IANAL (I am not a lawyer)

[JohnBoucher]

I noticed something interesting this morning. I see very few team web sites that have any visible copyright notices and legal stuff.

It does not have to be very long, but I believe that all teams would benefit from a statement that acknowledges that all registered materials (Logos, Trademarks and the such) belong to their registered owners.

If you are a 501(c)3 , this is a good place to promote it.

You also want to have a privacy statement and if you have a forum a statement stating usage rules.

By no means, do I believe that ours is ironclad, but if you want to read it please do so. http://www.team237.com/disclaimer.htm (http://www.team237.com/disclaimer.htm)

We link to it from the copyright notice that is at the bottom of every page.

Believe me, it helped us this year. We were challenged on a copyright issue early in the season.

[Joshua May]

Out team's website (http://www.angelfire.com/electronic2/hhsrobotics) also has a copyright statement at the bottom of every page, however we do not as of yet have a Privacy Statement on our webiste. I should probably look into typing one up.

[Bharat Nain]

Thanks for the information John. If one team was challenged with a copyright, then any other team can. I will definately look into putting a privacy statement on Team 25;s website, even though we have a copyright statement.

[Elgin Clock]

Believe me, it helped us this year. We were challenged on a copyright issue early in the season.
It wasn't that song "Crawling In The Dark" that the band Hoobastank gave us permission to use that you are talking about, now could it?? lol :cool::rolleyes:

[JohnBoucher]

No.. But that does make two times we were questioned. I was referinig to the pictures from a former member.

[Raven_Writer]

Team 5's website (http://www.robocards.org) has a minimal copyright notice. My own website (http://silent-poet.vze.com) has a more detailed copyright notice though. Since I don't collect information from either though, I don't exactly see a need for a Private Policy. What does a P.P. really do?

[JohnBoucher]

It’s my opinion that if you collect any personal information on your website, you need to describe what you will be doing or not doing with that information. It is critical with a commercial site, but important for any site.

If you have a forum, you need to inform users about the usage rules and in return you inform them about what you will be doing with their email address, ip and the other information that you collect.