visit. We may also use cookies to track your progress and number of entries in some of our promotions and contests. Advertising service vendors that serve ads into our site may also use their own cookies. You may opt-out of the cookies delivered by mkeonline.com by changing the setting on your browser. Please be aware that this will disable all cookies delivered to your browser, not just the ones delivered by mkeonline.com.

How is information collected by Advertising Cookies used?

Some online advertising for mkeonline.com is delivered by third-party vendors. These vendors, like other advertising service vendors, place cookies on users' hard drives so that their systems can identify your computer. By placing such cookies on your system, these vendors are able, among other things, to determine automatically whether you have seen a particular advertisement before and avoid sending you duplicate advertisements. It also enables these vendors to serve you advertisements tailored to things you have shown interest in based on other sites you have visited. These vendors allow visitors the option to opt-out of advertising cookies.

Often our advertisers contract with a third-party service to host their ads. In this case, an ad serving vendor contacts the advertisers' hosting service for a particular advertisement. In that case, an independent cookie may be used by the third-party service. We do not have a mechanism to allow visitors to opt-out of cookies from vendors with whom we do not have a contractual relationship.

Special Message for Kids under 13

Children under 13 should NOT send any information about themselves to us - including information like name, address or e-mail address. In general, we do not knowingly collect personally identifiable information from children under 13. If, in limited circumstances, we do knowingly collect personally identifiable information from a child under the age of 13, we will do so only with verified parental consent prior to collection. In the event that we learn that we have collected any personal information from a child under the age of 13 without verification of parental consent, we will delete that information from our database as quickly as possible.

Technology on the Internet is developing at a rapid pace, and we need to maintain our flexibility in the online arena. If we need to change our policy in the future, we will post these changes as soon as they go into effect.

User Agreement | Privacy Policy | Rules of Discussion | Copyright