THE FOLLOWING TERMS AND CONDITIONS GOVERN YOUR USE OF THE SITE. PLEASE READ THESE TERMS OF USE CAREFULLY BEFORE USING THIS SITE.
By using the Site, you agree to be bound by these Terms of Use, Privacy Policies, and Discussion and Comment Policy. If you do not agree to these Terms of Use, Privacy Policies, and Discussion and Comment Policy, please exit the Site and do not use the Site or any of its features.
This WGBH site (including all services, features, functionality and content available through the wgbh.org domain name, collectively, the "Site") is owned and operated by the WGBH Educational Foundation ("WGBH"). The terms and conditions of use (the “Terms” or “Terms of Use”) set forth herein apply to all information, online communications, services, text, video, audio files, graphics, still images, links, or other material and content that is or becomes available on the Site or is otherwise offered through the Site (collectively, "Content"). By accessing or using the Site, you specifically agree to abide by these Terms and any modifications thereto. Any modifications, additions or deletions to these Terms of Use or the Privacy Policy shall be effective immediately upon posting. Your continued use of the Site following the posting of updated Terms of Use or an updated Privacy Policy will mean that you agree to those changes.
A. Registration
Certain components, portions, features, or services available on the Site may, now or in the future, only be accessible and used after registration and creation of an account. When creating your account, you must provide true, accurate, and complete information, and maintain and promptly update this information. If you provide any information that is deceptive, untrue, inaccurate, or incomplete, or if WGBH has reasonable grounds to suspect that the information is untrue, inaccurate, or incomplete, WGBH has the right to suspend or terminate your account and access to the Site. You will receive a password and login name upon completing the registration process. You are responsible for maintaining the confidentiality of your password and login name, and are solely responsible for all activities that occur with your password and login name. You must immediately notify WGBH of any unauthorized use of your account or any other breach of security. WGBH will not be liable for any losses (including your or third party losses) caused by any unauthorized use of your account. You are responsible for obtaining access to the Site, which access may involve third party fees (such as Internet service provider charges). In addition, you must provide and are responsible for all equipment necessary to access the Site.
B. Restrictions on Use of Site and Content
1. You must be at least eighteen (18) years of age, be an emancipated minor, or, if over the age of 13, have the permission of your parent(s) or legal guardian(s), to register for certain features of the Site; submit any User Generated Content (defined below) or personally-identifying information on or through the Site; participate in any online contests (unless otherwise noted in the contest rules); and/or place an order on the WGBH Online Shop. If you are under 13 years of age, please do not send any information about yourself, including your name, address or email address. If we discover that we have collected any personally-identifying information from a child under the age of 13, we will remove that information from our database as soon as possible.
2. Non-commercial, Personal Use Only. This Site and the Content therein may be used for bona fide personal, non-commercial purposes only. You may not use this Content in a defamatory, derogatory or offensive manner. In addition, you may not use the Content for or in any commercial or for-profit manner without the prior written consent of WGBH. For clarity, this means the Content may not be used in any commercial tie-in (i.e. use of the Content in connection with marketing merchandise or services and/or in connection with premiums or promotions, or use of the Site or Content in order to gain advertising or subscription revenue), you may not charge anyone for the Content (e.g. charge for access to the Site or Content from another site), you may not incorporate the Content into a product that you sell or exchange in return for consideration of any kind (e.g. selling ads on another site targeted to the Site or Content), you may not use the Content to advertise or promote a product, nor may you use the Content in any other manner that may be construed as an endorsement, express or implied, of any person, party, product, or other entity.
3. You may not remove, copy, alter, reproduce, modify, create derivative works of, republish, post, publicly perform, publicly display, broadcast, download, transmit, distribute, license or commercially exploit, in whole or in part, the Content or this Site, except as expressly permitted by these Terms, the functionality of the Site, or, if applicable, by the respective content owner as indicated in any end user license agreement, if any, that accompanies such Content, provided that you include without modification all copyright and other proprietary notices contained in the Content.
4. You may not circumvent, disable or otherwise interfere with security- related features of the Site or features that prevent or restrict use or copying of any Content. You further agree not to reverse engineer or jeopardize the correct functioning of the Site or attempt to gain access to secured portions of the Site to which you do not possess access rights.
5. You may not collect or harvest any personally identifiable information from the Site, nor use the communications system provided by the Site (e.g. blogs, discussion boards, comments, questions and answers) for any advertising, promotion or solicitation purposes, regardless of whether or not this is for commercial or non-profit purposes.
6. You may not use the Site to generate unsolicited email advertisements or spam, to conduct or promote any illegal activity, for political campaigning, or soliciting support for legislative or other initiatives.
7. You may copy and download only the Content designated on the Site as downloadable. You acknowledge that you do not acquire any ownership rights by downloading copyrighted material.
8. You understand that when using the Site, you will be exposed to User Generated Content (defined below) from a variety of sources, and that WGBH is not responsible for the accuracy, usefulness, safety, or intellectual property rights of or relating to such User Generated Content. Though WGBH expects all users to adhere to our Terms and content policies, you understand and acknowledge that you may be exposed to User Generated Content that is inaccurate, offensive, indecent, or objectionable, and you agree to waive, and hereby do waive, any legal or equitable rights or remedies you have or may have against WGBH and our affiliates with respect thereto, and agree to defend, indemnify and hold WGBH, and its affiliates, and/or licensors, and their respective trustees, directors and employees, harmless to the fullest extent allowed by law regarding all matters related to your use of the Site.
9. WGBH reserves all rights not expressly granted in and to the Site and the Content.
C. User Generated Content:
1. This Site may now or in the future permit the submission of videos, images, textual content or other content submitted by you and other users ("User Generated Content") and the hosting, sharing and/or publishing of such User Generated Content. You understand that whether or not such User Generated Content is published, WGBH does not guarantee confidentiality with respect to any such User Generated Content. You acknowledge that User Generated Content may be routed through our servers, the servers of one or more third parties on our behalf, and the Internet, and may be viewed by WGBH staff and on the Internet by the general public. You acknowledge that the Site, including its features, are for public and not private communications.
2. You shall be solely responsible for your own User Generated Content and the consequences of WGBH posting, publishing or otherwise distributing them. By submitting your User Generated Content to the Site, you affirm, represent, and/or warrant that: (i) you own or have the necessary licenses, rights, consents, and permissions to upload, use and authorize WGBH to use all patent, trademark, trade secret, copyright or other proprietary rights, including privacy and publicity rights, in and to any and all User Generated Content to enable inclusion, distribution and use of the User Generated Content in the manner contemplated by the Site and these Terms; (ii) you have the written consent, release, and/or permission of each and every identifiable individual person in the User Generated Content to use the name or likeness of each and every such identifiable individual person to enable inclusion, distribution and use of the User Generated Content in the manner contemplated by the Site and these Terms; (iii) the User Generated Content is your own original work and that you own or control the necessary rights to enable inclusion, distribution and use of the User Generated Content in the manner contemplated by the Site and these Terms; (iv) the User Generated Content does not in any way violate any laws, rules or regulations, (v) the User Generated Content is not in any way derogatory, abusive, defamatory, invasive of privacy or publicity rights, harmful to children, vulgar, profane, lewd, obscene, offensive, pornographic, threatening, harrassing, violent, racist, or hateful, nor does it encourage conduct that would be considered a criminal offense, or give rise to civil liability; (vi) the User Generated Content does not violate or infringe upon the rights of any person or entity whatsoever; (vii) the User Generated Content is not an endorsement, express or implied, of any party, product, or other entity and (viii) you have not received payment or consideration of any kind for submitting the User Generated Content to WGBH or the Site.
3. Unless you enter into a separate written agreement with WGBH, WGBH does not claim ownership in User Generated Content you submit; however, by submitting the User Generated Content to WGBH, you hereby waive any and all moral rights in connection with the User Generated Content and you automatically grant WGBH and its licensees, a perpetual, worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free, and transferable license to use, reproduce, distribute, sub-license, modify, create derivative works of (including without limitation, to rename, edit, shorten, if video - split the videos into different segments, and use the entire User Generated Content or segments thereof), publish, transfer, transmit, publicly display, publicly perform, host, index, cache, tag, encode, and/or adapt the User Generated Content in any and all media formats and channels, including, but not limited to, the Site (including the advertisement and promotion thereof), third party licensee web sites, over the air (on radio or television), and on mobile platforms, without payment and without further consent or notice to you. You further grant WGBH and its licensees the right to contact you in connection with your User Generated Content and to use your name, city and state or province and other information that you have provided in connection with the User Generated Content.
You also hereby grant each user of the Site a non-exclusive license to access your User Generated Content through the Site, and to use, reproduce, distribute, create derivative works of, publish, transfer, transmit, publicly display and publicly perform such User Generated Content (in whole or in part) as permitted through the functionality of the Site and under these Terms.
4. In connection with your User Generated Content, you further agree that your will not upload content, or distribute anything that may be harmful to minors or that violates these Terms.
5. WGBH does not endorse any User Generated Content or any opinion, recommendation, or advice expressed therein, and WGBH expressly disclaims any and all liability in connection with User Generated Content. Opinions on the Site are not to be construed as assertions of fact.
6. By uploading User Generated Content, you are consenting to its display through the Site and for related promotional purposes.
7. You acknowledge that WGBH reserves the right to screen, refuse to post, remove or edit User Generated Content at any time and for any or no reason in our absolute and sole discretion without prior notice, although we have no duty to do so. If we elect to screen User Generated Content, there may be a delay in the posting of such content to allow for a review process. If we have questions about your User Generated Content, we have the right, but not the duty, to contact you for further information, including, for example, to verify that you own the copyright or otherwise have the rights to post the User Generated Content.
8. WGBH may terminate your access to the Site for uploading material in violation of these Terms, at any time, without prior notice and in its sole discretion.
E. Removal of Content
1. WGBH does not permit the infringement of intellectual property rights, including copyright, on its Site, and WGBH will remove Content (including User Generated Content) if properly notified that such Content infringes on another's intellectual property rights. WGBH reserves the right to remove Content, including User Generated Content without prior notice.
2. WGBH reserves the right to change or discontinue temporarily or permanently any Content, or services available through the Site at any time without notice. WGBH will not be liable to you or any third party for any modification or discontinuance of the services therein.
F. Conflicts: Some of the Content on the Site may now or in the future be made available under the specific terms of a license agreement. Where any matter contained in these Terms or elsewhere on this Site may be read so as to alter, amend or supersede any part of such license agreement, then the license agreement shall be taken to be the definitive and over-ruling part of these Terms.
G. Copyright: All rights, including copyright and database right, in this Site and its Content (including all text, images, software, illustrations, artwork, high resolution photography, video clips, audio clips, any after-sales material, and ancillary materials) are owned by or licensed to WGBH, or otherwise used by WGBH as permitted by applicable law or agreement. In the case of User Generated Content, the contents are licensed to WGBH by the user as set forth herein.
H. Trademarks: All trademarks, service marks, and trade names are proprietary to WGBH, unless otherwise noted, in which case they are the trademarks, service marks, and/or trade names of the respective owner as indicated by the mark, as the case may be. All rights are reserved by the respective owners. You may not use any WGBH-provided service marks, logos or graphics, without WGBH's prior written consent, except that you shall have the right, and obligation, to use any WGBH or other content provider service mark or logo included in, or required to be used in connection with, Content or other functionalities of the Site, subject to the requirements set forth in these Terms for the use of the Content or other functionalities of the Site.
I. Users' Obligation to Abide By Applicable Law: In connection with the use of the Site, you shall not engage in conduct or publish information which would infringe upon or injure the personal or property rights of any individual, group, or entity, including but not limited to defamation, harassment, invasion of privacy, tort, or disclosure of confidential or trade secrets. Furthermore, you shall not violate any law or treaty or intellectual property rights protected by law (such as copyright, patent and trademark rights). You acknowledge that the Content and materials available on the Site includes intellectual property that is protected under the copyright, trademark, and other intellectual property laws of the United States and/or other countries ("Intellectual Property Laws"). Such Intellectual Property Laws generally prohibit the unauthorized reproduction, distribution, or exhibition of all text, photographic and graphic (art and electronic) images, music, sound samplings, and other protected materials. The violation of applicable Intellectual Property Laws may give rise to civil and/or criminal penalties.
J. Notification of Copyright Infringement
1. If you are a copyright owner or an agent of a copyright owner and believe that any content on the Site infringes upon your copyrights, you may submit a notification to WGBH’s Designated Agent pursuant to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act ("DMCA") section 17 USC 512 (c) (3). All notifications of claimed copyright infringement should be forwarded to our Designated Agent: Eric Brass, One Guest Street, Boston, MA 02135, fax: 617-300-1014, email: infringement@wgbh.org,
According to Section 512 (c)(3)(a), any copyright infringement notification must include:
a. A physical or electronic signature of a person authorized to act on behalf of the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed;
b. Identification of the copyrighted work claimed to have been infringed, or, if multiple copyrighted works at a single online site are covered by a single notification, a representative list of such works at that site;
c. Identification of the material that is claimed to be infringing or to be the subject of infringing activity and that is to be removed or access to which is to be disabled, and information reasonably sufficient to permit the service provider to locate the material;
d. Information reasonably sufficient to permit the service provider to contact the complaining party, such as an address, telephone number, and, if available, an electronic mail address at which the complaining party may be contacted;
e. A statement that the complaining party has a good faith belief that use of the material in the manner complained of is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law; and
f. A statement that the information in the notification is accurate, and under penalty of perjury, that the complaining party is authorized to act on behalf of the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed.
You acknowledge that if you fail to comply with all of the above requirements, your notice may not be valid pursuant to the DMCA.
2. Counter-Notice. If any of your User Generated Content has been removed or disabled because of a matter of possible copyright infringement, and you believe that your Content is not infringing or that you have the authorization from the copyright owner or the copyright owner’s agent, you may send a counter-notice containing the following information to the Designated Agent:
a. A physical or electronic signature of the subscriber.
b. Identification of the material that has been removed or to which access has been disabled and the location at which the material appeared before it was removed or access to it was disabled.
c. A statement under penalty of perjury that you have a good faith belief that the material was removed or disabled as a result of mistake or misidentification of the material to be removed or disabled.
d. Your name, address, and telephone number, and a statement that you consent to the jurisdiction of the Federal District Court for Boston, Massachusetts for the resolution of any copyright or other claims arising out of your use of the Site or under the Terms, and a statement that you accept service of process from the person who provided notification of the alleged infringement.
K. Disclosure of Online Communications: You are cautioned that any online communications may not be fully confidential. In addition, you should be aware that federal postal regulations do not protect electronic mail. You should be aware that some administrative personnel of WGBH may, in the course of their regular duties, have access to communications required by law.
L. Rogue Programming and Viruses: WGBH is not responsible for any computer virus, trojan horse, timebomb, worm, or any other rogue programming ("Rogue Programming") that may be contained in any of the Content (including User Generated Content), material or software contained on the Site. WGBH has no obligation to detect the presence of any Rogue Programming. Any downloading of software or other materials or any other use of the Content (including User Generated Content) on the Site is at your risk, and you are advised to take adequate precautions to minimize any loss to your system caused by Rogue Programming, including use of anti-virus programs and proper backup of files. You agree not to post, transmit, or make available in any way through the Site any software or other materials that contain Rogue Programming.
M. Content of Information: You are responsible for the content of any information you put on the Site. WGBH has no obligation to, and does not in the normal course, monitor, prescreen or control any User Generated Content that is or becomes available on the Site. WGBH reserves the right to review any User Generated Content that is or becomes available on the Site. WGBH also reserves the right to refuse to post, to redact, edit or to move or remove any User Generated Content that is, in WGBH's sole discretion, unacceptable, undesirable, or in violation of these Terms. However, WGBH has no obligation to exercise such reservations of rights by WGBH and is not responsible for any failure or delay in removing such material.
N. Disclaimer of Warranties: The Site, the Content and other material on the Site are provided on an "As Is" basis without warranties of any kind, either express or implied, including without limitation warranties of title, non-infringement, or implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. WGBH does not warrant that any Content is complete or accurate, that the Site will be uninterrupted or error free, or that any Content or material is free of Rogue Programming.
O. Limitation of Damages. Under no circumstance, including negligence or any other legal theory, shall WGBH be liable for any direct, indirect, incidental, special, punitive, or consequential damages that may result from the use or inability to use the Site, including without limitation use of or reliance on Content available on the Site, interruptions, errors, defects, mistakes, omissions, deletions of files, delays in operation or transmission, non-delivery of Content, disclosure of communications, or any other failure of performance.
P. Release and Indemnity. Though WGBH expects all users to adhere to our content policies in these Terms, you may be exposed to content that violates our policies or is otherwise offensive through the use of the Site. Your use of the Site is at your own risk. You agree that WGBH is not liable for content that is provided by others. We take no responsibility for your exposure to content on the Site whether it violates our content policies or not. You understand that the information and opinions in content uploaded by third parties represent solely the thoughts of the author and is neither endorsed by nor does it necessarily reflect WGBH’s beliefs or editorial positions. You hereby release and waive any and all claims, causes of action and/or liability against WGBH arising from or in connection with your use of the Site, the Content and/or any other material on the Site. You also agree to defend, indemnify, and hold harmless WGBH and its trustees, officers and employees from and against any and all causes of action, claims or liability, including costs and attorneys fees, arising from or in connection with your use of the Site, your provision of User Generated Content to or on the Site, or failure to abide by applicable law or these Terms.
Q. Modifications: These Terms and the Content may be revised, amended, or supplemented by WGBH without notice at any time for any reason. Continuing to use the Site after a change has been made will signify your acceptance of the changes. You should refer back to this page for future updates.
R. Privacy Policy. The Site's Privacy Policy provides additional terms and conditions that apply to your use of our Site. If you do not agree to the conditions therein, please do not use the Site.
S. Other: These Terms will be governed by and interpreted in the English language pursuant to the laws of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, United States of America, without giving effect to any principles of conflicts of law. If any provision of these Terms shall be unlawful, void, or for any reason, unenforceable then that provision shall be deemed severable from these Terms and shall not effect the validity and enforceability of any remaining provisions. You expressly agree that any dispute arising under these Terms shall be brought solely and exclusively before the state or federal courts located in Massachusetts and you waive any claim that this forum is or may be inconvenient or improper.
T. International Users: The Site is controlled and operated within the United States. WGBH makes no representation that Content, materials or products available on or through the Site are appropriate or available for use outside of the United States. If you access the Site from a location outside the United States, you are responsible for compliance with applicable laws, including local laws regarding online conduct and content and U.S. export laws and regulations.
Privacy Policy For WGBH.org Visitors
Thank you for visiting wgbh.org and its associated sub-domains. As an extension of our broadcast mission, we want your visit to wgbh.org to enlighten, inform, and entertain you. We know you don't want the information you provide us shared indiscriminately. Here we explain what information WGBH (and our third-party vendors (collectively “we”) acting on our behalf to help deliver the services and operate and analyze use of the Site), collect, what we do with the information, and what controls you have over the information collected. We're committed to ensuring the privacy of your personally identifiable information, and to protecting your ability to make financial transactions and transmit your personal data with full confidence.
The privacy policy set forth here refers solely to wgbh.org, and it’s associated sub-domains such as, but not limited to, main.wgbh.org, careers.wgbh.org, shop.wgbh.org and campaign.wgbh.org. Please read it carefully, and if you have any questions or concerns, please contact us. Also, note that wgbh.org links to numerous other sites, such as PBS, NPR and Public Interactive. Please consult those sites to learn more about their policies.
1. WHAT INFORMATION DO WE COLLECT ABOUT YOU
We collect two types of information from you: a) Personally identifiable information, includes personal information (such as your name, address, e-mail address, telephone number, credit card information and/or other identifying information) you voluntarily supply upon request when you register for our website, make a donation, complete a survey, register for an online discussion, enter a contest or provide your e-mail address; and b) Non-personally identifiable information, for example IP Addresses and cookies, which includes tracking information collected as you navigate through our site. Uses of this information are discussed in Section 2 below.
A. Personally Identifiable Information
We will not collect personally identifiable information from you, other than what you supply to us on a voluntary basis upon request.
Registration for our websites:
Anyone can view our site, however some pages of the Site may require a free registration which enables full access to the information and resources offered throughout the Site. A unique email address (user name) and password must be supplied to register. By using the Site, you are agreeing to the conditions of our Terms of Use.
Paid Products and Services:
While the majority of our Site is free, we may now or in the future, charge fees for select products and services, such as purchases made through an online shop. To enable the purchase of these and other products we collect your telephone number, e-mail address, billing address and credit card information.
Support of WGBH:
On certain pages within the Site we may now or in the future offer visitors the opportunity to make a donation in support of WGBH or our programming. If a visitor chooses to make a donation, we will collect and store your telephone number, e-mail address, billing address and credit card information.
Forums, Feedback and Content Submissions:
On certain pages within the Site you can submit content to be published, make community postings, comments, suggestions, and vote. We may collect your name, address, and e-mail addresses in connection with these activities. We will indicate which information is required and which is optional.We may contact users regarding their submissions in certain circumstances.
Your submission of others’ Personally Identifiable Information:
On certain pages within the Site you can submit information about other people. For example, you may submit a person’s name and email address to send an article. This information will only be used for your intended purpose.
Contests, Sweepstakes, Surveys and Special Offers:
On occasion, we may collect personal information from users in connection with optional sweepstakes, surveys, contests or special offers. We will indicate which information is required and which is optional. Such information will be used as indicated at the time of collection.
E-Mail and E-mail Newsletters:
On occasion, we may collect personal information from users in connection with optional email and e-mail newsletters. We will indicate which information is required and which is optional. Such information will be used as indicated at the time of collection.
Marketing and Promotional Communications:
On occasion, we may collect personal information from users in connection with optional marketing and promotional communications from WGBH, PBS, or a public broadcasting station. We will indicate which information is required and which is optional. Such information will be used as indicated at the time of collection.
B. Non-personally Identifiable Information
In addition to information that you provide to us, we (again, this is WGBH and third party vendors) may also collect and store certain non-personally identifiable information automatically when you use the Site. This information helps us improve the experience you and other visitors have with the Site.
For example, we may collect your IP address, browser information and reference site domain, as well as related information such as the date on which you visit the Site. This information does not identify you personally and is only used in the aggregate.
As is common practice among web sites, we use “cookies” and similar technologies. In general, cookies -- the informational files that your web browser places on your computer when you visit a website -- are used on this Site to track and analyze how you and other visitors use our Site. We use these cookies in order to improve the Site, to identify the source of visitors and what pages you use while on our site, to offer visitors interactive and/or personalized features that would not be possible without the cookies, to recall specific information to save visitors time when they return to the Site, to provide our sponsors targeted sponsorship opportunities, to provide visitors customized sponsorship messages or list of customized videos of interest, and to identify usage and statistical trends. By looking at this traffic we can better understand our community, which allows us to improve our Site and to provide you with an optimal experience and better service. Our sponsorship service vendors, which serve sponsorship messages onto our site, and third party vendors that measure and analyze the use of the Site for us, may also use their own cookies. At no time does the cookie reveal your name, address, or e-mail address (even if you have entered these in specific areas of the Site). The Site pages cannot extract any personally identifying information about you from what we receive via a cookie and your browser.
You can set your browser preferences to refuse cookies or to alert you when cookies are being sent. However, some parts of the Site will not function properly if you do so.
2. HOW DO WE USE INFORMATION GATHERED ON THE SITE
Neither WGBH, nor our third-party vendors acting on our behalf to help deliver the services and operate the Site, will willfully disclose any personally identifiable information about our online users to any non-affiliated third party without first receiving the user's permission, unless required by law. WGBH’s affiliates include our local and national productions (such as NOVA, and Forum Network), PBS, and other public broadcasting stations or programming.
In terms of our own use of information, we may use your personally identifiable information for the activities described in the previous sections, for the activities described when you submitted the information, or for internal and marketing promotional purposes as further described in this policy.
We will typically explain the extent of use at the time you are asked to provide personal information. If you do not want this information to be collected or used by us for these purposes, you can simply “opt out.” Under certain circumstances, opting out may prevent your participation in activities for which personal information is needed, as in contests.
As mentioned, in certain cases, we contract with other companies to provide services on our behalf. These service providers maintain customer databases with e-mail addresses of Site visitors who have provided them to us by registering at our site, signing up for a newsletter or email, e-mailing us questions about the service, donors who submit online contributions, or online buyers who make a purchase. We (which includes our service providers) will use these addresses to respond to the general purposes for which we collected the information, to provide services and to operate the Site, including to respond to inquiries; to process credit card payments, billing, and shipping; to process e-mail distribution; for list processing and analysis; for promotions management; to send information about WGBH’s programs, services, or your local public broadcasting station’s membership/fundraising; or to correspond about a purchase or product offers. Our service providers have access to your personally identifiable information as necessary to provide certain services on our behalf. They are required to maintain the privacy of all such information in their possession or control and can only use the information on our behalf for the purpose that we have contracted them, for example sending you a newsletter. They are not authorized to use your information for any other purpose.
Similarly, personally identifiable information provided in connection with a donation will be shared with third parties who perform services to process the donation.
Like many nonprofits, we occasionally exchange some of our donors' names and postal addresses with carefully selected nonprofit educational, cultural, health, and social service organizations. When you make an online contribution, your name and postal address will be included as eligible for an exchange. Our exchange program provides other nonprofits with only your name and postal address.
If at any time you would like to check or update our record of your information, please let us know by using the wgbh.org Contact Us page, calling the WGBH Member Hotline (617-300-3300, Monday-Friday, 9am-5pm EST), or writing to us (WGBH, Box 200, Boston, MA 02135).
We will not sell, exchange, or lend e-mail addresses to any non-affiliated third party, without your permission. However, we or our service providers may release personally identifiable information if we believe in good faith that the law or legal process requires it, we have received a valid administrative request from a law enforcement agency, or such release is necessary to protect anyone’s rights, property or safety.
On certain pages, we may now or in the future, offer visitors the opportunity to provide comments, messages or other user-generated text, content or materials (collectively “User Materials”). Any information that you disclose when posting a message to these areas, such as your name, screen name or ID used, becomes public. In addition, the information that you disclose in these areas may be used by us for promotional and marketing purposes. We are not responsible for any personally identifiable information that you choose to disclose in these public areas. Further, WGBH, its production units, public broadcasting station affiliates and their licensees, may use, copy, sublicense, modify, transmit, publicly perform, display, create derivative works of, host, index, cache, tag, encode, and/or adapt any User Materials, and any information contained therein, in any and all media formats or channels, whether now known or hereafter devised, including, but not limited to, the Site, public broadcasting station web sites, other third party web sites, over the air (on radio or television), and on mobile platforms.
We reserve the right to send you e-mail relating to your account status. This includes order confirmations, renewal/expiration notices, notices of credit-card problems, other transactional e-mails and notifications about major changes to our Site and/or to our Privacy Policy. If you have registered for online discussions or other services, you may receive e-mail specific to your participation in those activities.
We offer several e-mail newsletters and emails. We will always provide a clear and convenient method of unsubscribing to our e-mailings. If you no longer wish to receive a specific newsletter, follow the "unsubscribe" instructions located in each newsletter or email, or by going to the Site's Contact Us page and send us a message. We will update our records as soon as possible.
WGBH, with the assistance from time to time of its third party service vendors, uses non-identifying aggregate information to analyze use of and better design the Site and to share with third parties in aggregate form only as appropriate. For example, we may tell a third party that a certain number of users accessed a particular video on our Site. However, we will not disclose any information that could be used to identify those users.
3. SECURITY OF INFORMATION
WGBH has in place what we believe to be appropriate physical, electronic, and managerial procedures to safeguard and secure the information we collect online. Credit card information provided on the Site is protected against unauthorized use by Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) security features. The SSL protocol is the industry standard method for creating an encrypted, secure connection between your web browser and a web server, such as the Site’s server. You should, however, keep in mind that no Internet or e-mail transmission is ever fully secure or error free. Because most e-mail is not encrypted, you should take special care in deciding what information you send to us via e-mail.
4. CHILDREN’S GUIDELINES
WGBH.org is a general audience site and does not knowingly collect or store personally identifiable information about children under the age of 13.
Any portions of our Site that are directed to children under the age of 13 (e.g., the kids section under the Kids and Family section) comply with COPPA (Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act) standards, which are in addition to wgbh.org policies. For complete guidelines on children’s information collection, please visit the WGBH KIDS PRIVACY POLICY which is linked to the kids section of the Site.
5. CORRECTIONS TO PERSONAL DATA; OPTING OUT
Please Contact Us to a) correct or update any personal information in the WGBH database that you state is erroneous, b) opt-out of future communications from WGBH, or c) request WGBH to make reasonable efforts to remove your personal information from the WGBH online database, thereby canceling your profile, newsletter registration and otherWGBH registrations. This will not necessarily remove previous public comments and other User Materials submitted for public display on the Site. You should understand that it may be impossible to delete personal information entirely because of backups and records of deletions.
6. ACCEPTANCE OF THIS PRIVACY POLICY FOR WGBH.ORG
By using this Site, you signify your agreement to the terms and conditions of this Privacy Policy for WGBH.org. If you do not agree to these terms and conditions, please do not use this Site. We reserve the right, at our sole discretion, to change, modify, add, or remove portions of this policy at any time. Please check this page periodically for any changes. Your continued use of WGBH.org following the posting of any changes to these terms shall mean that you have accepted those changes. If you have any questions or concerns, please contact us.
7. CHANGES TO THIS PRIVACY POLICY
Whenever this Privacy Policy for our Site changes, we will post the changes to the Site, and such changes will be effective immediately upon posting. If you do not agree to the changes, please do not continue to use the Site. Under certain circumstances, we may also elect to notify you of changes or updates to our Privacy Policy by additional means, such as posting a notice on the front page of our Site or sending you an e-mail if we have your e-mail address.
WGBH ONLINE AND CHILDREN: NOTICE TO PARENTS
WGBH takes great pride in the high-quality television, radio, and Web content we provide for children, as well as the public trust we have secured in doing so. As we move into providing an online Kids & Family service on the Web, this trust becomes even more important to you, and to us. We believe the following understanding will enhance the safety, value and enjoyment of your child's visits to WGBH Online.
It is our goal to provide service on our site while maintaining our strong commitment to identifying children and protecting their privacy. When we collect information from our Web visitors, we routinely ask them to confirm whether they are older than 18 years of age. If we learn that a user is younger than 18, we will not store his/her personal information for future communication.
WGBH does not willfully disclose to any third party any personally identifiable information about our online visitors who have identified themselves as younger than 18.
From time to time, we may offer contests, quizzes, and surveys in the Kids & Family section of WGBH Online. Our sole objective in these endeavors is to offer young visitors appropriate and entertaining interactive content. When we showcase online content specifically for young people that requires identifying information, we ask children to gain permission from a parent or caregiver first (e.g., "Hey, kids, before you enter our contest, make sure you get permission to participate from a parent or whoever takes care of you.")
If we know a visitor is younger than 18, we collect parental/caregiver permission offline (by US mail, fax, or phone) before we mail any prizes to the child. If your child submits stories, artwork, written comments, or anything else for us to post on our site, he or she will be identified only by first name, age, and state.
Your and your child's use of this site are conditioned on your having accepted these terms. Please check this policy frequently, as it is subject to change from time to time, and your child's continued use of the site is conditioned upon your acceptance of any modifications hereto.
We want to make this site a safe haven for where families to surf together, and where parents and caregivers are happy to have their children interact, learn, and play. If you have any comments or questions, we'd be happy to hear them.
Please see our Privacy Policy for more information about our site's overall practices and policies. If you have any questions or concerns regarding this policy, send us an e-mail at feedback@wgbh.org.
DISCUSSION AND COMMENT POLICY
This is the discussion policy for users of wgbh.org's social networking tools. All participants offering comments on wgbh.org are required to follow these guidelines. Those violating the following guidelines may have their comments removed or blocked.
Our guidelines are intended to facilitate a sense connection and sharing within the WGBH online community. You can contribute to and be part of our community by participating on wgbh.org with these guidelines in mind:
1. Be respectful and civil. If polite language isn’t possible, please don’t post. Engage points, focus on ideas, debate, and discuss. Never resort to name-calling, slander, or obscenities. Messages that include anything WGBH determines to be hate speech, a threat, harassment, or anything illegal will be removed and the poster will be blocked.
2. Post clear, concise comments (posts longer than 200 words tend to be ignored by readers anyway). Long posts may be edited by WGBH. Before submitting, take a moment to re-read your post for clarity, grammar, punctuation, and spelling. And please avoid typing in all caps; it's the online version of shouting.
3. Stay with the topic at hand. Keeping your posts focused contributes to the best possible discussion.
4. Write your own posts. A link or quote from another source can be a meaningful addition to the discussion; copying and pasting an entire article from elsewhere does not contribute in a meaningful way (also see guideline 2, above). In addition, it often violates the author’s copyright. Help keep the conversation lively and focused by posting only one link per comment.
5. Promote the discussion, rather than your own interests. WGBH’s online community is not an appropriate venue for posters’ advertisements, promotions, campaigns, solicitations, or proselytizing. There can be a fine line between discussion and promotion of personal interests; use your best judgment and we’ll use ours.
All comments are moderated, and WGBH will not publish comments that don’t meet these guidelines. Our guidelines are adapted in part from NPR’s Guidelines for Commenting. Thanks for being part of WGBH’s online community!