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Legalese/Privacy

The legalese required to maintain a website has gotten pretty weird, hasn't it? (You want diatribes on legalese? I've got your diatribes!)

Well, here's my legalese (and I fer sure invite suggestions for improvements!):

Takedown

Takedown

If you think that my website contains (or links to) material that you have the copyright on, please contact me.
For that matter, if you find anything else on my website (or linked-to from it) that looks illegal to you (obscene, classified military secret, trademark infringement, etc.), please contact me.
Heck, if you find anything that looks just plain stupid and/or wrong, please contact me.
Hey, I'm in this to inform and entertain, not to get folks all riled up when there's no cause for riling.

GNU Material

Some of the webpages on this website are not 100% original to me, but include material subject to the GNU Free Documentation License. I've taken that GNU material, re-worked it, and added some material of my own. Each webpage on which this occurs is thus a Modified Version of the original material.

This material is marked accordingly, webpage-by-webpage.
I, Tom Streeter, am both the new author and the publisher of each of these Modified Versions.
One of the GNU license requirements is that I must include a "History" section that states where I got this licensed material from. You'll note that, whenever I've taken GNU-licensed material from the Web, I've phrased my "History" section as:
- HISTORY: I've taken some material, below, from [here insert name of author's website]'s web piece(s) (last accessed in [here insert year]) on [here insert title(s), with hyperlinks].
Another GNU license requirement is that you -- when copying or modifying this Modified Version of mine onto your website -- must include a "History" section that re-states my "History" section, and that then adds to it an item stating at least the title of the Modified Version, the year, and my name (as new author).
Thus, as I read the GNU license, all you have to do to comply with the "History" requirement is to include:
- a suitable cross-reference to the GNU license; and
- a "History" section, phrased as:
  - HISTORY: I've taken some material, below, from Tom Streeter's web piece(s) (last accessed in [here insert year]) on [here insert title(s), with hyperlinks], which in turn took some material from [here insert name of website]'s web piece(s) (last accessed in [here insert year]) on [here insert title(s), with hyperlinks].
Yes, the GNU license has "additional requirements". I sure think that I've complied with everything that the GNU license requires. If I haven't, then I'm sure that the GNU licensors will bring this non-compliance to my attention! I mean, it's not like I'm hiding this website from Google and the other search engines. And, yes, I'll promptly correct any non-compliance.
I sure would appreciate somebody explaining to me how I can get rid of this GNU legalese from this website. Or at least how to make it more reader-friendly. Until then, I play by the rules as best I understand them.

Original Material

Everything else on this website is original to me and is Copyright © Tom Streeter 1991-[whatever this year is]. And that goes double for patents, trademarks (oh, yes: ™), and all other "Intellectual Property".

Pretty Broad License

That having been said:

Feel free to link to, quote, copy, modify, archive, or frame any page on this website. An acknowledgement and a link-back are appreciated, but not necessary. Cut your own deal with GNU material.
Keep in mind, though, that this website is a perpetual work in progress. A link to (or frame of) a page on this website -- one that worked yesterday -- might well not work today.
If I decide that you're not playing nice, I reserve the right to give notice that I have revoked this permission by the simple expedient(s) of:
- updating this webpage of legalese, and/or
- sending you an email (snail-mail if I have to).
Note that phrasing: "and/or". If you make it easy for me to send you an email/snail-mail, then I am more likely to do so, and to thereby bring the problem to your actual attention. "Ask, and you might well receive; don't ask, and your odds go way down." Maybe I'll:
- set up an RSS; or
- include your email address in this page, and send you an email every time I upload a modified version; or
- something else.
Keep in mind, though, that "notice" is complete once I update this webpage of legalese. So:
- Don't worry about pre-notice use; just don't do any post-notice use.
- If you're thinking about starting some hard-to-back-out-of project that uses stuff from this webpage, and that you could find yourself suddenly not permitted to use any more, then:
  - double-check back to this webpage; and
  - contact me; we can probably cut some special deal -- hey, I'm reasonable.

Legalese Disclaimer

Check out my legalese disclaimer.

Privacy Policy

Privacy? I can't vouch for my ISP, but I'm far too lazy, myself, to track visitors to this website:

I don't use cookies.
I don't use web bugs.

If you contact me, or if I otherwise get your contact information (email address, telephone number, street address, postal address, etc.), then:

I do not undertake any special responsibility to safeguard your communication (email, telephone call, face-to-face conversation, letter, etc.). This includes both:
- your contact information; and
- the contents of your communication.
On the other hand, I do undertake to refrain from:
- deliberately making it any easier for unauthorized persons to hack into this information than to it is for them hack into anything else on my computer;
  and from
- deliberately disclosing your contact information to third parties, other than to mutual friends who have misplaced it, or with your permission.
There's always the possibility that someone will hack into my computer, or will burglarize my home and bodily steal my computer. If this happens then -- as soon as I discover it and can get back on line -- I'll notify everybody in my address book. To ensure that you're in my address book, please sign up to receive update notices.

Note that this non-disclosure undertaking applies only to your contact information, and not to:

the contents of your communication; nor to
your identity as the person who made the communication.

If you want to extend this non-disclosure undertaking to also include such contents and identity, then we're going to have to negotiate some sort of non-disclosure agreement -- and I'm prepared to negotiate. Please check out my Non-Disclosure Terms.

All bets are off if I get hit with legal process.

"Process" includes, but it not limited to, subpoena, search warrant, and national security letter.
Yes, I undertake to notify you that I've been hit with legal process, but only if:
- the process explicitly states that it is permitted for me to notify you; or
- the process explicitly states, or I independently determine, that it is permitted for me to consult an attorney, and:
  - I approach the first attorney referred to me by the Lawyer Referral & Information Service of the Orange County (California) Bar Association; and
  - that attorney states, in writing, at the first meeting, that I am permitted to notify you.

Do you think that this is unreasonable? Then please explain to me why I should assume further obligations for receiving allegedly-confidential information that you want to disclose to me.

Update Notices

If you'd like to receive a notice whenever I update this webpage, or notice a hack-in/burglary, then please contact me. I'll put whatever email address you prefer on this webpage, and send a message whenever I update/notice. Consider giving me a special-purpose email address, and putting a special-purpose spam filter on it.

Current addresses to send notices to:

[none]

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