Terms of Service

Last Updated May 3, 2023

PLEASE READ THESE TERMS AND CONDITIONS OF USE CAREFULLY. BY ACCESSING OR USING THIS SITE, YOU AGREE TO BE BOUND BY THE TERMS AND CONDITIONS DESCRIBED HEREIN AND ALL TERMS INCORPORATED BY REFERENCE. IF YOU DO NOT AGREE TO ALL OF THESE TERMS, DO NOT USE THIS SITE.

These Terms of Service (“Terms”) apply to your access to and use of the Democracy Docket website, newsletters, emails, subscriptions, merchandise, and other communications (collectively, the “Site”) provided by Democracy Docket, LLC (“Democracy Docket,” “we,” or “us”). By accessing or by using our Site, you agree to these Terms, and any terms incorporated by reference. If you do not agree to these Terms, do not use our Site.

We may make changes to these Terms from time to time. If we make changes, we will provide you with notice of such changes, such as by sending an email, providing a notice through our Site or updating the date at the top of these Terms. Unless we say otherwise in our notice, the amended Terms will be effective immediately, and your continued use of our Site after we provide such notice will confirm your acceptance of the changes. If you do not agree to the amended Terms, you must stop using our Site.

If you have any questions about these Terms or our Site, please contact us at [email protected].

1. Privacy

For information about how we collect, use, share and otherwise process information about you, please see our Privacy Policy

2. Use of Site and Site Materials    

The Site and the documents, content, and other materials available through this Site (the “Site Materials”) are owned by the Democracy Docket, or our licensors or other third parties, and are protected by US and international copyright laws.  Except as explicitly stated in these Terms, all rights in and to the Site and the Site Materials are reserved by us, or our licensors, and may be used solely as authorized in these Terms. The Site and the Site Materials are provided solely for informational purposes and may be downloaded and used solely for your own personal, non-business, use.   All materials published or available on site (including, but not limited to text, photographs, images, illustrations, designs, audio clips, video clips, “look and feel, data, or compilations) are protected by copyright, and owned or controlled by Democracy Docket or the party credited as the provider of the content.

Any use of the Site or the Site Materials other than as specifically authorized herein, without our prior written permission, is strictly prohibited, will terminate the license granted herein and violate our intellectual property rights.

The Site and the Site Materials are provided on an “AS IS,” “AS AVAILABLE” basis without warranty or liability of any kind. The provision of agreements or templates does not constitute legal or other advice or create an attorney-client relationship between Democracy Docket and the user.  You should contact an attorney to review any legal documents prior to use and to obtain legal advice with respect to any documents or any legal issues or problems that may arise.

3. No Legal Advice

Our Services are for informational purposes only and not for the purpose of providing legal advice. You should contact your attorney to obtain advice with respect to any issue or problem. The use of and access to our Services does not create an attorney-client relationship. Likewise, the provision of information or materials does not constitute legal or other advice or create an attorney-client relationship.  You should contact an attorney to review any legal documents prior to use and to obtain legal advice with respect to any documents or any legal issues or problems that may arise. The opinions expressed at or through the Services are the opinions of the individual author and may not reflect the opinions of Democracy Docket.

4. Prohibited Conduct and Content

You are solely responsible for your use of the Site and use it at your own risk. You will not violate any applicable law, contract, intellectual property right or other third-party right or commit a tort, and you are solely responsible for your conduct while using our Site. You may only post or otherwise share content that is nonconfidential and that you have all necessary rights to disclose, including the lawful right to distribute and reproduce such content. You will not post, upload to, transmit, distribute, store, create or otherwise publish through our Site any of the following:

  • Content that is unlawful, libelous, defamatory, obscene, pornographic, indecent, lewd, suggestive, harassing, threatening, invasive of privacy or publicity rights, abusive, inflammatory or fraudulent;
  • Content that would constitute, encourage or provide instructions for a criminal offense, violate the rights of any party, or that would otherwise create liability or violate any local, state, national or international law;
  • Content that may infringe any patent, trademark, trade secret, copyright, or other intellectual or proprietary right of any party. By posting any content, you represent and warrant that you have the lawful right to distribute and reproduce such content;
  • Content that contains or depicts any statements, remarks or claims that do not reflect your honest views and experiences;
  • Content that impersonates any person or entity or otherwise misrepresents your affiliation with a person or entity;
  • Unsolicited promotions, advertising or solicitations;
  • Private or personal information of a third party without such third party’s consent;
  • Viruses, corrupted data, or other harmful, disruptive or destructive files or content; or
  • Content that, in our sole judgment, is objectionable or restricts or inhibits any other person from using or enjoying the Site, or may expose us or our users to any harm or liability of any type.

You further agree that you are solely responsible for your conduct while accessing or using our Site, and you agree that you will not do any of the following in connection with our Site or its users:

  • Use our Site other than for their intended purposes and in any manner that could interfere with, disrupt, negatively affect or inhibit other users from fully enjoying our Services or that could damage, disable, overburden or impair the functioning of our Services in any manner;
  • Use or attempt to use another user’s account without authorization from us and that user;
  • Impersonate or post on behalf or any person or entity or otherwise misrepresent your affiliation with a person or entity;
  • Engage in any stalking, intimidating, threatening, predatory or otherwise harassing conduct or cause discomfort to other users;
  • Copy, reproduce, distribute, publicly perform or publicly display all or portions of our Site, except as expressly permitted by us or our licensors;
  • Modify our Site, remove any proprietary rights notices or markings, or otherwise make any derivative works based on our Site;
  • Reverse engineer any aspect of our Site or do anything that might discover source code or bypass or circumvent measures employed to prevent or limit access to any part of our Services;
  • Use any data mining, robots, or similar data gathering or extraction methods designed to scrape or extract data from our Services;
  • Develop or use any applications that interact with our Site without our prior written consent;
  • Bypass or ignore instructions contained in our robots.txt file;
  • Send, distribute or post spam, unsolicited or bulk commercial electronic communications, chain letters or pyramid schemes;
  • Send any unsolicited commercial messages;
  • Use our Site for any illegal or unauthorized purpose, or engage in, encourage or promote any illegal activity that violates these Terms; or
  • Circumvent or attempt to circumvent any filtering, security measures or other features that we may from time to time adopt to protect our Services, our users or third parties.

5. Trademarks and Intellectual Property

Our Site, logo, and slogans including the text, graphics, images, photographs, videos, illustrations, information, data, software, and other content and materials contained therein (and the selection, arrangement and presentation thereof), are owned by Democracy Docket or our licensors and are protected under both U.S. and foreign laws. Subject to your compliance with these Terms, you are granted a limited, nonexclusive, nontransferable, non-sublicensable, revocable license to access and use the Site for non-commercial purposes and to download and print materials from the Site for the purpose of viewing, reading and retaining such materials for reference. Any other access, use, copying, distribution, retransmission or modification of our Site, without our prior written permission, is strictly prohibited and will terminate the license granted herein and violate our intellectual property rights. Reference to any products, services, processes or other information by trade name, trademark, manufacturer, supplier or otherwise does not constitute or imply endorsement, sponsorship or recommendation by us.

6. Feedback

You may voluntarily post, submit or otherwise communicate to us any questions, comments, suggestions, ideas, original or creative materials or other information about Democracy Docket or our Site (collectively, “Feedback”).  You understand that we may use such Feedback for any purpose, commercial or otherwise, without acknowledgment or compensation to you, including, without limitation, to develop, copy, publish, distribute, or improve the Feedback in Democracy Docket’s sole discretion. You understand that the Democracy Docket may treat Feedback as nonconfidential

7. Third-Party Content, Products, and Sites.

We may make third-party documents and other content available through the Site or provide information about third-party organizations, events, products, services, or activities (collectively, “Third-Party Content and Information”). We provide Third-Party Content and Information as a service to those interested in such content. Your dealings, correspondence, or interaction with third parties are solely between you and the third party and your access to and use of any Third-Party Content and Information is solely at your own risk.  Democracy Docket does not control or endorse, and makes no representations or warranties regarding, any Third-Party Content and Information.

8. Indemnification

To the fullest extent permitted by applicable law, you will indemnify, defend and hold harmless Democracy Docket and its independent contractors, service providers, and consultants, successor organizations, and each of their respective officers, directors, agents, partners and employees (individually and collectively, the “Indemnified Parties”) from and against any losses, liabilities, claims, demands, damages, expenses or costs (“Claims”) arising out of or related to (a) your Feedback or your use of any Site Materials; (b) your violation of these Terms; (c) your violation, misappropriation or infringement of any rights of another (including intellectual property rights or privacy rights); or (d) your misconduct in connection with the Site or the Site Materials. You agree to promptly notify Indemnified Parties of any third-party Claims, cooperate with Indemnified Parties in defending such Claims and pay all fees, costs and expenses associated with defending such Claims (including, but not limited to, attorneys’ fees). You also agree that the Indemnified Parties will have control of the defense or settlement, at the Indemnified Party’s sole option, of any third-party Claims.

9. Disclaimers

Your use of our Site and Site Materials is at your sole risk. Except as otherwise provided in a writing by us, our Site and any Site Materials contained therein are provided on an “as is” and “as available” basis, without warranties of any kind, either express or implied, including, but not limited to, implied warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, title, and non-infringement. In addition, Democracy Docket does not represent or warrant that our Site and Site Materials are accurate, complete, effective, reliable, current, enforceable, compliant, or error-free.  We cannot and do not represent or warrant that our Site or servers are free of viruses or other harmful components. You assume the entire risk as to the quality, effectiveness, accuracy, and performance of the Site and the Site Materials.’

10. Limitation of Liability

To the fullest extent permitted by applicable law, Democracy Docket and its contractors, service providers, consultants, successor organizations, and each of their respective officers, directors, agents, and employees,  will not be liable to you under any theory of liability—whether based in contract, tort, negligence, strict liability, warranty, or otherwise—for any indirect, consequential, exemplary, incidental, punitive or special damages or lost profits, even if such parties have been advised of the possibility of such damages.

The total liability of Democracy Docket for any claim arising out of or relating to these Terms or our Site or Site Materials, regardless of the form of the action, is limited to $5.

11. Governing Law and Venue

Any dispute arising from these Terms and your use of the Site will be governed by and construed and enforced in accordance with the laws of the District of Columbia, except to the extent preempted by U.S. federal law, without regard to conflict of law rules or principles that would cause the application of the laws of any other jurisdiction. Any dispute between the parties will be resolved in the state or federal courts of the District of Columbia and the United States, respectively, sitting in the District of Columbia.

12. Modifying and Terminating our Site

We reserve the right to modify our Site or to suspend or stop providing all or portions of our Site or Site Materials at any time. You also have the right to stop using our Site at any time. We are not responsible for any loss or harm related to your inability to access or use our Site or our Site Materials.

13. Severability

If any provision or part of a provision of these Terms is unlawful, void or unenforceable, that provision or part of the provision is deemed severable from these Terms and does not affect the validity and enforceability of any remaining provisions.

14. Miscellaneous

The failure of Democracy Docket to exercise or enforce any right or provision of these Terms will not operate as a waiver of such right or provision. The section titles in these Terms are for convenience only and have no legal or contractual effect. Except as otherwise provided herein, these Terms are intended solely for the benefit of the parties and are not intended to confer third-party beneficiary rights upon any other person or entity. You agree that communications and transactions between us may be conducted electronically.