Terms of Use - Aaron Severson

The following terms and conditions govern your access to and/or use of the aaronseverson.com website (including its web feeds, if any). Access to the aaronseverson.com website and its content is offered subject to your acceptance of all the terms and conditions contained herein and all other operating rules and policies (including, without limitation, the Privacy Policy and the Cookie Notice, which forms part of the Privacy Policy and also constitutes the “cookie policy” for this website, for jurisdictions that explicitly require such a policy — please read them!) that I may publish (collectively, the “Terms of Use”). By accessing and/or using the aaronseverson.com website, you signify your agreement to and agree to be bound by these Terms of Use. If you do not agree, you may not access or use the site.

For the purposes of these Terms of Use, the words “I,” “me,” and “my” refer to Aaron Severson, the owner and operator of the aaronseverson.com website, an individual U.S. citizen residing in Los Angeles, California, USA. Other terms have the same definitions specified in the “Definitions” section of the Privacy Policy.

The effective date of the terms and conditions listed below is Monday, November 13, 2023. (See the “Revisions” section below for a summary of recent changes.)

Please note that the terms and conditions listed below apply ONLY to the use of the aaronseverson.com website (including its web feeds, if any). Any other websites I own and/or operate have their own, separate terms and policies; other professional engagements or business dealings I undertake that are not specifically related to the aaronseverson.com website (e.g., publishing or licensing deals for my writing, or my professional writing/writing consulting services or other employment) shall be subject to the terms of separate client, employment, or other applicable agreements (whether written or verbal) and any other legal requirements that may apply, NOT to these terms. (You are not obligated to use this website in order to hire me or license my work!)

Your use of any third-party websites or services, including those linked from the aaronseverson.com website and/or on which I may have accounts, is subject to the individual terms of use/terms of service and privacy policies, if any, of those sites or services.

Variations in text style (e.g., different font weights, sizes, or colors) are used throughout these Terms of Use to improve readability, but have no legal significance or effect.

CREDITS AND LICENSE FOR THIS DOCUMENT

Portions of these terms were adapted from the Automattic Terms of Service for WordPress.com (primarily the version dated June 30, 2015, with some elements from later versions; you can find all these documents at their Legalmattic repository), which are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0) license. Therefore, these terms are also licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0, as the terms of that license require. If you elect to use or further adapt these terms, please credit Automattic as well as me (Aaron Severson). I also strongly recommend that you note the effective date shown above and include that date in your attribution if it is reasonably practical to do so. Recent changes to these terms are summarized in the “Revisions” section below. For a modification history of the WordPress.com terms, see their Terms of Service Change Log or the Legalmattic repository. (Automattic, Legalmattic, and WordPress.com are trademarks or registered trademarks of Automattic (or Automattic’s licensors). WordPress is a registered trademark of the WordPress Foundation in the United States and other countries. I am not affiliated with or endorsed by Automattic or the WordPress Foundation in any way.)

MINIMUM AGE REQUIREMENTS

This website is not intended for or directed to children under the age of 18. Access to or use of the aaronseverson.com website by any person younger than 18 is expressly prohibited. (Except as otherwise required by law, requests or inquiries involving this website that pertain to children under 18 should be submitted by a parent, legal guardian, or other authorized adult representative.)

Pursuant to the requirements of 47 U.S. Code Section 230(d), I hereby notify you that parental control protections (such as computer hardware, software, or filtering services) are commercially available that may assist you in limiting access to material that is harmful to minors. The U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) offers further information about such protections in the “Protecting Kids Online” section of the Federal Trade Commission Consumer Advice website. (I am not affiliated in any way with that website or the FTC and offer this link purely for your information.) You can also check with your Internet service provider, your mobile carrier, the manufacturers of your devices, and/or the providers of the operating system(s) and/or other software you use about the parental control protections they offer, some of which may be available at little or no additional cost to you.

GENERAL REPRESENTATIONS

By accessing and/or using this website, you represent and warrant that:

You are at least 18 years of age, and:
You can legally form a binding contract with me, and:
Your access to and/or use of the aaronseverson.com website:
- Will be in strict accordance with these Terms of Use, and:
- Will comply with all applicable laws and regulations (including, but not limited to, applicable laws regarding online conduct and acceptable content, privacy, data protection, the transmission of technical data exported from the United States or the country in which you reside, the use or provision of financial services, notification and consumer protection, unfair competition, and false advertising) and any company or organizational policies that may apply to you (e.g., your employer’s social media or online conduct policies), and:
- Is not in, from, by, or for the benefit of a country, organization, entity, or person embargoed or blocked by any government, including, but not limited to, those identified in sanctions lists published by the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) of the U.S. Department of the Treasury.
You are not:
- Located or residing in any country or territory subject to comprehensive U.S. sanctions (currently, Cuba, Crimea, Iran, North Korea, Donetsk People’s Republic, Luhansk People’s Republic, and Syria), or:
- Listed on any United States list of prohibited or restricted parties (e.g., the Office of Foreign Assets Control listing of Specially Designated Nationals and Blocked Persons), or otherwise subject to U.S. sanctions that would prohibit your access to or use of this website.
You will not use the aaronseverson.com website:
- For any unlawful purpose; to publish or otherwise distribute any illegal content; in furtherance of illegal activities; to infringe or misappropriate the intellectual property rights of any third party; to create, distribute, or otherwise facilitate malware, spyware, or other malicious software or code; to defame or illegally impersonate me or any third party; or to stalk or harass me or any third party, or:
- To disclose the sensitive personal information or proprietary commercial information of others without their permission, or to otherwise violate the privacy rights of any person or persons, or:
- To send or otherwise facilitate spam or bulk unsolicited messages, or:
- In any way that (as determined by me, in my sole discretion) overburdens, disrupts, attacks, or interferes with my systems and/or data, or:
- To disrupt, attack, or interfere with other users or the services or networks of third parties, or:
- In any manner that may cause me to violate U.S. export controls and sanctions. (I reserve the right to restrict or block your access to this website at any time without notice if I determine, in my sole discretion, that such access may cause a violation or create unacceptable risk to me under applicable export controls or sanctions.)

Please note that the prose stories presented or excerpted on this website may contain mature themes and/or content (including, but not limited to, depictions or discussions of sex, sexuality, and drug use). By accessing those stories, you further represent and warrant that you are of legal age to view such material in your area and that your access to such material does not violate any applicable law, ordinance, regulation, or company policy.

This website or certain portions thereof may use Google API services (such as, without limitation, the Google Fonts API and/or the Google Hosted Libraries) and/or content served via such Google APIs. You agree that your access to and/or use of the site and any such content will comply with the Google APIs Terms of Service as well as with all applicable laws and regulations. (Google and other related marks and logos are trademarks of Google LLC. I am not affiliated with or endorsed by Google in any way.)

DISCLAIMER OF WARRANTIES

THE AARONSEVERSON.COM WEBSITE AND ITS CONTENT ARE PRESENTED “AS IS.” EXCEPT AS OTHERWISE REQUIRED BY LAW, AND/OR, IN THE CASE OF MATERIAL USED OR OFFERED UNDER LICENSE, TO THE EXTENT EXPRESSLY REQUIRED BY THE TERMS OF THE APPLICABLE LICENSE AGREEMENT, I (AND, WHERE APPLICABLE, MY WEB HOST, LICENSORS, PARTNERS (IF ANY), CONTRACTORS, VENDORS, AND SERVICE PROVIDERS) HEREBY DISCLAIM ALL WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING, WITHOUT LIMITATION, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, AND NON-INFRINGEMENT. NEITHER I NOR MY WEB HOST, LICENSORS, PARTNERS (IF ANY), CONTRACTORS, VENDORS, OR SERVICE PROVIDERS MAKE ANY WARRANTY THAT THE WEBSITE OR ITS CONTENT WILL BE ERROR-FREE OR THAT ACCESS THERETO WILL BE CONTINUOUS OR UNINTERRUPTED. YOU UNDERSTAND THAT YOUR ACCESS TO AND/OR USE OF THE WEBSITE AND/OR THE CONTENT THEREOF IS ENTIRELY AT YOUR OWN DISCRETION AND RISK.

THIS WEBSITE MAY USE AND/OR GIVE YOU THE OPPORTUNITY TO USE CONTENT, PRODUCTS, AND/OR SERVICES DIRECTLY PROVIDED BY THIRD PARTIES RATHER THAN BY ME (SUCH AS, THOUGH NOT LIMITED TO, EMBEDDED VIDEO PLAYERS AND/OR OTHER TYPES OF CONTENT DESCRIBED IN THE “EMBEDDED CONTENT” SECTION OF THE PRIVACY POLICY, WHICH ARE HOSTED ON AND SERVED BY EXTERNAL CONTENT PROVIDERS RATHER THAN LOCALLY HOSTED BY MY WEB HOST ALONG WITH THIS WEBSITE’S OTHER CONTENT). EXCEPT AS OTHERWISE REQUIRED BY LAW, I MAKE NO WARRANTIES WHATSOEVER, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, REGARDING CONTENT, PRODUCTS, OR SERVICES DIRECTLY PROVIDED BY THIRD PARTIES, ANY USE OF WHICH IS AT YOUR OWN RISK, IS SOLELY BETWEEN YOU AND THE RESPECTIVE THIRD PARTY OR PARTIES, AND SHALL BE GOVERNED BY THE TERMS AND POLICES OF THE APPLICABLE THIRD PARTY OR PARTIES. QUESTIONS OR COMPLAINTS REGARDING CONTENT, PRODUCTS, AND/OR SERVICES DIRECTLY PROVIDED BY THIRD PARTIES SHOULD BE DIRECTED TO THE THIRD PARTY OR PARTIES THAT PROVIDE SUCH CONTENT, PRODUCTS, AND/OR SERVICES. (FOR EXAMPLE, BUT WITHOUT LIMITATION, IF YOU HAVE TECHNICAL PROBLEMS VIEWING A VIDEO THROUGH AN EMBEDDED VIDEO PLAYER ON THIS WEBSITE, YOU’LL NEED TO CONTACT THE PLATFORM OR SERVICE THAT PROVIDES THAT PLAYER.)

LIMITATION OF LIABILITY

EXCEPT AS OTHERWISE REQUIRED BY LAW, NEITHER I NOR MY WEB HOST, LICENSORS, PARTNERS (IF ANY), CONTRACTORS, VENDORS, OR SERVICE PROVIDERS SHALL BE LIABLE (INCLUDING FOR ANY THIRD-PARTY PRODUCTS OR SERVICES PURCHASED OR USED THROUGH THIS WEBSITE) WITH RESPECT TO ANY SUBJECT MATTER OF THESE TERMS OF USE UNDER ANY CONTRACT, NEGLIGENCE, STRICT LIABILITY, OR OTHER LEGAL OR EQUITABLE THEORY FOR: (A) ANY SPECIAL, INCIDENTAL, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES; (B) PUNITIVE DAMAGES; (C) THE COST OF PROCUREMENT FOR SUBSTITUTE PRODUCTS OR SERVICES; (D) INTERRUPTION OF USE OR LOSS OR CORRUPTION OF INFORMATION OR DATA; (E) ANY LOSS (DIRECT OR INDIRECT) OF ACTUAL OR ANTICIPATED PROFIT, REVENUE, INCOME, SAVINGS, OPPORTUNITY, REPUTATION, OR GOODWILL; OR (F) ANY AMOUNTS THAT EXCEED $50 OR THE AMOUNT ACTUALLY PAID BY YOU TO ME IN CONNECTION WITH THIS WEBSITE DURING THE TWELVE (12) MONTH PERIOD PRIOR TO THE CAUSE OF ACTION, WHICHEVER IS GREATER. IN PARTICULAR, BUT WITHOUT LIMITATION, I SHALL HAVE NO LIABILITY RELATED TO YOUR ACCESS TO THE MATERIAL ON THE SITE IN VIOLATION OF ANY APPLICABLE LAW, ORDINANCE, REGULATION, OR COMPANY POLICY.

EXCEPT TO THE EXTENT OTHERWISE REQUIRED BY APPLICABLE LAW, I SHALL HAVE NO LIABILITY FOR ANY FAILURE OR DELAY DUE TO MATTERS BEYOND MY REASONABLE CONTROL.

IF I CAUSE DAMAGE TO YOU AND YOU ARE A CONSUMER IN EUROPE, I LIMIT MY LIABILITY TO THE MAXIMUM AMOUNT PERMISSIBLE IN YOUR COUNTRY OF RESIDENCE. LIABILITY WILL BE LIMITED TO FORESEEABLE DAMAGES ARISING DUE TO A BREACH OF MATERIAL CONTRACTUAL OBLIGATIONS TYPICAL FOR THIS TYPE OF CONTRACT. I AM NOT LIABLE FOR DAMAGES THAT RESULT FROM A NON-MATERIAL BREACH OF ANY OTHER APPLICABLE DUTY OF CARE. THIS LIMITATION OF LIABILITY WILL NOT APPLY TO ANY STATUTORY LIABILITY THAT CANNOT BE LIMITED, TO LIABILITY FOR DEATH OR PERSONAL INJURY CAUSED BY MY NEGLIGENCE, LIABILITY CAUSED BY MY WILLFUL MISCONDUCT OR GROSS NEGLIGENCE, OR MY RESPONSIBILITY FOR SOMETHING I HAVE SPECIFICALLY PROMISED TO YOU. YOU AND I AGREE THAT MY AND MY AFFILIATES’ TOTAL LIABILITY IS LIMITED TO THE GREATER OF $50 OR THE AMOUNT ACTUALLY PAID BY YOU TO USE THE AARONSEVERSON.COM WEBSITE DURING THE 12 MONTHS PRECEDING THE CLAIM. TO THE EXTENT THAT MY LIABILITY IS LIMITED OR EXCLUDED, THE LIMITATIONS OR EXCLUSIONS WILL ALSO APPLY TO THE PERSONAL LIABILITY OF MY EMPLOYEES, LEGAL REPRESENTATIVES, AND VICARIOUS AGENTS.

INDEMNIFICATION

To the extent allowed by applicable law, you agree to indemnify and hold harmless me; my web host; my licensors, partners (if any), contractors, vendors, service providers; and their respective directors, officers, employees, and agents against against any and all claims, liabilities, damages, demands, losses, costs, and expenses (including, without limitation, reasonable attorneys’ fees) related to or arising out of your access to and/or use of the aaronseverson.com website and/or its content, including, but not limited to, any violation(s) by you of these Terms of Use and/or any interactions between you and other users; my advertisers and/or sponsors, if any; and/or other third-party websites and/or online services to which this website may link and/or which the website otherwise incorporates, which link to this website, and/or that you use in connection with your access to and/or use of the aaronseverson.com website.

EXTERNAL LINKS

Links on the aaronseverson.com website to other websites and/or online services are provided for visitors’ information and/or for purposes of bibliographic reference and/or attribution. EXCEPT AS OTHERWISE REQUIRED BY LAW, I MAKE NO WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, AND SHALL HAVE NO LIABILITY WHATSOEVER WITH RESPECT TO THE CONTENT, APPROPRIATENESS, ACCURACY, LEGALITY, SAFETY, UTILITY, OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE OF ANY WEBSITE OR ONLINE SERVICE TO WHICH I MAY LINK (INCLUDING, WITHOUT LIMITATION, THE WEBSITES OF ANY OF MY ADVERTISERS AND/OR SPONSORS) OR FOR YOUR USE OF ANY SUCH LINK, WEBSITE, OR SERVICE, WHICH IS ENTIRELY AT YOUR OWN RISK. SIMILARLY, EXCEPT TO THE EXTENT OTHERWISE REQUIRED BY APPLICABLE LAW, I ACCEPT NO RESPONSIBILITY FOR AND SHALL HAVE NO LIABILITY WITH RESPECT TO ANY OTHER WEBSITE OR ONLINE SERVICE THAT MAY LINK TO THE AARONSEVERSON.COM WEBSITE.

USE OF TRADEMARKS

These Terms of Use do not grant you any right or license to use any of my trademarks or service marks, or to make commercial use of my name or likeness. All right, title, and interest in and to my marks remain solely with me. All rights in and to my name and likeness are expressly reserved. (For the avoidance of doubt, nothing in this paragraph is intended or shall be construed to in any way restrict or limit any rights you may have to copy and/or use content that contains, depicts, and/or incorporates my name and/or likeness to the extent permitted under the terms of any applicable license agreement pertaining to the use of such content; certain licenses may require me to waive or agree to not enforce certain of my rights with respect to content I release under such licenses so as not to restrict the exercise of the licensed rights. For guidelines regarding the reuse of other site content, see the “Reprint/Reuse Policy” section below.)

All other trademarks and/or service marks mentioned, described, and/or depicted on this website are the property of their respective owners. Except as otherwise expressly indicated, I have no affiliation with or endorsement by the holders of such marks, and no such affiliation or endorsement is implied or should be inferred. These Terms of Use do not grant you any right or license to use such marks, all right, title, and interest in and to which remain solely with their respective owners.

The opinions expressed in the content presented on this website are solely those of the individual(s) expressing those opinions and do not necessarily reflect the views of the owners of any applicable trademark(s) and/or service mark(s); of me or my web host, advertisers, licensors, partners (if any), contractors, vendors, or service providers; or of any other third party.

DISCLOSURE OF PAID ADVERTISEMENTS AND/OR ENDORSEMENTS

This website may run paid banner and/or text advertisements and/or sponsored links from various advertisers. Such paid advertisements, whether banner ads, text links, or in some other form, will be identified with words such as, as appropriate, “Sponsor,” “Sponsors,” “Sponsored Link(s),” “Sponsored Content,” “Ad,” “Advertisement,” “Advertisement(s),” or “Paid Promotion” (and/or by images or icons containing such words).

Except as otherwise expressly indicated (e.g., in a review of a book or other product), references to, depictions of, or advertisements for products or services on the aaronseverson.com website do not constitute my recommendation or endorsement of those products or services.

In the event that I receive financial compensation and/or other valuable consideration for any content presented on the site other than paid advertisements (e.g., if I receive a free copy of a book to review), the nature of that compensation or consideration will be disclosed as part of the applicable content and/or otherwise adjacent to it.

FINANCIAL TRANSACTIONS

Financial transactions with me that pertain to the aaronseverson.com website (e.g., payments for advertising on the site) are subject to the Financial Transactions Policy, which is incorporated into and forms part of the Privacy Policy for this website.

COMMENT POLICY

By submitting a comment to this website:

You affirm that you are at least 18 years old. You may not submit a comment if you are younger than 18. Except as otherwise required by law, I will promptly delete any comment submitted by a person I know or subsequently discover to be under the age of 18.
You warrant and affirm that your comment, the contents thereof, and your use of the comment system do not violate any applicable law or regulation or infringe upon the copyrights or any other rights (e.g., privacy rights, publicity rights, personality rights, or trademark rights) of any other person or entity.
To the extent allowed by applicable law, you agree to indemnify and hold harmless me; my web host; my licensors, partners (if any), contractors, vendors, service providers; and their respective directors, officers, employees, and agents against any and all claims, liabilities, damages, demands, losses, costs, and expenses (including, without limitation, reasonable attorneys’ fees) related to or arising out of your comment, the contents thereof, or your use of the comment system.
To the extent allowed by applicable law, you grant me a worldwide, nonexclusive, royalty-free license to:
1. Use, publish, and display your comment on the aaronseverson.com website. (Please note that if the website’s “Recent Comments” Widget(s) are enabled, the name or pseudonym you entered into the “Name” field, and a link to your comment may also appear (along with other recent comments) in the “Recent Comments” box(es), which may be visible on the home page and/or other areas of the website as well as the specific post or page you commented on. The contents of published comments may also appear in search results of the website’s search function and/or in the site’s web feeds, if any.)
2. Edit your comment as I deem appropriate.
3. Copy your comment (or portions thereof) for reference, backup, and/or other administrative purposes.
4. Transmit your comment via email to the site administrator; to the author of the post or page on which you submitted your comment; and, if applicable, to other users who have requested email notifications of replies and/or follow-up comments.
You further authorize me to:
1. Send you email notifications of replies and/or follow-up comments, if you specifically request such notifications (which you may discontinue upon request).
2. Respond to your comment via the email address you supply. (Please note that I may respond via email in addition to or instead of publishing the comment on this website, particularly if your comment includes a question or offer of assistance and/or if I need to clarify any pertinent details — for example, if you have submitted two very similar comments, I might email you to ask which one you want me to publish.)
You acknowledge and agree that I may collect and use personal information I receive through and/or in connection with your comment as described in the Privacy Policy.

Comments are published on the site at my sole discretion. Submitted comments may be screened prior to publication to prevent spamming and/or defuse contentious arguments, and/or may be subjected to certain automated tests in order to filter out submissions made by automated bots and discourage spamming and/or other malicious activity. I do not guarantee that any comment you submit will be published.

I may edit, decline to publish, unpublish, or delete any comment on this website at any time, at my sole discretion, with or without notice. My reasons for editing, declining to publish, unpublishing, or deleting a comment typically include (but are not limited to) the following:

It exceeds the maximum length permitted by the comment system.
It contains special characters and/or code that the website can’t properly display.
It otherwise disrupts the formatting or functionality of the website.
It appears to contain or constitute malicious code or spam.
It contains abusive or defamatory language, or may violate someone’s rights and/or privacy.
It was submitted by a person I believe to be under the age of 18.

From time to time, comments may be inadvertently deleted due to technical issues or the restoration of the site database from older backup files.

If you have a question about why a comment was deleted or not published, feel free to contact me. Again, I do not guarantee that any submitted comment will be published or that any published comment will continue to be displayed on this website indefinitely.

When you submit a comment, you may have the option to request email notifications each time a reply or follow-up comment is published. If you have previously requested such notifications and wish to stop receiving them, please either contact me via email or submit another comment asking me to discontinue the notifications, and I will do so at my earliest opportunity.

If you would like me to edit or remove any of your existing comments, please let me know, either by submitting another comment in reply to the existing one or contacting me via email at admin (at) aaronseverson (dot) com, explaining what you want me to do with the comment(s) in question. Once I receive your message, I will endeavor to make the change or deletion you request, to the extent I reasonably can. (Please note that I may contact you via email to clarify or confirm your request before executing the change or deletion, especially if I’m not sure exactly what you want me to do or if I need to take additional steps to verify your identity.)

Please note that if a comment is deleted from the website, archival copies of the original comment and its associated information may be retained in my records and/or in backups or archives made by me and/or my web host. Under certain rare circumstances — e.g., the restoration of the site from a backup file — a previously deleted comment may reappear. I will endeavor to promptly delete any such comments, but cannot guarantee it. If you notice that your previously deleted comment has reappeared, please let me know and I will remove the comment as soon as possible.

Opinions expressed in comments published on this website are those of the respective commenters and do not necessarily represent my opinions or those of my web host, advertisers, licensors, partners (if any), contractors, vendors, or service providers. The publication of a comment does not necessarily constitute my endorsement of an opinion, product, or service.

EXCEPT AS OTHERWISE REQUIRED BY LAW, I MAKE NO WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, AND SHALL HAVE NO LIABILITY WHATSOEVER WITH RESPECT TO ANY COMMENT PUBLISHED ON THIS WEBSITE (INCLUDING, WITHOUT LIMITATION, SUCH COMMENT’S APPROPRIATENESS, ACCURACY, LEGALITY, SAFETY, UTILITY, OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE) OR THE CONTENT, APPROPRIATENESS, ACCURACY, LEGALITY, SAFETY, UTILITY, OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE OF ANY WEBSITE OR ONLINE SERVICE TO WHICH SUCH COMMENT MAY LINK. YOUR USE OF ANY INFORMATION OR LINK CONTAINED IN ANY COMMENT ON THE AARONSEVERSON.COM WEBSITE IS ENTIRELY AT YOUR OWN RISK.

I reserve the right to temporarily or permanently limit or deny access to the commenting feature and/or to the site as a whole to visitors I believe to be under age 18; whose past comments have been unpublished and/or deleted for the above-mentioned or any other reason(s); and/or whose comments and/or other activity on the site I deem (in my sole judgment) abusive, disruptive, or to constitute spam.

CONTACT FORM POLICY

By using any contact or feedback forms I may offer on the site, or by submitting a California Privacy Request Form via the Do Not Sell My Personal Information page:

You affirm that you are at least 18 years old. Except as otherwise required by law, I will promptly delete any contact or feedback form I receive from a person I know or subsequently discover to be under the age of 18. Except as otherwise required by law, requests or inquiries pertaining to children under 18 should be submitted by a parent, legal guardian, or other authorized adult representative.
You warrant and affirm that your message and/or use of the contact or feedback forms does not violate any applicable law or regulation or infringe upon the copyrights or any other rights (e.g., privacy rights, publicity rights, personality rights, or trademark rights) of any other person or entity.
You authorize me to transmit your message via email to the site administrator, to respond to your inquiry as appropriate via the email address and/or other contact information you provide, and to perform automated tests on your message in order to filter out messages sent by automated bots and discourage spamming and/or other malicious activity. Please note that while I endeavor to respond to all legitimate inquiries, I do not guarantee you will receive a reply except as required by law.
To the extent allowed by applicable law, you grant me a limited, worldwide, nonexclusive, royalty-free license to copy your message (or portions thereof) (or portions thereof) for reference, backup, and/or other administrative purposes. This license (a) shall not apply to any material your message may incorporate or contain that you do not have the legal rights to license or sublicense to me; (b) shall be sublicensable to the extent reasonably necessary for me to exercise the licensed rights; and (c) shall only be transferable as part of a business transfer (e.g., if I sell or otherwise transfer ownership of the aaronseverson.com website and/or its assets).
You acknowledge that the California Privacy Request Form on the Do Not Sell My Personal Information page is solely intended solely for use by California residents (and/or their authorized agents) to submit requests and/or questions pertaining to their privacy rights under applicable California law. (See the “Your California Privacy Rights” section of the Privacy Policy for more information about these rights.) You agree not to use that form for any other purpose. (For information about how to contact me regarding other privacy-related matters, please refer to the “Controller/Responsible Party, Questions, and How to Reach Me” section of the Privacy Policy.)
For contact or feedback form submissions OTHER than California Privacy Request Form submissions, if your message includes questions and/or comments about me, my content, and/or this website, or pertains to a technical problem with the site, and unless you specifically request otherwise, to the extent allowed by applicable law, you grant me a worldwide, nonexclusive, royalty-free license to use, publish, and display your message (or excerpts thereof) on the aaronseverson.com website to publicly respond to your question(s) and/or comment(s), and/or to support other users with similar concerns. This license (a) shall not apply to any material your message may incorporate or contain that you do not have the legal rights to license or sublicense to me; (b) shall be sublicensable to the extent reasonably necessary for me to exercise the licensed rights; and (c) shall only be transferable as part of a business transfer (e.g., if I sell or otherwise transfer ownership of the aaronseverson.com and/or its assets). If I publish your submission or an excerpt thereof, I will redact any information that appears to be personally identifying other than the name or pseudonym you supplied (unless you ask or authorize me to include other personally identifying information). If I have published or excerpted your message in such a fashion and you wish me to amend and/or further redact the published information (e.g., to remove your name or substitute a pseudonym), I will make a reasonable effort to accommodate your request provided that it does not infringe upon the rights of others or attempt to impersonate some other individual or organization. If you wish me to completely unpublish your submission or the excerpts thereof, please let me know and I will endeavor to do so (to the extent I reasonably can) at my earliest opportunity. California Privacy Request Form submissions will NOT be published, although I may, to the extent required and/or otherwise permitted by applicable law and/or regulations, publish aggregate information about requests I receive (e.g., how many requests of a particular type I received in a given period).
You acknowledge and agree that I may collect and use personal information I receive through and/or in connection with your message as described in the Privacy Policy.

I reserve the right to temporarily or permanently limit or deny access to the contact and/or feedback forms and/or to the site as a whole to visitors I believe to be under age 18; who have used the forms to submit or attempt to submit spam and/or malicious code; and/or whose other activity on the site I deem (in my sole judgment) to be abusive and/or disruptive.

REPRINT/REUSE POLICY

The following is my policy for the reuse of content on the aaronseverson.com website:

LINKING AND HOTLINKING: You may publish, display, or otherwise share hyperlinks to this website, its web feeds, or any individual page or post on the site. However, you may not “hotlink” to any image, script, or other non-text element hosted on this website without my permission. (“Hotlinking” means causing an image or element hosted on and served by this website to be displayed or run on some other website or online service — for example, posting an image tag on your own website or forum with an HREF attribute pointing to the image location at aaronseverson.com would constitute hotlinking, but copying a public domain image from my site and uploading that image to your own website would not.) For the avoidance of doubt, nothing in this provision is intended or shall be construed to in any way restrict or limit your rights to copy or use any content I use or offer under Creative Commons license(s); open source license(s); and/or other, similar license(s) (as described below) in any manner permitted under the terms of the specified license and/or otherwise permitted by applicable law. Furthermore, this provision does NOT apply to images or content that are not hosted on and served by the aaronseverson.com site. The use or reuse of any script, font, image, embedded video or audio recording, or other content hosted on and served by any other website or online service is subject to any terms and conditions stipulated by the hosting site/service and the applicable rights holder(s), which are outside of my control. (Creative Commons, CC, the CC in a circle logo, CCPlus, CC+, the CC+ in a circle logo, CC0, all other Creative Commons license and public domain dedication marks, and their associated buttons and icons are trademarks or registered trademarks of Creative Commons.)
TRANSLATION AND ACCESSIBILITY AIDS: You are free to translate my content on this website into languages other than English (either using automatic translation software or by some other means) for your own personal use or internal reference and/or for the purposes of creating bibliographic citations in languages other than English. You are also free to use accessibility aids and/or assistive technology (e.g., screen readers or automated text-to-speech readers) in any reasonable manner for purposes of enabling you to access and use this website, its web feeds, and/or its content.
PUBLIC DOMAIN CONTENT: If I have used any content (e.g., text or images) on this website that is in the public domain in your jurisdiction, or if I declare that I have released or dedicated certain content to the public domain, you may copy or use that public domain content in any manner permitted by applicable law. (Please note that content that is in the public domain in the U.S. is not necessarily in the public domain elsewhere and vice versa, and that even if the content is in the public domain in your jurisdiction, it may still be subject to rights other than copyright — e.g., patent rights, trademark rights, likeness rights, publicity rights, personality rights, privacy rights, and/or moral rights — that may limit certain uses of that content.) If I have modified or adapted that public domain content, you will need my prior authorization to reuse my modified or adapted version unless (1) I have offered my modified or adapted version under a Creative Commons license or other license (as described below), (2) I have released or dedicated my version to the public domain, and/or (3) your use is otherwise permitted by applicable law. EXCEPT AS OTHERWISE REQUIRED BY APPLICABLE LAW, I MAKE NO WARRANTIES WHATSOEVER WITH RESPECT TO ANY PUBLIC DOMAIN CONTENT I PUBLISH OR DISPLAY ON THIS WEBSITE (WHETHER MODIFIED OR OTHERWISE), INCLUDING, WITHOUT LIMITATION, THE ACCURACY OR COMPLETENESS OF ANY ASSOCIATED COPYRIGHT AND/OR OTHER RIGHTS INFORMATION. ANY USE OF SUCH CONTENT IS ENTIRELY AT YOUR OWN RISK. (Creative Commons, CC, the CC in a circle logo, CCPlus, CC+, the CC+ in a circle logo, CC0, all other Creative Commons license and public domain dedication marks, and their associated buttons and icons are trademarks or registered trademarks of Creative Commons.)
CONTENT USED UNDER LICENSE: If I have used any content (e.g., text or images) on this website under a Creative Commons license or some other, similar license (the source, attribution information, and applicable license information for which will be noted within and/or adjacent to the applicable content), I cannot sublicense such content, but you are free to copy or use that licensed content in any manner permitted under the terms of the specified license (or any other terms offered by the applicable rights holder) and/or otherwise permitted by applicable law. (Please note that licensed content may be subject to rights other than copyright that the license might not include — e.g., patent rights, trademark rights, likeness rights, publicity rights, personality rights, privacy rights, and/or moral rights — that may limit certain uses of that content that the license terms would otherwise permit.) If I have modified or adapted such licensed content, I will indicate along with the attribution and license information whether my modifications and/or adaptations are also offered under the specified license (which certain licenses require). EXCEPT TO THE EXTENT EXPRESSLY REQUIRED BY THE TERMS OF THE APPLICABLE LICENSE OR OTHERWISE REQUIRED BY APPLICABLE LAW, I MAKE NO WARRANTIES WHATSOEVER WITH RESPECT TO ANY CONTENT USED OR OFFERED UNDER SUCH A LICENSE, INCLUDING, WITHOUT LIMITATION, THE ACCURACY OR COMPLETENESS OF ANY ASSOCIATED LICENSE, COPYRIGHT, AND/OR OTHER RIGHTS INFORMATION. ANY USE OF SUCH CONTENT IS ENTIRELY AT YOUR OWN RISK. (Creative Commons, CC, the CC in a circle logo, CCPlus, CC+, the CC+ in a circle logo, CC0, all other Creative Commons license and public domain dedication marks, and their associated buttons and icons are trademarks or registered trademarks of Creative Commons.)
CONTENT OFFERED UNDER LICENSE: In the event I have explicitly offered some portion of the site content (for example, a specific post or page) under a Creative Commons license or some other, similar license (the details of which will be noted within and/or adjacent to the applicable content) you are free to copy or use that content in any manner permitted under the terms of the specified license and/or otherwise permitted by applicable law. (Please note that licensed content may be subject to rights other than copyright that the license might not include — e.g., patent rights, trademark rights, likeness rights, publicity rights, personality rights, privacy rights, and/or moral rights — that may limit certain uses of that content that the license terms would otherwise permit.) EXCEPT TO THE EXTENT EXPRESSLY REQUIRED BY THE TERMS OF THE APPLICABLE LICENSE OR OTHERWISE REQUIRED BY APPLICABLE LAW, I MAKE NO WARRANTIES WHATSOEVER WITH RESPECT TO ANY CONTENT USED OR OFFERED UNDER SUCH A LICENSE, INCLUDING, WITHOUT LIMITATION, THE ACCURACY OR COMPLETENESS OF ANY ASSOCIATED LICENSE, COPYRIGHT, AND/OR OTHER RIGHTS INFORMATION. ANY USE OF SUCH CONTENT IS ENTIRELY AT YOUR OWN RISK. (Creative Commons, CC, the CC in a circle logo, CCPlus, CC+, the CC+ in a circle logo, CC0, all other Creative Commons license and public domain dedication marks, and their associated buttons and icons are trademarks or registered trademarks of Creative Commons.)
COMMENTS: Comments published on this website are the property of the respective commenters. Except as otherwise permitted by applicable law, if you wish to reprint or reuse comment(s) on this website that were submitted by someone other than me, you will need the permission of the applicable commenter(s) (and/or other applicable rights holder(s)). I cannot grant such permission, but if you obtain the permission of the applicable commenter(s) (and/or other applicable rights holder(s)) to reprint or reuse their comment(s), you generally do not need any additional permission from me unless you also wish to reprint my comments and/or other content owned by me (for instance, if you want to reprint a comment thread between me and one or more other site visitors). In general, the same is true of photographs, images, and/or other media content in comments submitted by people other than me.
PROGRAMMATIC ELEMENTS: In the event that I distribute (or “convey,” as the Free Software Foundation defines that term in version 3 of the GNU General Public License) through or in connection with this website any programmatic elements (e.g., code snippets, software programs or elements thereof, and/or font files) offered, modified, and/or under an open source license, some other type of free software license, a Creative Commons license, and/or other such license, you may use such licensed programmatic elements in any manner permitted under the terms of the specified license (or any other license or terms offered by the applicable rights holder(s)) and/or otherwise permitted by applicable law. (Please note that such licensed programmatic elements may be subject to rights other than copyright that the license might not include — e.g., patent rights, trademark rights, likeness rights, publicity rights, personality rights, privacy rights, and/or moral rights — that may limit certain uses of the licensed programmatic elements that the license would otherwise permit.) EXCEPT TO THE EXTENT EXPRESSLY REQUIRED BY THE TERMS OF THE APPLICABLE LICENSE OR OTHERWISE REQUIRED BY APPLICABLE LAW, I MAKE NO WARRANTIES WHATSOEVER WITH RESPECT TO ANY SUCH LICENSED ELEMENTS, INCLUDING, WITHOUT LIMITATION, THE ACCURACY OR COMPLETENESS OF ANY ASSOCIATED LICENSE, COPYRIGHT, AND/OR OTHER RIGHTS INFORMATION. ANY USE OF SUCH ELEMENTS IS ENTIRELY AT YOUR OWN RISK. (Free Software Foundation and GNU are trademarks or registered trademarks of Free Software Foundation, Inc. Creative Commons, CC, the CC in a circle logo, CCPlus, CC+, the CC+ in a circle logo, CC0, all other Creative Commons license and public domain dedication marks, and their associated buttons and icons are trademarks or registered trademarks of Creative Commons.)
ALL OTHER CONTENT: Except as specified above and/or otherwise permitted by applicable law, you may not copy, republish, repost, or otherwise redistribute any portion of the content from this website — other than brief quotations with appropriate attribution, and/or bibliographic citations — or publish or distribute translations of the content into other languages, without my prior written authorization or, for content not owned or otherwise administered by me, the authorization of the applicable rights holder(s). If the applicable rights holder(s) give you permission to reuse their content (whether directly or under a Creative Commons license or other license), you generally do not need any additional permission from me to do so unless you wish to reuse a version that I have modified or adapted, in which event you will also need my prior authorization unless (1) I have licensed or assigned my rights (if any) in and to my modified or adapted version to a third party (in which case you may need the permission of that third party), (2) I have offered my modified or adapted version under a Creative Commons license or other license (as described above), (3) I have released or dedicated my modifications and/or adaptations to the public domain, and/or (4) your use is otherwise permitted by applicable law. For the avoidance of doubt, nothing in this provision is intended or shall be construed to in any way restrict or limit any rights you may have under the terms of any applicable license pertaining to the use of such content. However, please note that such content may be subject to rights other than copyright that the license might not include — e.g., patent rights, trademark rights, likeness rights, publicity rights, personality rights, privacy rights, and/or moral rights — that may limit certain uses of that content that the license terms would otherwise permit; the same may be true of content that is in the public domain in your jurisdiction. (Creative Commons, CC, the CC in a circle logo, CCPlus, CC+, the CC+ in a circle logo, CC0, all other Creative Commons license and public domain dedication marks, and their associated buttons and icons are trademarks or registered trademarks of Creative Commons.)

If you have questions or wish to further discuss reprint/reuse permissions, please contact me via email at admin (at) aaronseverson (dot) com or by mail at 11100 National Bl. #3, Los Angeles, CA 90064, USA.

COPYRIGHT/INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY VIOLATIONS

If you believe that any material on or linked to by this website violates your copyright (or other intellectual property right(s)), you can submit a notice to me via email at admin (at) aaronseverson (dot) com or via postal mail at:

Aaron Severson
Attn: aaronseverson.com
11100 National Bl. #3
Los Angeles, CA 90064
USA

For copyright notices, please be sure that your notice includes all of the following:

Identification of the copyrighted work claimed to have been infringed, or, if the claim involves multiple copyrighted works, a representative list of such works, and:
Identification of the material that is claimed to be infringing or to be the subject of infringing activity, and information reasonably sufficient to permit me to locate the material, and:
Information reasonably sufficient to permit me to contact you, and:
Your statement that you have a good faith belief that the use of the material in the manner complained of is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law; and:
Your statement that the information in your notice is accurate, and under penalty of perjury, that you are the owner of, or are authorized to act on behalf of the owner of, an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed; and:
The physical or electronic signature of the owner of, or a person authorized to act on behalf of the owner of, an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed.

I will respond to all such notices, including, as required or appropriate, by removing the infringing material or disabling all links to the infringing material.

If the material described in your notice was provided to me by a third party, I reserve the right to forward a copy of your claim to that third party (since the claim may implicate their rights).

I will take reasonable efforts to terminate access to the website by a visitor who is determined to be a repeat infringer of copyrights or other intellectual property rights (e.g., by blocking that visitor’s access to the comment system).

CHANGES TO THIS WEBSITE

I may update, change, or discontinue the aaronseverson.com website or any portion thereof at any time, at my sole discretion. Unless I indicate otherwise, these Terms of Use will apply to any updates, changes, or additions to this website.

TERMINATION AND SEVERABILITY

If you wish to terminate this agreement, you may simply discontinue accessing or using the aaronseverson.com website. I may terminate your access to any or all part of the website, with or without cause or notice, at any time, effective immediately, including if I believe, in my sole discretion, that you have violated these Terms of Use or any other applicable terms or policies.

ANY PROVISIONS OF THESE TERMS OF USE WHICH BY THEIR NATURE SHOULD SURVIVE TERMINATION (INCLUDING, WITHOUT LIMITATION, WARRANTY DISCLAIMERS, INDEMNITY, LIMITATIONS OF LIABILITY, LICENSES FOR THE USE OF YOUR COMMENTS AND/OR FORM SUBMISSIONS, AND PROVISIONS PERTAINING TO THE OWNERSHIP OF TRADEMARKS AND/OR SERVICE MARKS) SHALL SURVIVE TERMINATION. In the event of termination, I shall have the right, but not the obligation, to unpublish any or all of your published comments and/or any or all of your form submissions (or excerpts thereof) that I have previously published. You may also request that I unpublish any or all of your published comments and/or previously published form submissions (or excerpts thereof), which I will endeavor to do (to the extent I reasonably can) at my earliest opportunity following my receipt of your request.

If any part of these Terms of Use is held to be invalid or unenforceable, that part will be construed to reflect the parties’ original intent and the remaining portions will remain in full force and effect.

JURISDICTION AND GOVERNING LAW

Except to the extent otherwise provided by applicable law, these Terms of Use and any access to and/or use of this website will be governed by the laws of the State of California, USA, excluding its conflict of law provisions and the application of the United Nations Convention of Contracts for the International Sale of Goods. The proper venue for any disputes arising out of or relating to these Terms of Use and/or any access to and/or use of this website will be the state and/or federal courts located in Los Angeles County, California, USA. Nothing in these Terms of Use affects your rights as a consumer to rely on mandatory provisions in your country of residence.

CALIFORNIA CONSUMER NOTICE

To the extent that the aaronseverson.com website constitutes an “electronic commercial service,” as that term is defined in the Electronic Commerce Act of 1984 (California Civil Code Section 1789 et seq.), California Civil Code Section 1789.3 requires me to provide the following notice:

The “provider of service,” as that term is defined in California Civil Code Section 1789.2(c), is the owner and operator of the aaronseverson.com website, Aaron Severson, 11100 National Bl. #3, Los Angeles, CA 90064, USA.
There is currently no charge to access or use the aaronseverson.com website, other than the charges for any purchases you may make through or in connection with the website (e.g., the purchase of advertising) and any taxes, fees, shipping costs, and/or other related charges that may apply to such purchases.
To resolve a complaint regarding the aaronseverson.com website, or to receive further information regarding use of the aaronseverson.com website, please contact me via postal mail at the above address, via email at admin (at) aaronseverson (dot) com, or by telephone at (310) 909-7846. (IMPORTANT NOTE: Calls or messages to this number — which is provided by the Google Voice communications service — may be transcribed and/or recorded, and transcriptions, recordings, call notifications (including notifications of missed calls), texts, and/or other messages may be transmitted via email. All communications made or received through this number are subject to any applicable Google terms and policies (including, but not limited to, the ones listed in the Google Voice “Additional Terms of Service” help page; the Google Privacy Policy; and, where applicable, the Google Telephony Services Privacy Disclosure) as well as to the aaronseverson.com Privacy Policy. Google, Google Voice, Google Workspace, and other related marks and logos are trademarks of Google LLC. I am not affiliated with or endorsed by Google in any way.) If you have questions or complaints, you may also submit them to me via any other contact method I may reasonably specify or make available to you for that purpose (e.g., the contact information listed on my invoices, or, where applicable, in our written agreement(s) or other business communications).
If you have a complaint, you can also contact the Complaint Assistance Unit of the Division of Consumer Services of the California Department of Consumer Affairs by telephone at (800) 952-5210 (or TTY (800) 735-2929 for the hearing impaired) or in writing at 1625 North Market Bl., Suite N 112, Sacramento, CA 95834, USA.

MISCELLANEOUS

The Terms of Use constitute the entire agreement between me and you concerning the subject matter thereof. These Terms of Use will be binding upon and will inure to the benefit of the parties and their respective heirs, successors, and permitted assigns.

I may assign my rights under these Terms of Use without condition. You may only assign your rights under these Terms of Use with my prior written consent.

A waiver by either party of any term or condition of these Terms of Use, or any breach thereof, in any one instance will not waive such term or condition or any subsequent breach thereof.

REVISIONS

These terms and conditions may be revised from time to time, at my sole discretion. If I do make changes, they will be summarized in the “recent revisions” list below; I may also provide additional notice in other ways (e.g., by updating the “Most Recent Policy Updates” box and/or by sending out email notifications).

Any such revisions will apply on a going-forward basis and, unless I indicate otherwise, will be effective immediately once posted on this page. By continuing to use or access the aaronseverson.com website after the effective date of any such revision, you agree to be bound by the revised Terms of Use. You have the right to object to any changes at any times by ceasing to use or access the aaronseverson.com website.

Recent revisions:

November 13, 2023: In General Representations, updated the hyperlinks to the OFAC sanctions lists.
April 24, 2023: Fixed a typographical error in California Consumer Notice (a nonprintable character had been inadvertently inserted after the telephone number in item No. 3).
December 18, 2022: In Disclaimer of Warranties, deleted the parenthetical aside beginning “(OR ANY CONTENT, PRODUCTS, AND/OR SERVICES DIRECTLY …” from the final paragraph and moved that text to the first paragraph, so that it precedes the final sentence of the first paragraph, which previously began “ANY ACCESS TO AND/OR USE OF …” Revised the latter sentence to change “ANY ACCESS TO AND/OR USE OF” to “YOU UNDERSTAND THAT YOUR ACCESS TO AND/OR USE OF” for clarity and emphasis. Also in that paragraph, changed “EXPRESSLY REQUIRED BY THE TERMS …” to “TO THE EXTENT EXPRESSLY REQUIRED BY THE TERMS …” In Reprint/Reuse Policy, changed all instances of the phrase “EXCEPT AS EXPRESSLY REQUIRED BY THE TERMS …” to “EXCEPT TO THE EXTENT EXPRESSLY REQUIRED BY THE TERMS …”
December 17, 2022: As a global change (except in this Revisions section), changed all instances of the phrase “Unless otherwise required” to “Except as otherwise required” (maintaining the existing capitalization). In Reprint/Reuse Policy, changed all instances of “UNLESS EXPRESSLY REQUIRED” to “EXCEPT AS EXPRESSLY REQUIRED” for consistency.
December 12, 2022: In California Consumer Notice, changed “as that term is defined by …” to “as that term is defined in …” and changed “(as defined in subdivision (c) of California Civil Code Section 1789.2)” to “as that term is defined in California Civil Code Section 1789.2(c),” set off with commas, for consistency of usage.
November 17, 2022: In Credits and License for This Document, added an express disclaimer of affiliation or endorsement after the trademark notice.
October 5, 2022: In General Representations, changed the phrases “in my sole judgment” and “at my sole discretion” to “in my sole discretion” for wording consistency.
September 23, 2022: In General Representations, updated the link to the OFAC sanctions page.
September 1, 2022: As a global change, adjusted the formatting of certain bullet-pointed lists for stylistic consistency. Also fixed some inconsistent capitalization in General Representations. Tinkered with these revisions after initial publication.
July 19, 2022: In Copyright/Intellectual Property Violations, changed “violates your copyright” to “violates your copyright (or other intellectual property right(s))” and changed “Please be sure that your notice includes …” to “For copyright notices, please be sure that your notice includes …”
July 14, 2022: In Comment Policy, added a bullet point to the examples of reasons for editing, declining to publish, unpublishing or deleting a comment regarding special characters and/or code that the website can’t properly display.
July 9, 2022: In Credits and License for This Document, updated the link to the WordPress.com Terms of Service. After initial publication, updated the August 24, 2015 entry below to make the same change.
July 5, 2022: In Credits and License for This Document, deleted a now-duplicative line about the license for this document. In Disclaimer of Warranties, made some minor wording adjustments and clarifications. In Limitation of Liability, added a new paragraph regarding the rights of consumers in Europe. In External Links and Comment Policy, changed “EXPRESSED OR IMPLIED” to “EXPRESS OR IMPLIED”; the former was a typographical error. In Reprint/Reuse Policy, changed various instances of “EXCEPT AS EXPRESSLY REQUIRED” to “UNLESS EXPRESSLY REQUIRED” for wording consistency. In Changes to this Website, added a clarification that these Terms of Use will also apply to any updates, changes, or additions to this website. In Termination and Severability, made some clarifications to my right to terminate access. In Jurisdiction and Governing Law, added a reference to the UN Convention of Contracts for the International Sale of Goods and an additional note regarding consumer rights in other countries. Also added “USA” after “California” (mostly for consistency), separated with a comma. In Revisions, made some clarifications regarding the effective date of changes and their applicability, also deleting the sentence beginning “However, any dispute that arose …” (which the revised language makes redundant) and fixing a typo.
June 18, 2022: In California Consumer Notice, revised the wording of the Google Voice disclosure to more closely match the one in the Privacy Policy, for internal consistency.
June 13, 2022: In Copyright/Intellectual Property Violations, made a variety of wording changes (including revising the text to refer only to alleged copyright violations, not other intellectual property rights). In California Consumer Notice, revised the first numbered provision to more closely reflect the statutory definitions. Made some minor wording changes to the third numbered provision and added a sentence clarifying that questions or complaints can also be submitted via any other contact method I may reasonably specify or make available to you for that purpose (for consistency with the Financial Transactions Policy). Also rearranged the Department of Consumer Affairs information to put the telephone numbers before the address and added “USA” to their postal address for stylistic consistency. Tinkered with these revisions after initial publication.
June 5, 2022: In Comment Policy, changed “may edit, decline to publish, unpublish, or delete any comment at any time” to “may edit, decline to publish, unpublish, or delete any comment on this website at any time”.
May 31, 2022: Made some updates to Disclosure of Paid Advertisements and/or Endorsements, including adding “Ad” as one of the words that may be used to identify paid advertisements or sponsored content and removing the parenthetical stipulation about multi-page content.
May 29, 2022: In Credits and License for This Document, clarified the wording of the license language.
May 25, 2022: In Minimum Age Requirements, updated the reference and links to the FTC “Protecting Kids Online” pages, which have moved and no longer seem to be directly related to the FTC OnGuardOnline initiative. (OnGuardOnline remains a registered trademark of the United States Federal Trade Commission.) Further amended the text of that section to also suggest contacting the providers of the operating system(s) and/or other software you use for information about their parental controls.
May 12, 2022: In Contact Form Policy, revised the bullet point beginning “For contact or feedback forms OTHER than …” to change “I will endeavor to do so at my earliest opportunity” to “I will endeavor to do so (to the extent I reasonably can) at my earliest opportunity.” In Termination and Severability, changed “which I will do at my earliest opportunity upon receipt of your request” to “which I will endeavor to do (to the extent I reasonably can) at my earliest opportunity following my receipt of your request” for clarity and consistency.
April 28, 2022: In General Representations, updated the language regarding economic sanctions and U.S. lists of prohibited or restricted parties, and added an explicit stipulation that I may restrict or block your access if I determine that it may cause a violation or create unacceptable risk to me under applicable export controls or sanctions. (This updated language is adapted from the latest version of the Terms of Service for WordPress.com described in Credits and License for This Document.)
April 12, 2022: In Minimum Age Requirements, changed “privacy-related requests and/or other legal inquiries …” to “requests or inquiries …” In Comment Policy, updated the first numbered provision to add a sentence: “Except as otherwise required by law, I will promptly delete any comment submitted by a person I know or subsequently discover to be under the age of 18.” In the list of typical reasons for editing, declining to publish, unpublishing, or deleting a comment, added a bullet point: “It was submitted by a person I believe to be under the age of 18.” In Contact Form Policy, revised the first numbered provision to change “Except as otherwise required by law, if I receive a communication from a person I know to be under the age of 18, I will promptly delete all copies of the message without acknowledging or responding to it” to “Unless otherwise required by law, I will promptly delete any contact or feedback form I receive from a person I know or subsequently discover to be under the age of 18” and change “privacy requests or questions pertaining to minor children” to “requests or inquiries pertaining to children under 18” for internal consistency. Also deleted the sentence about being unable to respond to communications from persons under 18 (since in some cases, a response may be legally required) and set “You affirm that you are at least 18 years old” in boldface. Tinkered with these revisions after initial publication.
April 11, 2022: In Limitation of Liability, changed “VENDORS, AND SERVICE PROVIDERS” to “VENDORS, OR SERVICE PROVIDERS” for grammar and consistency. In Use of Trademarks, changed “of my web host, …” to “of me or my web host, …”
March 28, 2022: In Disclosure of Paid Advertisements and/or Endorsements, changed “the nature of that compensation …” to “the nature of that compensation or consideration …”
March 27, 2022: In the Comment Policy and Contact and Email Communication Policy, changed “You consent to my collection and use of personal information …” to “You acknowledge and agree that I may collect and use personal information …” In the latter section, also changed “submit requests or questions” to “submit requests and/or questions” for wording consistency.
March 2, 2022: In the preamble, changed “to this website” to “to the aaronseverson.com website”; changed “accessing and/or using this website” to “accessing and/or using the aaronseverson.com website”; deleted the phrase “shall be deemed to”; and changed “the owner of this website” to “the owner and operator of the aaronseverson.com website”. In California Consumer Notice, changed “this website” to “the aaronseverson.com website”; changed “access or use this website” to “access or use the aaronseverson.com website”; changed “If you have questions or complaints, …” to “If you have a question or complaint, or if you would like to receive further information regarding the aaronseverson.com website, …”; and changed “to that number” to “to this number”. In Revisions, changed “of the website …” to “of the aaronseverson.com website …” and changed “this website” to “the aaronseverson.com website.” Tinkered with these revisions after initial publication.
February 12, 2022: In Comment Policy, revised the paragraph beginning “If you would like me to edit or remove …” to change “especially if I’m not sure exactly what you want me to do” to “especially if I’m not sure exactly what you want me to do or if I need to take additional steps to verify your identity” (to make the wording consistent with the Privacy Policy).
February 6, 2022: In Copyright/Intellectual Property Violations, changed “you expressly authorize me to forward your claim to that third party” to “I reserve the right to forward a copy of your claim to that third party (since the claim may implicate their rights).”
February 1, 2022: In the preamble, changed “U.S.A.” to “USA” for internal consistency. In Jurisdiction and Governing Law, changed “will be governed by the laws of the state of California (excluding its conflict of law provisions) and of the United States of America” to “will be governed by the laws of the State of California, USA, excluding its conflict of law provisions.” (This is the wording currently used in the WordPress.com Terms of Service described in Credits and License for This Document, although they don’t capitalize “state” and style “U.S.A.” with periods.) Tinkered a bit with these revisions after initial publication.
January 24, 2022: In Reprint/Reuse Policy, updated the Linking and Hotlinking provision to change “open-source” to “open source”; change “copy and/or use” to “copy or use”; and change “in any manner the terms of the applicable license permit” to “in any manner permitted under the terms of the specified license and/or otherwise permitted by applicable law.” In the Public Domain Content provision, changed “copy and use” to “copy or use” for internal consistency. Also revised the the Public Domain Content and Content Offered Under License provisions to fix certain changes I had intended to make on January 23, 2022 that hadn’t been properly completed (in the former provision, “Please note that licensed content may be subject to rights other than copyright that the license might not include — e.g., trademark rights, likeness rights, publicity rights, personality rights, privacy rights, and/or moral rights — that may limit certain uses of that content that the license terms would otherwise permit” should read “Please note that content that is in the public domain in the U.S. is not necessarily in the public domain elsewhere and vice versa, and that even if the content is in the public domain in your jurisdiction, it may still be subject to rights other than copyright — e.g., patent rights, trademark rights, likeness rights, publicity rights, personality rights, privacy rights, and/or moral rights — that may limit certain uses of that content”; in the latter provision, “may be subject to rights other than copyright” was supposed to read “may be subject to rights other than copyright that the license might not include” just as in the Content Used Under License provision). Updated the Programmatic Elements provision to change “the GNU General Public License, version 3” to “version 3 of the GNU General Public License” and change “under a Creative Commons license and/or open-source license(s)” to “under an open source license, some other type of free software license, a Creative Commons license, and/or other such license”; and add a sentence after that one: “(Please note that such licensed programmatic elements may be subject to rights other than copyright that the license might not include — e.g., patent rights, trademark rights, likeness rights, publicity rights, personality rights, privacy rights, and/or moral rights — that may limit certain uses of the licensed programmatic elements that the license would otherwise permit.)” Throughout that section, also changed all instances of “e.g., trademark rights, likeness rights, …” to “e.g., patent rights, trademark rights, likeness rights, …” for consistency. Tinkered further with these revisions after initial publication.
January 23, 2022: In Reprint/Reuse Policy, updated the Content Used Under License, Content Offered Under License, Programmatic Elements, and All Other Content provisions to change the phrase “or otherwise permitted by applicable law” to “and/or otherwise permitted by applicable law” (also removing a preceding comma in All Other Content). In the Public Domain Content provision, also changed “any image or other content (e.g., a photograph)” to “any content (e.g., text or images)”; changed “that public domain image or content” to “that public domain content”; and changed “Please note that material that is in the public domain in the U.S. is not necessarily in the public domain elsewhere and vice versa” to “Please note that content that is in the public domain in the U.S. is not necessarily in the public domain elsewhere and vice versa, and that even if the content is in the public domain in your jurisdiction, it may still be subject to rights other than copyright — e.g., trademark rights, likeness rights, publicity rights, personality rights, privacy rights, and/or moral rights — that may limit certain uses of that content.” Also revised the disclaimer language to change “PUBLIC DOMAIN MATERIAL” to “PUBLIC DOMAIN CONTENT” and change “SUCH MATERIAL” to “SUCH CONTENT” for wording consistency. In the Content Used Under License and Content Offered Under License provisions, added a parenthetical note after the sentence ending “permitted by applicable law”: “(Please note that licensed content may be subject to rights other than copyright that the license might not include — e.g., trademark rights, likeness rights, publicity rights, personality rights, privacy rights, and/or moral rights — that may limit certain uses of that content that the license terms would otherwise permit.)” Also revised the disclaimer language to change “ANY MATERIAL USED OR OFFERED UNDER SUCH A LICENSE” to “ANY CONTENT USED OR OFFERED UNDER SUCH A LICENSE”and change “SUCH MATERIAL” to “SUCH CONTENT” for wording consistency. In the All Other Content provision, changed “or (4) your use …” to “and/or (4) your use …” and added a note after the following sentence ending “permitted by applicable law”: “However, please note that such content may be subject to rights other than copyright that the license might not include — e.g., trademark rights, likeness rights, publicity rights, personality rights, privacy rights, and/or moral rights — that may limit certain uses of that content that the license terms would otherwise permit; the same may be true of content that is in the public domain in your jurisdiction.” In Copyright/Intellectual Property Violations, fixed a formatting error. Fixed a typo in the August 27, 2021 entry below. Tinkered with these revisions after initial publication.
January 16, 2022: In Reprint/Reuse Policy and Copyright/Intellectual Property Violations, updated the postal mailing address to replace “California” with “CA” and add “USA” to the address. In California Consumer Notice, added “USA” to the postal mailing address.
January 3, 2022: In the preamble, changed “shall be deemed to signify …” to “shall be deemed to refer to …” In California Consumer Notice, changed “requires the following notice:” to “requires me to provide the following notice:” Later in the day, also changed “To the extent that your access to and/or use of this website constitutes or involves the purchase of “goods or services” using an “electronic commercial service,” as those terms are defined by &helllip;” to “To the extent that this website constitutes an “electronic commercial service,” as that term is defined by …” Tinkered with these revisions after initial publication.
January 2, 2022: In California Consumer Notice, changed “Under California Civil Code Section 1789.3, California consumers are entitled to the following notice:” to “To the extent that your access to and/or use of this website constitutes or involves the purchase of “goods or services” using an “electronic commercial service,” as those terms are defined by the Electronic Commerce Act of 1984 (California Civil Code Section 1789 et seq.), California Civil Code Section 1789.3 requires the following notice:” Also changed “Questions or complaints may be submitted …” to “If you have questions or complaints, you can contact me …” and changed “by phone” to “by telephone” for wording consistency. In the subsequent numbered item, changed “California consumers can also report complaints to …” to “If you have a complaint, you can also contact …” and added the department’s TTY number in addition to their regular toll-free number.
December 31, 2021: In Comment Policy, changed “Publish and display your comment …” to “Use, publish, and display your comment …” In Contact Form Policy, changed “make copies of your message (or portions thereof)” to “copy your message (or portions thereof)” and changed “to publish your message or excerpts of it” to “to use, publish, and display your message (or excerpts thereof)” for consistency. In Reprint/Reuse Policy, updated the item on hyperlinks to change “publish, post, or otherwise share hyperlinks” to “publish, display, or otherwise share hyperlinks” and change “and/or any individual post/page thereof” to “or any individual page or post on the site.”
December 28, 2021: In Contact Form Policy, changed “includes general questions/comments about my business, technical questions about the website, or a report of technical problems” to “includes questions and/or comments about me, my content, and/or this website, or pertains to a technical problem with the site, and unless you specifically request otherwise,” and changed “to respond your question or comment and/or to support other users with similar concerns” to “to publicly respond to your question(s) and/or comment(s), and/or to support other users with similar concerns.” Also fixed an inadvertent use of “us” rather than “me” and changed “(unless you authorize me to include other personally identifying information)” to “(unless you ask or authorize me to include other personally identifying information).” Fixed a typo (inadvertent repetition of the word “your”). In Termination and Severability, added language about the removal of published comments and/or form submissions in the event of termination. Also moved the waiver language from Termination and Severability to Miscellaneous. In Miscellaneous, rearranged the text to put the sentence about heirs, successors, and assigns after the “entire agreement” clause. Also changed “You may assign your rights under these Terms of Use to any party that consents to and agrees to be bound by these terms and conditions” to “You may only assign your rights under these Terms of Use with my prior written consent.” (This latter change is primarily intended to avoid any legal issues related to the licensing-related provisions.)
December 27, 2021: In Contact Form Policy, added to the bullet point regarding publication of your message or excerpts of it an additional sentence: “If you wish me to completely unpublish your your submission or the excerpts thereof, please let me know and I will endeavor to do so at my earliest opportunity.” In Termination and Severability, added “LICENSES FOR THE USE OF YOUR COMMENTS AND/OR FORM SUBMISSIONS” to the examples of provisions that shall survive termination. Tinkered with these revisions after initial publication.
December 26, 2021: In Revisions, changed “box on the front page” to just “box” (since the box in question doesn’t necessarily only appear on the front page).
December 25, 2021: In Comment Policy, made a variety of clarifications and wording adjustments, rearranged some existing text to put it in a more logical order, and clarified the grant-of-license language. In Contact Form Policy, revised the grant-of-license language in the same manner as in Comment Policy; changed “transmit your message and its contents” to “transmit your message”; changed “I cannot guarantee you will receive a reply” to “I do not guarantee you will receive a reply except as required by law”; and added boldface to the latter phrase. Changed the sentence that began “My publication of your submission or excerpt thereof …” to “If I publish your submission or an excerpt thereof, I will redact any information that appears to be personally identifying other than the name or pseudonym you supplied (unless you authorize me to include other personally identifying information).” In the subsequent sentence, changed “amend and/or redact” to “amend and/or further redact”. Also fixed a typographical error (“the name or pseudonym you apply” was supposed to read “the name or pseudonym you supplied”). In Reprint/Reuse Policy, changed “assigned or licensed” to “licensed or assigned” and changed all instances of the phrase “WITH REGARD TO” to “WITH RESPECT TO” for internal consistency. Also updated the “Comments” provision to change “by someone other than me” to “that were submitted by someone other than me” in the interests of clarity. In Copyright/Intellectual Property Violations, made a number of minor wording changes, mostly for clarity, and changed “(e.g., by blocking their IP address)” to “(e.g., by blocking that visitor’s access to the comment system).” As a global change, adjusted the way em dashes are presented to avoid formatting or display issues.
December 24, 2021: In Reprint/Reuse Policy, changed “sub-license” to “sublicense”.
December 22, 2021: In Miscellaneous, changed “The Terms of Use will be binding upon and will inure to the benefit of the parties, their successors, and permitted assigns” to “These Terms of Use will be binding upon and will inure to the benefit of the parties and their respective heirs, successors, and permitted assigns.”
December 18, 2021: In Minimum Age Requirements, changed “not affiliated in any way with this website” to “not affiliated in any way with that website” for wording consistency.
December 17, 2021: In Minimum Age Requirements, added a paragraph with information about parental control protections pursuant to 47 U.S. Code Section 230(d).
December 15, 2021: In the preamble, added a parenthetical sentence after the effective date, noting that this section contains a summary of recent changes and providing an internal link. In Credits and License for This Document, fixed a typographical error (the phrase “section below” was repeated twice). In Reprint/Reuse Policy, changed “(as described in the sections below)” to “(as described below)” for internal consistency.
December 14, 2021: In Disclaimer of Warranties, changed “YOUR ACCESS TO AND/OR USE OF THE WEBSITE AND ITS CONTENT …” to “ANY ACCESS TO AND/OR USE OF THE WEBSITE AND/OR THE CONTENT THEREOF …” In Indemnification, changed “websites or services” to “websites and/or online services” for internal consistency. In External Links, changed “or for purposes of bibliographic reference and/or attribution” to “and/or for purposes of bibliographic reference and/or attribution.” Also changed “ACCEPT NO RESPONSIBILITY OR LIABILITY WHATSOEVER” to “SHALL HAVE NO LIABILITY WHATSOEVER”; changed “OF ANY WEBSITE OR ONLINE SERVICE NOT OWNED AND/OR OPERATED BY ME” to “OF ANY WEBSITE OR ONLINE SERVICE TO WHICH I MAY LINK”; changed “OF ANY ADVERTISERS AND/OR SPONSORS” to “OF ANY OF MY ADVERTISERS AND/OR SPONSORS”; and changed “OR FOR YOUR USE OF SUCH LINKS” to “OR FOR YOUR USE OF ANY SUCH LINK, WEBSITE, OR SERVICE” for clarity. Later in that section, changed “ACCEPT NO RESPONSIBILITY FOR OTHER WEBSITES OR ONLINE SERVICES …” to “ACCEPT NO RESPONSIBILITY FOR AND SHALL HAVE NO LIABILITY WITH RESPECT TO ANY OTHER WEBSITE OR ONLINE SERVICE …” In Comment Policy, revised the disclaimer text for greater clarity and consistency with the revised wording of the External Links section. In Reprint/Reuse Policy, updated the hotlinking language to change “some external website or service” to “some other website or online service”; change several instances of “hosted on or served by” to “hosted on and served by”; and change “an external website or online service” to “any other website or online service” for greater clarity and consistency. Amended the entries below for July 13, 2018; December 29, 2015; and August 24, 2015 to replace the specific references to this policy’s license with generic terms (to avoid any confusion in the event the license changes in the future, e.g., to a later version of the same license). (I tinkered with these revisions after initial publication.)
December 12, 2021: In General Representations, deleted “adware” (since there’s not really a consistent definition, and a lot of perfectly legitimate software may now technically fall into that category) and changed “programs” to “software” (which is the term I more commonly use in these policy pages). In Contact Form Policy, changed “For form submissions OTHER than California Privacy Request Forms” to “For contact or feedback form submissions OTHER than California Privacy Request Form submissions”; changed “your inquiry” to “your message”; and changed “your message or inquiry” to “your message” for wording consistency. Also changed “except under the conditions described in the …” to “except as otherwise described in the …” and fixed a typographical error (duplicate quotation marks).
December 9, 2021: In the preamble, changed “your use of …” to “your access to and/or use of …” and changed “By accessing or using …” to “By accessing and/or using …” In Minimum Age Requirements, changed “Use of or access to …” to “Access to or use of …” for wording consistency. In General Representations, changed “By accessing and using” to “By accessing and/or using”; changed “Your use of …” to “Your access to and/or use of …”; and changed “that your use of …” to “that your access to and/or use of …” (also for wording consistency). In Disclaimer of Warranties, changed, “YOUR USE OF …” to “YOUR ACCESS TO AND/OR USE OF …” and changed “MAKE NO WARRANTIES REGARDING” to “MAKE NO WARRANTIES WHATSOEVER REGARDING” for consistency. Also changed “RATHER LOCALLY HOSTED” to “RATHER THAN LOCALLY HOSTED” (fixing a typo). In Indemnification, removed the parentheses around “and their respective directors, officers, employees, and agents” and made some minor wording and punctuation adjustments for clarity; changed “related to or arising out of your use of …” to “related to or arising out of your access to and/or use of …”; changed “advertisers and sponsors” to “advertisers and/or sponsors”; and changed “in connection with your use of …” to “in connection with your access to and/or use of …” In External Links, changed “MAKES NO WARRANTY” to “MAKES NO WARRANTIES” and changed “ADVERTISERS OR SPONSORS” to “ADVERTISERS AND/OR SPONSORS” for consistency. In Disclosure of Paid Advertisements and/or Endorsements, changed “paid banner or text advertisements” to “paid banner and/or text advertisements”. In Comment Policy, revised the bullet point regarding indemnification to better match the updated text in the Indemnification section. Also changed “MAKES NO WARRANTY” to “MAKES NO WARRANTIES” for consistency. In the Reprint/Reuse Policy, changed all instances of “NO WARRANTY WHATSOEVER” to “NO WARRANTIES WHATSOEVER” for consistency. In Termination and Severability, changed “simply discontinue using” to “simply discontinue accessing or using” and set the paragraph regarding provisions surviving termination in all caps. In Jurisdiction and Governing Law, changed “access to or use of” to “access to and/or use of”. Split the language regarding venue into a separate sentence and replaced “arising out of or relating to any of the same” with a more specific description (essentially repeated from the first sentence). In California Consumer Notice, changed “currently no charge to use” to “currently no charge to access or use”.
December 8, 2021: In General Representations, changed “malware or other malicious code” to “malware, spyware, adware, or other malicious programs or code” (a phrase borrowed from the current version of the WordPress.com Terms of Service described in Credits and License for This Document). Added to that same bullet point after “malicious program or code”: “to defame or illegally impersonate me or any third party;” separated with a semicolon. In Disclaimer of Warranties and Limitation of Liability, set all the text in all caps. Also in Disclaimer of Warranties, changed “This website and its content …” to “The aaronseverson.com website and its content …”; added the word “implied” before the phrase “warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, and non-infringement”; and added a new final sentence to the first paragraph: “Your use of the website and its content is entirely at your own risk.” Also in Limitation of Liability, changed “loss or corruption of data” to “loss or corruption of information or data”; changed “for any amounts” to “any amounts”; and added “punitive damages” and “any loss (direct or indirect) of actual or anticipated profit, revenue, income, savings, opportunity, reputation, or goodwill” to the types of liability excluded, renumbering the items accordingly. In Indemnification, added the phrase “To the extent allowed by applicable law” to the beginning of the first sentence, set off with a comma. In External Links, set the warranty and liability disclaimer in all caps and removed the boldface. Also changed “offer no warranty” to “make no warranty” and changed “for the content, …” to “with respect to the content, …” Renamed “Disclosure Notice: Paid Advertisements and Endorsements” “Disclosure of Paid Advertisements and/or Endorsements” (which sounds less awkward). In that section, changed “paid text or banner advertisements from various advertisers” to “paid banner or text advertisements and/or sponsored links from various advertisers.” Also deleted the words “From time to time” from the beginning of that sentence and changed “whether text links, banner ads, or in any other form …” to “whether banner ads, text links, or in some other form …” In Comment Policy, added the phrase “To the extent allowed by applicable law” to the beginning of the bullet point about indemnification, set off with a comma. Set that section’s liability disclaimer paragraph in all caps and removed the boldface. Made some wording adjustments to the final paragraph about reserving the right to deny access. In Contact Form Policy, changed “Controllers, Questions, and How to Reach Me” to “Controller/Responsible Party, Questions, and How to Reach Me” (the correct current name of that section of the Privacy Policy). Also changed “law/regulations” to “law and/or regulations” in the same bullet point. Added a new final paragraph to that section (similar to the final paragraph of the Comment Policy) about reserving the right to deny access to the contact or feedback forms. In Reprint/Reuse Policy, set the warranty disclaimers in all caps and replaced various instances of the phrase “offer no warranty” to “make no warranty” for internal consistency. Corrected some errors in the November 27, 2021 entry below. (I had apparently accidentally pasted part of a revision summary from the Ate Up With Motor Terms of Use with some language that doesn’t apply to these terms.) Tinkered with these revisions (and this summary of them) after initial publication.
November 28, 2021: In Disclaimer of Warranties, further adjusted the wording of the recently added language regarding third-party content, products, and/or services in hopes of clarifying the intent. In Revisions, changed “use of and access to …” to “use of …” In Limitation of Liability, changed the final paragraph to read “Except to the extent otherwise required by applicable law, I shall have no liability for any failure or delay due to matters beyond my reasonable control.” In Revisions, changed “by updating the “Most Recent Policy Updates” box on the front page” to “by updating the “Most Recent Policy Updates” box” (since the box doesn’t only appear on the front page).
November 27, 2021: Moved the effective date from Revisions to the preamble, in a new third paragraph (following the one beginning “For the purposes of …” Removed the boldface from text in the subsequent paragraph. Updated Credits and License for This Document to reflect the new location of the effective date, set the reference to the Revisions section in quotation marks, and make that reference an internal link for consistency and easier reference. In General Representations, changed “Is not contrary to any applicable U.S. Economic Sanctions, and:” to “Is not inconsistent with any applicable U.S. sanctions law, and:” and added two bullet points: “You are can legally form a binding contract with me, and:” and “You are not on any list made by a U.S. government authority relating to designated, restricted, or prohibited persons, and:” (This language is borrowed from the WordPress.com Terms of Service described in Credits and License for This Document.) In Disclaimer of Warranties, added a new paragraph regarding third-party content, products, and/or services. Updated the paragraph disclaiming error-free or uninterrupted service to also refer to third-party content, products, and/or services. In External Links, changed “appropriateness, legality …” to “appropriateness, accuracy, legality …” In Comment Policy, changed “to be abusive, disruptive, or constitute spam” to “abusive, disruptive, or to constitute spam.” Added a new section following the Copyright/Intellectual Property Violations section: “Changes to This Website,” containing the text “I may update, change, or discontinue the aaronseverson.com website or any portion thereof at any time, at my sole discretion.” Renamed the Governing Law section “Jurisdiction and Governing Law”; moved that section so that it follows rather than precedes Termination and Severability; added the parenthetical phrase “(excluding its conflict of law provisions)” after “the state of California” (a nuance borrowed from the WordPress.com Terms of Service described in Credits and License for This Document); and changed “local, state, and/or federal courts” to “state and/or federal courts”. In Revisions, changed “These terms may be modified …” to “These terms and conditions may be revised …”; added a sentence explaining that changes to these terms will be summarized in this recent revisions list; and changed “Your continued use of and access to the site signifies your acceptance of any such modifications” to “Your continued use of and access to the website after the effective date of any such revision will signify your acceptance of those changes.”Tinkered further with these revisions after initial publication.
November 26, 2021: In California Consumer Notice, replaced the section symbol (§) with the word “Section” for clarity.
November 13, 2021: In Contact Form Policy, changed “(e.g., statistics describing how many requests of a particular type …” to “(e.g., how many requests of a particular type …”
November 12, 2021: In Contact Form Policy, changed “de-identified aggregate information about requests” to “aggregate information about requests” for greater consistency with the Privacy Policy wording. (I initially marked this change before I executed it, which I did later the same day.) Tinkered with these revisions after initial publication to fix some editorial errors that occurred in my earlier attempts to publish this update today.
November 11, 2021: In Contact Form Policy, changed “publish and/or disclose de-identified and/or aggregated information about requests” to “publish de-identified aggregate information about requests” for better grammar and greater consistency with the Privacy Policy wording.
November 10, 2021: In Disclosure Notice: Paid Advertisements and Endorsements, changed “(or by images or icons containing such words)” to “(and/or by images or icons containing such words)” and changed “financial compensation or other valuable consideration” to “financial compensation and/or other valuable consideration”.
November 9, 2021: In Credits and License for This Document, made a number of wording changes for clarity and stylistic consistency. (I tinkered with these changes and made a belated correction after initial publication.)
November 8, 2021: In Minimum Age Requirements, added “under the age of 18” to the end of the first sentence. Revised the second sentence to read “Use of or access to the aaronseverson.com website by any person younger than 18 is expressly prohibited.” (I tinkered with this revised wording after initial publication.)
November 7, 2021: Throughout these terms, replaced a number of instances of “such as” (with or without qualifiers like “without limitation”) with “e.g.,” setting off the applicable text with commas and/or parentheses as grammatically appropriate.
November 2, 2021: In General Representations, changed “the Google Hosted Libraries API(s)” to just “the Google Hosted Libraries” for consistency with the current wording in the Privacy Policy.
November 1, 2021: In Contact Form Policy, changed “a person I know or reasonably suspect to be …” to “a person I know to be …” for consistency with the related Privacy Policy language.
October 30, 2021: In Limitation of Liability, changed “in violation of any applicable law, regulation or company policy” to “in violation of any applicable law, ordinance, regulation, or company policy” for wording consistency. Also changed “I shall have no liability …” to “neither I nor my web host, licensors, partners (if any), contractors, vendors, and service providers shall be liable …” and changed “beyond my reasonable control” to “beyond our reasonable control” (again for wording consistency). In Indemnification, changed “me and my licensors, partners …” to “me and my web host, licensors, partners …” (again for consistency). Fixed a formatting error in this recent revisions list.
October 18, 2021: In Limitation of Liability, added the phrase “(including for any third-party products or services purchased or used through this website)” after “shall be liable”. (This addition is adapted from an addition made to the October 17, 2021 version of the WordPress.com Terms of Service described in Credits and License for This Document.) Also changed “or (d) for any amounts that exceed the fees actually paid by you to me for access to the site content” to “or (d) for any amounts that exceed $50 or the amount actually paid by you to me in connection with this website during the twelve (12) month period prior to the cause of action, whichever is greater.” (This is also adapted from language in the current version of the WordPress.com Terms of Service.)
October 7, 2021: Further tinkered with the California Consumer Notice section added on October 4, 2021, to adjust the Google trademark notice.
October 5, 2021: Further tinkered with the wording of the California Consumer Notice section added on October 4, 2021.
October 4, 2021: Added a new California Consumer Notice with a California Civil Code § 1789.3 notice. Tinkered with the wording and formatting after initial publication (including resetting the text as an ordered list rather than inline).
October 3, 2021: In Reprint/Reuse Policy, set the contact email at the end of the section in boldface.
October 2, 2021: In Contact Form Policy, revised the bullet about the California Privacy Request Form to change “intended only for …” to “intended solely for use by …” change “under the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA)” to “under applicable California law”; change the reference to the “California Privacy and Data Protection Rights” section of the Privacy Policy to refer instead to the “Your California Privacy Rights” section (updating the link accordingly); and change “more information about this law” to “more information about these rights.”
October 1, 2021: Updated Comment Policy to clarify that comment notification emails may also be sent to the author of the post or page on which the comment was submitted. Also changed “Transmit the comment …” to “Transmit your comment …”
September 25, 2021: In General Representations, updated the bullet point beginning “For any unlawful purposes …” to change “purposes” to “purpose”; change “to publish any illegal content” to “to publish or otherwise distribute any illegal content”; and add “to stalk or harass me or any third party” to the listed items. Updated the bullet point beginning “To disclose the sensitive personal information …” to change “of others without their permission …” to “of others without their permission, or to otherwise violate the privacy rights of any person or persons …” Changed “To send spam or bulk unsolicited messages …” to “To send or otherwise facilitate spam or bulk unsolicited messages …” Updated the bullet point beginning “In any way that …” to change “sole discretion” to “sole judgment” and change “systems” to “systems and/or data”. In Disclaimer of Warranties, changed “and my web host, licensors, partners (if any), contractors, vendors, and service providers …” to “(and, where applicable, my web host, licensors, partners (if any), contractors, vendors, and service providers) …” In Comment Policy, changed “(e.g., publicity rights, personality rights, and/or privacy rights)” to “(e.g., privacy rights, publicity rights, personality rights, or trademark rights)”. Also updated the paragraph beginning “I reserve the right to redact, edit, or otherwise modify a comment …” to add “contains abusive or defamatory language,” set off with a comma, and changed “appears to violate someone’s rights and/or privacy” to “may violate someone’s rights and/or privacy.” In Contact Form Policy, added an item to the numbered list regarding warranting and affirming that your message and/or use of the contact or feedback forms does not violate the rights of others (similar to the existing bullet point in Comment Policy, with the same revision noted above). Tinkered with these revisions after initial publication.
September 22, 2021: In Disclaimer of Warranties, Limitation of Liability, and Indemnification, changed “contractors, vendors, partners, or licensors” to “web host, licensors, partners (if any), contractors, vendors, or service providers” and changed “contractors, vendors, partners, and licensors” to “web host, licensors, partners (if any), contractors, vendors, and service providers” (as applicable). In Use of Trademarks, changed “advertisers, licensors, service providers, or vendors” to “web host, advertisers, licensors, partners (if any), vendors, or service providers”. In Disclaimer of Warranties, also changed “I and any applicable …” to “I and my …” In Comment Policy, added a bullet point: “You agree to indemnify and hold harmless me and my web host, advertisers, licensors, partners (if any), contractors, vendors, and service providers (and their respective directors, officers, employees, and agents) against any claims related to or arising from your comment, its content, or your use of the comment system.” Also added a sentence to the beginning of the paragraph beginning “The publication of a comment …”: “Opinions expressed in comments published on this website are those of the respective commenters and do not necessarily represent my opinions or those of my web host, advertisers, licensors, partners (if any), contractors, vendors, or service providers.” Also changed “does not necessarily indicate my endorsement of the comment or any product, service, or website” to “does not necessarily constitute my endorsement of an opinion, product, or service.” In the following paragraph, changed “each time a reply or follow-up comment is posted” to “each time a reply or follow-up comment is published.” Also revised the paragraph regarding disclaimers of liability for comments to read: “Unless otherwise required by law, I accept NO responsibility or liability for and make NO warranty of any kind, expressed or implied, with regard to any comment(s) published on this website, including, without limitation, such comment(s)’ accuracy or suitability for any purpose and/or the accuracy, utility, suitability for any purpose, or legality of any external website linked in such comment(s). Any use of the information contained in any comment on the aaronseverson.com website is entirely at your own risk.” In the final paragraph of that section, changed “visitors who I believe …” to “visitors I believe …”
September 18, 2021: In the Reprint/Reuse Policy, further revised the Programmatic Elements provision to update the trademark information.
September 14, 2021: Further Updated Use of Trademarks to adjust the disclaimer language in the paragraph regarding the use of my name and/or image.
September 13, 2021: Updated Use of Trademarks to add a disclaimer to the language regarding the use of my name and/or likeness. (Releasing content under certain licenses may require me to waive or agree to not enforce certain rights so as not to restrict the exercise of the rights provided by those licenses.) Also change “reuse of other content” to “reuse of other site content” for clarity. In Comment Policy, changed “(such as publicity rights and/or privacy rights)” to “(e.g., publicity rights, personality rights, and/or privacy rights)” for completeness. In the Reprint/Reuse Policy, updated the Linking and Hotlinking provision to change “to copy or use” to “to copy and/or use” and change “under Creative Commons license(s); open-source license(s); and/or other, similar license(s)” for internal consistency. Further updated the Programmatic Elements provision to clarify that the GNU General Public License is by the Free Software Foundation and further amend the trademark information. Also changed all instances of “under any applicable license pertaining …” to “under the terms of any applicable license pertaining …” and changed all instances of “allowed by the specified license …” to “permitted under the terms of the specified license …” Updated the Creative Commons trademark notices throughout the Reprint/Reuse Policy. (I tinkered further with these changes after initial publication.)
September 12, 2021: In the Reprint/Reuse Policy, updated the Programmatic Elements provision to add a trademark notice for GNU.
September 10, 2021: In General Representations, further updated the Google trademark notice.
September 9, 2021: In General Representations, updated the Google trademark notice. Removed a number of extra spaces.
September 7, 2021: In General Representations, added a disclaimer of affiliation to the reference to the Google APIs Terms of Service. Also changed “as well as all applicable laws and regulations” to “as well as with all applicable laws and regulations.” In Use of Trademarks, changed “These Terms of Use do not grant you any license to make commercial use of my name or any of my trademarks or service marks. All right, title, and interest in such marks shall remain solely with me” to “These Terms of Use do not grant you any right or license to use my name, my likeness, or any of my trademarks or service marks. All right, title, and interest in and to my marks remain solely with me. All rights in and to my name and likeness are expressly reserved.” Changed the following paragraph to: “All other trademarks and/or service marks mentioned, described, and/or depicted on this website are the property of their respective owners. Except as otherwise expressly indicated, I have no affiliation with or endorsement by the holders of such marks, and no such affiliation or endorsement is implied or should be inferred. These Terms of Use do not grant you any right or license to use such marks, all right, title, and interest in and to which remain solely with their respective owners.” In the last paragraph of that section, changed “the owners of any applicable trademark(s) … ” to “the owners of any applicable trademark(s) and/or service mark(s) …” In the Reprint/Reuse Policy, updated the All Other Content provision to change “not owned by me” to “not owned or otherwise administered by me”. In Termination and Severability, changed “Any provision of these Terms of Use …” to “Any provisions of these Terms of Use …” for grammatical reasons and changed “and limitations of liability” to “limitations of liability, and provisions pertaining to the ownership of trademarks and/or service marks” (still enclosed in parentheses). In the older entries in this recent revisions list, changed “Google API TOS” to “Google APIs Terms of Service” for internal consistency.
September 2, 2021: In Reprint/Reuse Policy, updated the provision on Programmatic Elements to change “code segments” to “code snippets” (which is the more proper term of art) and change “programs, program components, or …” to “software programs or elements thereof, and/or …” Also updated the All Other Content provision to change “unless you wish to reuse a version of the content that I have modified or adapted” to “unless you wish to reuse a version that I have modified or adapted” and revise the wording of the provisions following the phrase “you will also need my prior authorization unless” for clarity and to add language about the possibility of my assigning or licensing my modified or adapted version to a third party, renumbering the other listed subclauses accordingly.
September 1, 2021: Updated Credits and License for This Document to make some minor wording and formatting adjustments (including changing “Automattic Inc.” to just “Automattic” and changing “with some elements of later versions through February 21, 2020” to just “with some elements from later versions”). Also updated the WordPress trademark notice. In Reprint/Reuse Policy, updated the item about Comments to change “posted on” to “published on” and change “of the people who originally submitted those comments” to “of the respective commenters”; change “reprint or reuse a comment posted on this website” to “reprint or reuse comment(s) on this website”; change “you will need to seek the permission of the original poster (or other applicable rights holder(s))” to “you will need the permission of the applicable commenter(s) (and/or other applicable rights holder(s))”; change “although if you obtain the permission of the original poster/rights holder(s) to reprint or reuse their comment …” to “but if you obtain the permission of the applicable commenter(s) (and/or other applicable rights holder(s)) to reprint or reuse their comment(s) …”; and change “The same is true of photographs, images, or other non-text content in comments left by …” to “In general, the same is true of photographs, images, and/or other media content in comments submitted by …” Updated the item about All Other Content to change “If the rights holder(s) …” to “If the applicable right(s) holders …” and change “pertaining to the use of the content” to “pertaining to the use of such content.”
August 27, 2021: In General Representations, changed “may use Google APIs (such as, without limitation, the Google Fonts API and/or the Google Hosted Libraries API) and/or content served via such Google APIs” to “may use Google API services (such as, without limitation, the Google Fonts API and/or the Google Hosted Libraries API(s)) and/or content served via such Google APIs” and updated the trademark notice. Renamed the FTC Disclosure Notice: Paid Advertisements and Endorsements to just “Disclosure Notice: Paid Advertising and Endorsements” and changed the anchor for that section from “FTC” to “AdsEndorsements”.
August 18, 2021: In General Representations, made a number of wording changes to the paragraph regarding Google APIs for consistency, clarity, and to better reflect the current provisions of the Google APIs Terms of Service. In Reprint/Reuse Policy, changed various instances of the phrase “and other rights information” to “and/or other rights information” throughout.
August 16, 2021: In the preamble, updated the paragraph beginning “For the purposes of …” to note that other terms have the same definitions specified in the “Definitions” section of the Privacy Policy. Updated the Financial Transactions Policy section to add a note that the Financial Transactions Policy is incorporated into and forms part of the Privacy Policy (mostly for clarity) and added a link to the Privacy Policy (without the anchor link) for reference.
August 14, 2021: In External Links, changed “Links to other websites or online services are provided solely for your information or for the purposes of bibliographic reference” to “Links on the aaronseverson.com website to other websites and/or online services are provided for visitors’ information or for purposes of bibliographic reference and/or attribution” for greater clarity and internal consistency.
August 6, 2021: In FTC Disclosure Notice: Paid Advertisements and Endorsements, changed the phrase “any other consideration” to “other valuable consideration”.
August 4, 2021: In Copyright/Intellectual Property Violations, made a formatting adjustment to the email address; changed “by mail at …” to “via postal mail at …”; moved the mailing address to a separate paragraph; added ATTN information; and changed the state to the abbreviation.
August 2, 2021: In Credits and License for This Policy, added a note that a change history for this document can be found in the “Recent revisions” list below the Effective Date. In Use of Trademarks, moved the paragraph beginning “These Terms of Use …” to place it immediately after the first paragraph of that section; changed “andall right, title, and interest in such marks will remain …” to “All right, title, and interest in such marks shall remain …” (also making it the start of a new sentence rather than a clause of the previous one). In the following paragraph, changed “Trade names …” to “Other trade names …” for clarity. Changed “Other trade names, trademarks, and/or service marks mentioned, described, or depicted on this website are used here for the purposes of identification, description, and/or commentary. Such marks remain the property of their respective owners” to “Other trade names, trademarks, and/or service marks mentioned, described, or depicted on this website remain the property of their respective owners and are used here for the purposes of identification, description, and/or commentary” and changed “is implied” to “is implied or should be inferred.” Also changed “Any opinions expressed herein are mine alone and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the trademark owners; my contractors, vendors, partners, or licensors; or any other third party” to “The opinions expressed in the content presented on this website are solely those of the individual(s) expressing those opinions and do not necessarily reflect the views of the owners of any applicable trademark(s); of my advertisers, licensors, service providers, or vendors; or of any other third party.” In FTC Disclosure Notice: Paid Advertisements and Endorsements, changed “explicitly indicated” to “expressly indicated” for wording consistency.
July 15, 2021: In Comment Policy, changed “prevent spam” to “prevent spamming” and changed “discourage spam and other malicious activity” to “discourage spamming and/or other malicious activity” (to draw a grammatical distinction between individual examples of spam and the act of spamming — yes, this is obviously hairsplitting!) In Contact Form Policy, changed “discourage spam and other malicious activity” to “discourage spamming and/or other malicious activity” for the same reason and for consistency.
July 1, 2021: In the preamble, changed “shall be deemed to signify …” to “shall be deemed to refer to …” In Credits and License for This Document, changed “Automattic’s legalmattic repository” to “their Legalmattic repository” (to correct the capitalization and eliminate the possessive). In Comment Policy, changed “widgets” to “Widget(s)” for correct stylization and because their number may vary. Also corrected the stylization in earlier items in this recent revisions list, to avoid confusion. Updated the entry on this list for March 2, 2020, to remove the possessive form of Automattic (making the applicable reference just “the Terms of Service …”). Fixed a typographical error in the entry for July 26, 2018. Updated the entry for January 16, 2016, to note that I changed my mind on the specified issue (about the reuse of public domain images I’ve modified) as of March 17, 2020. Fixed a formatting error in this item. Removed extra spaces throughout this page and fixed some formatting errors with the various lists.
June 25, 2021: In Comment Policy, changed “Edit or redact” to “Edit and/or redact”. In Contact Form Policy, changed “amend or redact the published information” to “amend and/or redact the published information” for consistency.
June 21, 2021: In Financial Transactions, changed “Financial transactions related to aaronseverson.com …” to “Financial transactions with me that pertain to the aaronseverson.com website …” for consistency with the current text of the Financial Transactions Policy. Fixed a formatting error in the April 18, 2021 entry in this recent revisions list.
April 18, 2021: In Comment Policy, adjusted the capitalization of the ordered list HTML tags for internal consistency. In Contact Form Policy, changed the bullet-pointed list to an ordered list. Updated several earlier entries on this recent revisions list referring to that section, the Comment Policy, and the Reprint/Reuse Policy to change references to “bullet point” or “bullet points” to “item” or “items” (since those lists are ordered, not unordered bullet-pointed lists).
April 2, 2021: In Comment Policy, changed “the collection and use your information …” (which contained a grammatical error!) to “my collection and use of personal information I receive through and/or in connection with your comment …” for clarity. In Contact Form Policy, changed “the collection and use of your information …” to “my collection and use of personal information I receive through and/or in connection with your message …” for consistency.
December 14, 2020: In Comment Policy, changed “Comments may be screened prior to posting to prevent spam and/or to defuse contentious arguments” to “Comments may be screened prior to publication to prevent spam and/or defuse contentious arguments, and/or may be subjected to certain automated tests in order to filter out submissions made by automated bots and discourage spam and other malicious activity.” In Contact Form Policy, added a similar statement to the item beginning “You authorize me to transmit your message and its contents …” making some minor adjustments to the existing text to fit the addition. (The Privacy Policy already makes this point, but I thought it worth also mentioning here for clarity.)
December 5, 2020: In Indemnification, changed “… your use of the aaronseverson.com website or its content” to “… your use of the aaronseverson.com website and/or its content”.
December 4, 2020: In the third paragraph of the preamble changed “apply ONLY to the use of the aaronseverson.com website” to “apply ONLY to the use of the aaronseverson.com website (including its web feeds, if any)” for consistency. In the Reprint/Reuse Policy, amended the item on content used under license to change “the source, attribution information, and applicable license information for which will be noted within or adjacent to the applicable content” to “the source, attribution information, and applicable license information for which will be noted within and/or adjacent to the applicable content” and amended the item on content offered under license to change “the details of which will be noted within or adjacent to the applicable content” to “the details of which will be noted within and/or adjacent to the applicable content”.
December 1, 2020: In the preamble, amended the first sentence to add the parenthetical phrase “(including its web feeds, if any)” after “… the aaronseverson.com website”. In the fourth paragraph of the preamble, changed “… including those linked from the aaronseverson.com website or on which I may have accounts …” to “… including those linked from the aaronseverson.com website and/or on which I may have accounts …” In the Comment Policy, changed “… which may be visible on the home page and other areas of the website as well as the specific post or page you commented on” to “… which may be visible on the home page and/or other areas of the website as well as the specific post or page you commented on” and changed “The contents of published comments may also appear in search results of the website’s search function” to “The contents of published comments may also appear in search results of the website’s search function and/or in the site’s web feeds, if any.” In Reprint/Reuse Policy, updated the item on Translation and Accessibility Aids to change “site content” to “content” and change “… enabling you to access and use this website and/or its content” “… enabling you to access and use this website, its web feeds, and/or its content.” In Copyright/Intellectual Property Violations, changed “… violates your copyright …” to “… violates your copyright or other intellectual property right(s) …” and changed the words “work” and “work(s)” to material for consistency.
October 24, 2020: In Comment Policy, changed “From time to time, comments may accidentally be deleted due to technical issues such as site upgrades” to “From time to time, comments may be inadvertently deleted due to technical issues or the restoration of the site database from older backup files” for greater clarity.
October 8, 2020: In the Reprint/Reuse Policy section, updated the item on Translation and Accessibility to change “You are also free to use accessibility aids or software (such as screen readers or automated text-to-speech readers) in any reasonable manner for purposes of enabling you to access the site and read or view our content” to “You are also free to use accessibility aids and/or assistive technology (e.g., screen readers or automated text-to-speech readers) in any reasonable manner for purposes of enabling you to access and use this website and/or its content.”
October 4, 2020: In the Comment Policy and Contact Form Policy, changed “for reference, backup, and/or other internal administrative purposes” to “for reference, backup, and/or other administrative purposes.”
September 29, 2020: Renamed the License for This Document section “Credits and License for This Document,” which is a more precise description. Made a minor clarification to an earlier item on this revisions list.
September 18, 2020: In Reprint/Reuse Policy, added an initial sentence to make clear that it applies specifically to content on this website.
September 16, 2020: Fixed some formatting errors in the General Representations section, one of which was affecting much of the page.
July 23, 2020: Made some further updates to the Reprint/Reuse Policy to make it very clear that the policy is not intended to restrict your rights any applicable license pertaining to the use of the content, also changing “this provision shall not be construed …” to “nothing in this provision is intended or shall be construed …” for emphasis and changing “rights holder” to “rights holder(s)” throughout for consistency (since in some cases there may be more than one), amending the adjacent text where necessary for grammatical purposes. In the provision on Trademark Use, changed “if the applicable party or owner authorizes …” to “if the applicable party or owners authorize …” for similar reasons.
July 22, 2020: Updated the preamble to add a link to the Cookie Notice, noting that it forms part of the Privacy Policy and also constitutes the “cookie policy” for this website. Changed the phrase “please read it!” to “please read them!” for clarity. Removed an extra space elsewhere on this page. In the Reprint/Reuse Policy, added trademark notices for Creative Commons and amended the provision on linking and hotlinking to clarify that the prohibition on hotlinking applies only to hotlinking without my permission and state clearly that this provision shall not be construed to in any way restrict or limit your rights to copy or use content I use or offer under license in any manner the applicable license permits. (That provision was never intended to limit or restrict the rights provided by such licenses, but I decided it would be prudent to make that expressly clear.) In the same provision, changed “This does NOT apply …” to “Furthermore, this provision does NOT apply …” to avoid confusion; changed “For the avoidance of doubt, “hotlinking” means means” to “”Hotlinking” means …” (to eliminate the duplicated word and limit the use of the phrase “for the avoidance of doubt” to the more important point); and changed “HREF element” to “HREF attribute” (which is the correct technical term).
July 21, 2020: Made a minor correction in a previous item in this recent revisions list. (Nothing in the terms themselves was changed, I just fixed my description of the changes made on July 19.)
July 19, 2020: Updated the license section to change its name from “License for This Policy” to “License for This Document” and change references in that section to “this policy” to “these terms” for clarity. Also noted that the Automattic changelog can also be found in the repository mentioned in that section and added a notice stating that Automattic, Legalmattic, and WordPress.com are trademarks or registered trademarks of Automattic or Automattic’s licensors (and that WordPress is a registered trademark of the WordPress Foundation). Also added a trademark attribution notice to General Representations and made some minor wording changes to the Reprint/Reuse Policy section and this revisions list (to ensure that the words “license” or “licenses” always appear immediately after “Creative Commons” throughout, for trademark attribution reasons). Also in the Reprint/Reuse Policy, in the item on public domain content, changed the phrase “as described above” to “as described below,” as the language to which that phrase refers is now in subsequent items. (This is a belated correction; for some reason, the phrase wasn’t changed at the time the items were reordered.)
June 30, 2020: Made a number of amendments and clarifications to the Comment Policy: Changed “infringe the copyrights or any other rights (such as publicity rights) …” to “infringe upon the copyrights or any other rights (such as publicity rights and/or privacy rights) …” In the next paragraph, changed “prevent spam or defuse contentious arguments” to “prevent spam and/or defuse contentious arguments” and changed “any comment posted” to “any comment you submit” for consistency and clarity. In the latter sentence, also added a comma after “published” for readability. Later in that section, changed “contains malicious code or spam” to “appears to contain or constitute malicious code or spam”; changed “violate someone’s rights or privacy” to “violate someone’s rights and/or privacy”; changed “in backups or archives files made by me or my web host” to “in backups or archives made by me and/or my web host”; and changed, “Again, I do not guarantee that any comment posted will be published” to, “Again, I do not guarantee that any submitted comment will be published” for clarity. Added a new final paragraph to the section: “I reserve the right to temporarily or permanently limit or deny access, either to the commenting feature and/or to the site as a whole, to visitors who I believe to be under age 18; whose comments have been unpublished and/or deleted for the above-mentioned or any other reasons; and/or whose comments and/or other activities on the site and/or its related services I deem (in my sole judgment) to be abusive, disruptive, or constitute spam.”
June 26, 2020: A few minor wording adjustments for consistency: In Comment Policy, changed “email notifications of replies or follow-up comments” to “email notifications of replies and/or follow-up comments” and added a comma after the phrase “… asking me to discontinue the notifications …” In Contact Form Policy, changed “via the email address or other contact information you provide” to “via the email address and/or other contact information you provide” and changed “on the aaronseverson.com website or its associated social media accounts” to “on the aaronseverson.com website.”
June 16, 2020: In Copyright/Intellectual Property Violations and this revisions list, corrected instances of the word “us” and “we” to “me” and “I” for consistency of language. (Some language in these terms was adapted from other documents that use “we” rather than the first person.)
May 30, 2020: In Contact Form Policy, changed “infringe on” to “infringe upon” for better grammar.
April 26, 2020: Updated the preamble to note (for the avoidance of doubt and consistency with the wording of the Privacy Policy) that Aaron Severson is the owner of this website. Also changed the phrase “Please note that these Terms of Use …” to “Please note that the terms and conditions listed below …”
Marcy 17, 2020: In Reprint/Reuse Policy, clarified that you do generally need my permission to reuse public domain content that I have modified or adapted. Made a number of other minor wording adjustments to that section (including clarifying that you can translate any portion of my content on this website for your own personal use or internal reference, not just written content).
March 3, 2020: In General Representations, amended the stipulation about not sharing sensitive personal or proprietary commercial information of others to add the phrase “without their permission.”
March 2, 2020: Somewhat more extensive update based on the latest (Feb. 21, 2020) version of the Terms of Service for WordPress.com. Updated the preamble to clarify some terminology and move the attribution/license information into a new License for This Policy section. Added a Minimum Age Requirements section and clarified that other types of legal inquiries pertaining to children (not just privacy-related ones) should be submitted by a parent, legal guardian, or other authorized adult representative. Updated the General Representations section to move the representations to a bullet-pointed list, clarified some provisions, removed some of the age-related language (which is now in Minimum Age Requirements), and added some new stipulations (principally to spell out that you can’t use the site for spam, revealing sensitive personal or proprietary information, or spreading malware). In Disclaimer of Warranties, changed “and its contents” to “and its content” and changed Neither I nor my vendors, partners, or contractors (as applicable) make any warranty that the website will be error-free or that access to the website will be continuous or uninterrupted” to “Neither I nor my vendors, partners, contractors, or licensors make any warranty that the website or its content will be error-free or that access thereto will be continuous or uninterrupted.” In Limitation of Liability, changed “I accept no liability for any failure or delay due to matters beyond my reasonable control” to “Except to the extent otherwise required by applicable law, I shall have no liability for any failure or delay due to matters beyond my reasonable control” and made that a separate paragraph. Updated the Indemnification section to add some additional stipulations. Revised the wording of the External Links section to make it more expansive (including online services as well as external websites) and note that I take no responsibility for other sites or services that link to this one. Updated Use of Trademarks to note that these Terms of Use don’t give you a license to make commercial use of my name or trademarks. In the Reprint/Reuse Policy, updated the Linking and Hotlinking item to change “hosted on or served by an external website” to “hosted on or served by an external website or online service” and “the terms and conditions of the hosting site” to “any terms and conditions stipulated by the hosting site/service,” also noting that the latter are outside of my control; updated the item regarding public domain material to add the word “otherwise” to “Except as required by applicable law” and note that it also applies to material I release to the public domain; amended the Content Used Under License item to explain that I will now indicate along with the attribution/license information whether my modifications or adaptations (if any) are offered under the same license; added a new item regarding trademark use; added a new item describing other elements other than written content or images (e.g., scripts or fonts offered under an open source license); and clarified that even if the applicable rights holder authorizes you to reuse their content, you will also need my authorization to reuse a version modified or adapted by me (except where I’ve offered the modified/adapted version under a Creative Commons license or other license or released my version to the public domain). Also fixed some formatting in that section. Made some minor adjustments to the wording of Copyright/Intellectual Property Violations and revised the list formatting. Updated Governing Law to note that the appropriate venue is courts in Los Angeles County (which is much bigger than just the City of Los Angeles). In Termination; Severability, moved the waiver language to a new paragraph. Added a new Miscellaneous section. Fixed a formatting error in this revisions list. Changed the Other Elements subsection of the Reprint/Reuse Policy to “Programmatic Elements” to better describe what it applies to and further adjusted some of the wording in the Content Used Under License item. Made some further minor wording adjustments throughout the Reprint/Reuse Policy for greater consistency.
February 29, 2020: In Use of Trademarks, changed “mentioned on this website” to “mentioned, described, or depicted on this website.” Made some technical adjustments to this page’s anchors for internal links (to use ID rather than NAME attributes) and removed a “Return to the top of this page” link that was no longer working.
February 17, 2020: Added a new Financial Transactions Policy subsection, referring to the policy now incorporated into the Privacy Policy.
February 15, 2020: Made some minor adjustments to the wording of the preamble.
February 13, 2020: In the Contact Form Policy section, inserted information about how to contact me regarding other privacy-related matters.
February 12, 2020: Updated the text to change the name of the CCPA Request Form to the California Privacy Request Form to reduce the risk of confusion. Changed the phrase “to submit requests or questions regarding their privacy rights …” to “to submit requests or questions pertaining to their privacy rights …”
February 11, 2020: Updated the Contact Form and Email Communication Policy to clarify the purpose of the CCPA Request Form, add stipulations about the use of that form, and explain that while CCPA Request Form submissions will not be published, I may publish and/or disclose de-identified and/or aggregated information or statistics about requests received.
February 10, 2020: Added a new Contact Form Policy section.
December 21, 2019: In the preamble, changed “the Terms of Use contained herein and other operating rules and policies that I may publish …” to “the Terms of Use contained herein and any other operating rules and policies that I may publish …”
November 25, 2019: Changed the bullet-pointed list under Comment Policy to a numbered list and updated the styles of several of the lists to fix a formatting problem where ordered lists were not displaying correctly.
November 23, 2019: Updated the preamble to strike the phrase “or the Privacy Policy for this website” after the phrase “NOT to these terms.” Updated the General Representations section to note that, except as otherwise required by law, any privacy-related requests or questions regarding children under 18 should be submitted by a parent, legal guardian, or other authorized adult representative. Updated the Comment Policy, restructuring the list and clarifying some wording.
June 25, 2019: Updated the Reprint/Reuse Policy to clarify that creating bibliographic citations or properly attributed brief quotations is allowed.
May 7, 2019: In Indemnification, changed “… and/or your violation(s) of these Terms of Use. This includes any use of …” to “… and/or any violation(s) by you of these Terms of Use. This includes, but is not limited to, any use of …”
May 6, 2019: In the section of the preamble describing the version(s) Automattic terms I’ve adapted, changed “with some very minor portions …” to “with some elements …”
April 28, 2019: Minor adjustment to Disclaimer of Warranties: Changed “as otherwise required by law or to the extent expressly required under …” to “as otherwise required by law and/or to the extent expressly required under …”
April 9, 2019: Changed the heading “Disclaimer of Warranty” to “Disclaimer of Warranties.” Under Use of Trademarks, changed “I have no affiliation or partnership with” to “I have neither any affiliation or partnership with” for grammatical purposes.
March 25, 2019: Under External Links, changed “owned and operated” to “owned and/or operated.” Under Use of Trademarks, changed “Except as otherwise explicitly indicated, I have no partnership with, relationship to, or endorsement by the holders of such marks, and no such partnership, relationship, or endorsement is implied” to “Except as otherwise expressly indicated, I have no affiliation or partnership with nor any endorsement by the holders of such marks, and no such affiliation, partnership, or endorsement is implied.”
March 12, 2019: Struck the Works of Fiction section, which was potentially confusing.
March 6, 2019: Updated the FTC Disclosure Notice: Paid Advertisements and Endorsements section to add “Paid Promotion” to the list of words that may be used to identify paid advertising or links. Changed the beginning of that sentence from “All such …” to “Such …”; changed “will be identified with the words …” to “will be identified with words such as, as appropriate, …”; and changed “or by images or icons containing those words” to “or by images or icons containing such words.”
February 28, 2019: Added a new section, FTC Disclosure Notice: Paid Advertisements and Endorsements.
February 22, 2019: Amended the language of the Comment Policy item about email replies to make it a bit more concise.
February 6, 2019: Amended the language about the Google Fonts API to also include Google Hosted Libraries. Amended the Comment Policy to revise and expand the language regarding responding to your comments via email, also consolidating it with the related item for clarity.
February 3, 2019: Under Reprint/Reuse Policy, made some minor adjustments to the examples listed in Accessibility and Translation.
February 1, 2019: Fixed some typos, updated text styles, and edited link titles on this page for better accessibility.
January 27, 2019: Further clarified warranty disclaimer language in Reprint/Reuse Policy by changing “Except as expressly required under the terms of the applicable Creative Commons license or other license or otherwise required by law” to “Except as expressly required by the terms of the applicable license or otherwise required by law” (also fixing a typo in one of those passages). Added a sentence to the preamble: “Your use of any third-party websites or services, including those linked from the aaronseverson.com website or on which I may have accounts, is subject to the individual terms of use/terms of service and privacy policies, if any, of those sites or services.” Slightly adjusted the wording of Who I Am and moved that text to the preamble for clarity. Fixed an editorial error in the preamble: “NOT to this policy …” should have read “NOT to these terms …”
January 16, 2019: Clarified warranty disclaimer language in Reprint/Reuse Policy and changed “explicitly” to “directly” in the last item. Fixed a typo on this list (the date of the prior modification was supposed to be 2019).
January 13, 2019: Updated Reprint/Reuse Policy to clarify that you don’t need my permission to reuse content the applicable rights holder has authorized you to use.
November 28, 2018: Clarified the Reprint/Reuse Policy by changing “copyright and rights information” to “copyright and other rights information” (with or without an Oxford comma) and (in the Comments item) changing “reprint my comments …” to “reprint my comments and/or other content owned by me …” Changed “by the applicable Creative Commons license or other license agreement” to “under the terms of the applicable Creative Commons license or other license” and “adjacent to the applicable content” to “within or adjacent to the applicable content.
November 27, 2018: Added “no warranty” disclaimers to the Reprint/Reuse Policy and updated the “All Other Content” item to note that the reuse of content not owned by me requires the permission of the applicable rights holder and change “languages other than English” to “other languages.”
November 15, 2018: Streamlined and clarified the preamble at the top of this page.
October 22, 2018: Updated this page’s hyperlinks with “rel=noopener” or “rel=noopener noreferrer” attributes for security purposes.
October 16, 2018: Clarified the text of the Governing Law and Who I Am sections.
September 29, 2018: Updated Comment Policy to note that published comments may appear in search results of the website’s search function.
September 28, 2018: Updated and clarified/streamlined Comment Policy, adding additional information about email notifications and modifying/deleting comments.
September 26, 2018: Clarified Comment Policy text about the Recent Comments Widgets (including noting that there is more than one such Widget).
August 29, 2018: Updated Comment Policy to note that comments you submit may appear in the Recent Comments area. Added a subsection on comments to the Reprint/Reuse Policy.
August 25, 2018: Updated Use of Trademarks to include service marks and changed subsequent references to trademarks to “marks.”
August 16, 2018: Added anchor link to Comments section; no changes to terms, just that formatting update.
July 26, 2018: Added Google APIs Terms of Service information to General Representations section.
July 14, 2018: Fixed a couple of very minor editorial glitches.
July 13, 2018: Amended preamble to make clearer that these terms apply only to the use of this website, not to any other business or professional arrangement with me. Added a “Who I Am” section for clarity and noted that I’ve borrowed a few bits and pieces from more recent versions of the WordPress.com TOS under the same license.
July 4, 2018: Amended Comment Policy to clarify that I may respond to your comment by emailing you prior to or instead of publishing the comment.
May 23, 2018: Updated http links to https where applicable. Updated Comment Policy.
May 19, 2018: Minor updates to align with updated Privacy Policy.
June 6, 2016: Updated Works of Fiction disclosure language.
May 29, 2016: Amended Comment Policy to change “… and to make copies of the comment and its content for routine backup or other internal administrative purposes” –> “to make copies of the comment and its contents for routine backup or other internal administrative purposes; and to transmit the comment and its contents via email to the site administrator and, if your comment was in reply to a comment posted by another user, to the user who posted the original comment to which you replied.”
May 15, 2016: Clarified that I may make copies of comments for routine backup or other internal administrative purposes.
March 11, 2016: Deleted text regarding modified/adapted images from the “PUBLIC DOMAIN MATERIAL” section of the Reprint/Reuse Policy.
February 1, 2016: Clarified recent revision list, added version date for Automattic TOS to attribution section.
January 19, 2016: Clarified the Reprint/Reuse Policy by changing “material” to “content” throughout.
January 17, 2016: Clarified Public Domain Material section of Reprint/Reuse Policy: “I impose no conditions on such reuse” –> “I impose no conditions on such reuse (other than any conditions that applicable law may expressly require)”.
January 16, 2016: Added note to the Reprint/Reuse Policy clarifying that my modifications or adaptations of public domain images may be freely copied and used. [I changed my mind effective Marcy 17, 2020.]
January 13, 2016: Added note to preamble clarifying that variations in text style have no legal significance. Editorial corrections to past revision list.
January 12, 2016: Further clarified Reprint/Reuse Policy and added provision for public domain material.
January 11, 2016: Clarifications and editorial changes to Reprint/Reuse Policy, including a clearer definition of hotlinking and clarifications regarding other reuses of material on this website.
January 8, 2016: In Reprint/Reuse Policy, changed language regarding material used under license: “you are free to use that licensed content or material as allowed under the applicable license (or any other terms offered by the applicable rights holder) or otherwise permitted by law” –> “I cannot sub-license such content or material, but you are free to use it as allowed under the applicable license (or any other terms offered by the applicable rights holder), or as otherwise permitted by law.” Replaced “Terms of Service” with “Terms of Use” throughout.
January 7, 2016: Removed references to third-party font API service, as I’ve discontinued using it. ETA: Editorial changes.
January 6, 2016: Clarified previous revision information. ETA: Added information on third-party font API to General Representations section and changed the name of that section to simply “General Representations” with slight wording changes.
December 31, 2015: Clarification of Reprint/Reuse Policy regarding reuse of licensed content. Clarified licensing language.
December 29, 2015: Editorial corrections. Clarified that this entire policy is available under the specified license and clarified licensing language. Added “except as otherwise required by law or to the extent expressly required under the terms of an applicable license agreement” to the Disclaimer of Warranty. In Reprint/Reuse Policy paragraph 5, changed “original” to “licensed.”
December 28, 2015: Added note regarding version history of the Automattic terms. Editorial corrections. Clarified licensing language.
December 25, 2015: Editorial and formatting corrections.
December 24, 2015: Added link to Automattic Inc. main site. Clarified hotlinking policy.
December 23, 2015: Editorial corrections.
December 22, 2015: Updated Reprint/Reuse Policy; editorial changes; added more detailed recent revisions information. Clarified licensing language.
December 21, 2015: Clarification of Reprint/Reuse Policy. Clarified licensing language.
December 13, 2015: Added note explicitly allowing use of accessibility tools.
August 24, 2015: Split Terms of Use from Privacy and Legal. Extensive update of Terms of Use based on the Automattic Inc. TOS language noted above (version dated 30 June 2015). Added new preamble; new Limitation of Liability, Governing Law, and Termination; Severability sections; revised language of Adult Content; General Representations section; added note to Revisions section regarding disputes and changes of version; retitled No Warranty to Disclaimer of Warranty with revised language. Reorganized and revised Comment Policy for greater clarity. Clarified that I may publish excerpts of messages received via the comment forms to support other users or clarify your request. Added Trademark Use to Reprint/Reuse Policy. Various minor wording and editorial changes throughout. Added license information.

Please contact me if you need information on earlier revisions.