Beach Center Blog Policy Statement

Beach Center Blog Policy

General Statement of Copyright

The Beach Center is committed to providing an environment that supports research and teaching activities. As a matter of principle and practice, the Beach Center encourages all members of the academic community to publish without restriction their papers, books, and other forms of communication in order to share openly and fully their findings and knowledge with colleagues and the public. The Copyright Policy has been prepared in this spirit and with this intent. The Copyright Policy is intended to promote and encourage excellence and innovation in scholarly research and teaching by identifying and protecting the rights of the Beach Center, contributing faculty, staff, and students.

The Beach Center website, including but not limited to web pages, images, photographs, publications, and resources, unless otherwise noted, are the property of and copyrighted by the Beach Center on Disability. All rights reserved, unless specifically noted otherwise on the materials (webpage, document, image, etc.).

In some instances, specific contents may be copyrighted or trademarked by others.  We use standard copyright notices and legally accepted creative commons copyright notices on materials not owned by the Beach Center to denote the ownership and restrictions placed on the use of these materials.. By using any of this material, you assume all risks of copyright and/or trademark infringement and related liability.

Notice of Ownership and Copyright

Although the Beach Center generally includes a basic statement of copyright on each page of our website and on each document or other material available on our website, the absence of such copyright notice in any material on the Beach Center website does not, and should not be taken to, abrogate any ownership or intellectual property right of the Beach Center or other copyright holder in the content.  The presence or absence of a statement of copyright on any material on the Beach Center website does not limit, in any way, the Beach Center or other copyright holder’s intellectual property rights in the content of that web page or material.  The function of the copyright statement is to provide notice of copyright. In the absence of specific copyright notice, materials are  and should be assumed to be copyrighted with all rights reserved.  Applicable law and the Beach Center Policies and Terms for Use govern the nature and scope of the Beach Center’s intellectual property rights for all web pages and website content.

Digital Millennium Copyright Act

The Digital Millennium Copyright Act, signed into law on October 28, 1998, amended the copyright law to provide limitations for service provider liability relating to material online. Subsection 512(c) of the copyright law provides limitations on service provider liability with respect to information residing, at direction of a user, on a system or network that the service provider controls or operates, if the service provider has designated an agent for notification of claimed infringement by providing contact information to the Copyright Office and through the service provider’s publicly accessible website. 17 U.S.C. 512(c).

Notification of Claimed Infringement Under The Digital Millennium Copyright Act:

If any owners of copyrights believe the Beach Center’s users are infringing copyright protected work, they may send a notice to the Beach Center’s designated agent at:

DMCA Designated Agent for the Beach Center on Disability Blog:

matstowe@ku.edu

Information regarding the Digital Millenium Copyright Act can be found online at: http://www.ku.edu/~vcinfo/Copyright/DMCA.html

Accessibility

The Beach Center on Disability is committed to providing an accessible website for individuals with disabilities and their families.  Our goals for accessibility are:

1)      To meet the most current Web Content Accessibility Guidelines established by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) as well as those set forth by Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act. For more information see: http://www.w3.org/TR/WAI-WEBCONTENT.

2)      To meet the individual accessibility needs of those for whom these standards are not sufficient to guarantee access.

The Beach Center staff recognizes that accessibility is an ongoing responsibility and tries to perform regular checks on the accessibility of our website and the extent to which it meets the above recommendations and standards. While we cannot guarantee that we will meet these standards at all times due to the dynamic nature of our site and the need to regularly update content or that these standards and conformance measures will ensure accessibility for all people with disabilities, we will try to address any barriers to access over and above those addressed in these guidelines when brought to our attention.

In addition, for specialized Web-based applications, such as PowerPoint displays or audio and video components, the Beach Center staff will work closely with individual viewers with accessibility challenges in order to identify and/or rectify accessibility barriers that may be inherent in certain designs or software applications. 

Please contact our Web Administrator for help in resolving any accessibility problems you experience with our site.

Privacy and Confidentiality

Unless a visitor explicitly waives the confidentiality and privacy requirement, the Beach Center and its staff will keep all personally identifiable information provided by visitors completely confidential whenever such information is delivered in a manner that provides a reasonable expectation of privacy.  Information about an individual that is publicly posted on the web site by that individual will not be considered to create a reasonable expectation of privacy and will be considered to be the equivalent of an explicit waiver of confidentiality with regard to all information provided in that post.  Unless consent has been given to disclose such material, all e-mails, instant messaging, and other person-to-person communications will be regarded as confidential to the extent they contain personally identifiable information. For the purposes of this document, confidentiality is defined as not making personally identifiable information available to any other organization, public or private, or its employees.

The Beach Center and its staff will respect the wishes of anonymous visitors to our website and respect their right to privacy.  We do not attempt to ascertain the identity of visitors who do not willingly disclose such information.

Information automatically collected about visitors to the Beach Center website (i.e. web analytics) is for use in the aggregate (we do not use individual data) and will be used exclusively for the purpose of evaluating, reporting, and improving the performance and outcomes of the Beach Center’s website and web activities over time.  You will not receive advertisements, solicitations, emails, or any other message simply by virtue of your visit to our site.   

External links disclaimer and policy

The Beach Center website contains links to many external websites and materials that are not part of the Beach Center website (third party web pages).  Links to these third party web pages are provided solely as a convenience and should not be taken to indicate ownership, control, endorsement, monitoring of, approval of, or responsibility for, the third party site or its contents by the Beach Center.  The Beach Center has no control over the accessibility for people with disabilities of third party web pages.

While most sites welcome links that draw new individuals to their web pages, legal actions have been pursued when links have been used to bypass the home page and thus the efforts of the owner to display or use cookies, security measures, tracking techniques, stated terms of use, and disclaimers.  Other complaints include the use of framed links to mislead the viewer into believing that the site is of your own creation or links to libelous or defamatory information.  Because of these emerging concerns, the Beach Center website will employ external links in a responsible manner using the following guidelines:

(1)   The Beach Center website will not use frames to open links to outside pages within our own pages.

(2)   The Beach Center website will not link to a picture or embed a graphic without permission of the owner.

(3)   The Beach Center will not knowingly include links that violate an owner’s website linking policy or that lead to defamatory or libelous information.

We request that others follow these same procedures when providing a link to any web page or content on the Beach Center website, but the Beach Center provides explicit permission to link to any web page on our website (we do not have a policy against deep linking).

3^rd Party Contributions

Some parts of the Beach Center website, the Communities of Practice in particular, allow direct contribution to the website in the form of posting of comments and other materials by website users (Contributors).  By contributing to our website, either directly or with the assistance of Beach Center staff, whether through comments (e.g. such as in a discussion board), cooperative writing (e.g. such as in a wiki or google docs), or other posting of materials in any format (e.g. audio, video, or text), the contributor acknowledges and agrees to the following terms and conditions as governing the contribution:

1.         License to Use Materials.  By contributing to the Beach Center website, the contributor grants the Beach Center a royalty-free, non-exclusive, perpetual, irrevocable, non-transferable, license to use, re‑use, display, transmit, distribute, publish, re‑publish, copy, and create derivative works based on the aforementioned comments and materials, in any format, whether digitally or in print, for any purpose.

2.         The Contribution is an Irrevocable Gift.  By contributing to the Beach Center website, the contributor acknowledges that they are providing the contribution of their own free will without any expectation for compensation for their contribution and that the Beach Center has the right to use contributions for any purpose (including research and public dissemination). The Beach Center cannot and will not pay for or otherwise compensate a contributor for submissions or postings or for giving us permission to post information on the Website. 

3.         The Contributor Guarantees Ownership.  By contributing to the Beach Center website, the contributor warrants and guarantees that they own the materials they are submitting and that the contribution does not violate the intellectual property rights of any other party.  Contributors must originate or otherwise own the contribution.  In other words, the contributor wrote or created it, did not copy it from someone else, or received ownership from the author or owner of the contribution.  The contributor agrees to indemnify the Beach Center and hold them harmless for all costs in any action for violation of intellectual property rights related to the contributor’s contribution.  We reserve the right to remove any materials that may not comply with our policy.

4.         The Contributor guarantees that the contribution is truthful and accurate, and not false or defamatory.  By contributing to the Beach Center the contributor guarantees that the contribution is truthful and accurate to the best of the contributor’s knowledge and does not include false or defamatory statements.  The contributor agrees to indemnify the Beach Center and hold them harmless for all costs in any action for defamation related to the contributor’s contribution.  The Beach Center does not and will not publish material that includes statements or information that is known to be false or defamatory.

The Beach Center does not monitor or otherwise control all 3^RD party contributions and is not responsible for the content of 3^rd party contributions to its website or any harm that may arise from such contributions or reliance on their content.  The Beach Center may, at its discretion, remove any contribution it deems offensive or that violates the legal rights of another upon adequate notice or when, in the judgment of Beach Center staff, there is a good reason for doing so.

General Disclaimer of Warranties and Liability
The Beach Center on Disability website is provided as a public service. Although the staff at the Beach Center on Disability works hard to provide quality information and content on the website, the Beach Center cannot guarantee the accuracy, completeness, timeliness, or suitability of the materials or information in any particular materials or document, on any particular web page, or for any particular purpose or for any particular person. This website, like many websites, is a work in progress with information being continually added and updated. Some of the content is from 3^rd person contributions.  The Beach Center is not responsible for 3^rd party content and explicitly If you believe any information provided on the website is inaccurate or unclear, please inform us of your concern and we will try to respond to your concern or inquiry in a timely fashion.

THE MATERIALS, DOCUMENTS, AND RELATED GRAPHICS PUBLISHED AS PART OF THE BEACH CENTER’S SERVICES COULD INCLUDE TECHNICAL INACCURACIES OR TYPOGRAPHICAL ERRORS. CHANGES ARE PERIODICALLY ADDED TO THE INFORMATION HEREIN AS WELL AS 3^RD PARTY CONTRIBUTIONS. THE BEACH CENTER MAY MAKE IMPROVEMENTS AND/OR CHANGES IN THE DOCUMENTS AND/OR RELATED GRAPHICS DESCRIBED HEREIN AT ANY TIME.

THE BEACH CENTER MAKES NO REPRESENTATIONS ABOUT THE SUITABILITY OF THE INFORMATION CONTAINED IN THE MATERIALS, DOCUMENTS AND RELATED GRAPHICS PUBLISHED AS PART OF OUR SERVICES FOR ANY PURPOSE, WHETHER PROVIDED BY THE BEACH CENTER OR PROVIDED THROUGH 3^RD PARTY CONTRIBUTIONS TO OUR WEBSITE. ALL SUCH MATERIALS, DOCUMENTS AND RELATED GRAPHICS ARE PROVIDED "AS IS" WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND. THE BEACH CENTER HEREBY DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES AND CONDITIONS WITH REGARD TO THIS INFORMATION, INCLUDING ALL WARRANTIES AND CONDITIONS OF MERCHANTABILITY, WHETHER EXPRESS, IMPLIED OR STATUTORY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, TITLE AND NON-INFRINGEMENT.

IN NO EVENT SHALL THE BEACH CENTER BE LIABLE FOR ANY SPECIAL, INDIRECT OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES OR ANY DAMAGES WHATSOEVER ARISING OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE USE OR PERFORMANCE OF INFORMATION AVAILABLE FROM OUR SERVICES WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, NEGLIGENCE OR OTHER TORTIOUS ACTION.

Equal Opportunity and Non-Discrimination

The Beach Center on Disability is part of the University of Kansas research community. The Beach Center and the University of Kansas are Equal Opportunity Employers and are committed to affording equal employment opportunities for all individuals in all employment matters. Neither the Beach Center nor the University of Kansas discriminates on the basis of age, sex, race, color, creed, religion, national origin, sexual orientation, marital or parental status, or disability. The Beach Center is also committed to eliminating discrimination on the bases of any of these characteristics in all its activities.  Any evidence of discriminatory practices by Beach Center employees in performance of their duties shall be evaluated and acted upon promptly through the Equal Opportunity/ Affirmative Action grievance procedures of the Beach Center and the University. Acts of retaliation for participation in grievance procedures are prohibited.

Attribution and Disclaimer Statement

This website was developed under a grant from the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research (NIDRR) in the U.S. Department of Education's Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services (OSERS).  However, the content of the Beach Center’s website is determined exclusively by Beach Center staff and does not necessarily represent, and should not be assumed to reflect, the opinions or policy of NIDRR, OSERS, the U.S. Department of Education, or any other federal agency.