Member Agreement
tao.ca Member Agreement - v 1.0
In this agreement the following definitions apply:
* "Member" - someone who accesses the tao.ca project
* "OAT" - the collective who runs tao.ca
* "The Collective" - OAT
* "Facilities" - the tao.ca servers that host the email, mailing lists and webspace.
1. Introduction
tao.ca is run by a group of Toronto-area activists who form the OAT Collective. The tao.ca project exists to provide communications infrastructure resources to those who we identify as allies in the struggle against capitalism and for a better world.
Members of tao.ca are asked to keep in mind that the tao.ca facilities exist in order to provide grassroots activists a place to work and share information and organizing tools from. Decisions about how accounts and resources are allocated are made on the basis of whether projects fit within the 10 point basis of unity that guide the OAT Collective. OAT prioritizes work according to the Collective's politics and to the general political climate. The Collective also makes decisions based on how the actions of one member affect the tao.ca community as a whole.
OAT retains the right to refuse assistance to users based on workload or on treatment of admin workers. tao.ca is run by volunteer administrators who wish to engage in relationships based on mutual respect and mutual aid. We ask that users engage with the OAT Collective and system administrators on that basis. At all times, OAT will strive to involve members in resolving problems, except in cases where this is not feasible.
This agreement sets out how tao.ca facilities may or may not be used. Many of the guidelines will be obvious, however, we state them here so there will be no confusion or doubt over what is or is not acceptable.
You should check this Member Agreement regularly as we may change it to include new issues that arise in connection with member use of facilities or the way we administer services.
If we have reasonable grounds to suspect you are in breach of this Member Agreement, and refuse to work with the Collective in order to redress the breach, or you do anything which would put us in breach of our obligations to others - we reserve the right to suspend or terminate your access to the facilities. We will give you notice of suspension or termination as soon as it is practical to do so.
2. Mutual Aid
The tao.ca project depends heavily on the support of its members. Members are highly encouraged to make annual contributions of either money or social labour in order to support the real costs of this project. Donations can be made either by mailing a cheque or money order made out to TAO Communications to 401 Richmond Avenue, Suite# 444, Toronto, ON, M5V 3A8 - or by depositing money directly into our credit union account at Metro Credit Union (800 Bay Street, Toronto, ON, M5S 3A9, transit# 04392, branch# 828, account# 6773030). You can contact OAT about contributing social labour at oat@tao.ca.
3. General Use
New email/web accounts and mailing lists can be applied for at http://members.tao.ca/. Once your email account has been approved by the OAT Collective, you can access it via the web at https://webmail.tao.ca/ or by POP/IMAP (see http://help.tao.ca/ for instructions on setting up POP/IMAP). Your mail account comes with 10 Megabytes of storage. If you have requested web space, you are alloted an additional 10 Megabytes. If more space is required, you may make this request to oat@tao.ca. Instructions on accessing a requested mailing list will be mailed to you.
Member accounts or mailing lists that remain unused for three months after initial set-up, or which remain dormant for a period of six months at any other time will be removed. OAT will attempt to make contact with list workers or account owners within a reasonable time frame before removal. Arrangements can be made with OAT by members to circumvent account removal in special circumstances.
tao.ca facilities should not be used either directly or indirectly:
1. to transmit material counter to the 10 point basis of unity, material that is invasive of another's privacy, or material that disparages or insults any individual or group, based on race, ethnicity, gender, nationality, sexual orientation, disability, or other immutable characteristic;
2. to transmit or cause to be transmitted any advertising, promotional or other materials that are unsolicited (commonly known as "spam");
3. to engage in commercial or for-profit activity;
4. to transmit or cause to be transmitted mail bombs, chain letters, chain petitions or pyramid schemes.
4. Content
tao.ca operates on limited resources and is at this time only able to provide hosting for projects belonging to grassroots and radical activists. Material posted on the tao.ca server that is counter to the 10 basic points of agreement, may be removed at the discretion of OAT in consultation with the member responsible for the content.
Sites hosting for-profit and commercial content will be removed without notice. Sites that require payment for access will likewise be removed.
Members wishing to post multi-media and streaming content must contact the OAT Collective before doing so in order to ensure that such content does not put an undue amount of pressure on bandwidth or hosting resources.
5. Security
Members of the OAT Collective exercise discretion and security in their work as system administrators and as activists, and ask that members take security considerations seriously when accessing the facilities. OAT recommends that all members check out http://security.tao.ca/ for information on secure communications.
While the OAT Collective take security on tao.ca very seriously, it is up to members to safeguard their own data. OAT recommends that members learn how to use encryption tools such as PGP in order to ensure communications security.
As part of using tao.ca, user accounts may be created for you for which you will receive a password or passwords. You are responsible for maintaining the confidentiality of your accounts and passwords, and are responsible for the actions of any person who uses your account or passwords to gain access to tao.ca.
You agree to completely log out of your account at the end of each session and to notify the OAT Collective immediately of any unauthorized use of your accounts, or any other breach of security at any time. You may request that your account be modified, a new password issued, or your account disabled, by sending an email to oat@tao.ca.
You must not use the tao.ca facility to carry out port scanning or probing (which is an attempt to identify an open gateway into another Internet user's machine). This causes extra headaches for our administrators and brings unwanted attention to the tao.ca project. Where it has been identified that an account has been used for this activity OAT may terminate it.
You must not use the facilities to run any program that can be used to compromise the efficiency and security of network traffic.
You must not use the facility to knowingly or unknowingly cause to be transmitted Worms, Trojans or Viruses. Any account found to have been used to transmit such items can be subject to immediate suspension or disconnection of services without notice.
OAT in no way offers support for the detection or removal of Viruses, Worms or Trojans. OAT strongly recommends that you use good quality up to date anti-virus software supplied by a reputable anti-virus developer to protect your system from unwanted Viruses, Worms and Trojans.
OAT reserves the right to perform security audits on its facilities or services hosted through tao.ca. These security audits may include pinging, portscanning, banner-checking and any other technique OAT deems necessary.
6. Data Protection and Privacy
OAT is security-conscious when collecting and storing member data. We do not keep log files of system activity. We DO NOT willingly give user information to any other organisations, companies or government agencies for any purpose.
7. Domain Names
Domain name hosting is not automatic with webspace. OAT will host domain names for members for a negotiated fee.
Members are responsible for the registration and upkeep of their own required domain names.
8. Websites
Members must keep your own back-up copies of any data and files. We do not keep back-up copies of your pages and will not be liable for any loss of your data or files.
You are responsible for the content of your website (including any content you link to) which must comply with the General Use section of this Member Agreement and the 10 Points of Agreement.
We may remove or request the removal of any material or links from your website if we consider that you are in breach of this Member Agreement.
If your website generates abnormally high hit levels or high levels of network traffic, affecting other services, OAT may move it and/or restrict access to it. OAT will work with members in order to deal with situations like this where they arise.
On termination of your Internet account for any reason, we may delete your website from our server immediately.
9. Email Storage
You are responsible for checking your email regularly and storing any emails you wish to keep. On termination of your account for any reason, any emails (read or unread) kept on our servers may automatically be deleted.
10. Mailing lists
Mailing lists are granted on the basis that their content and spirit aren't duplicated elsewhere (either on tao.ca or other activist servers). You see the list of mailing lists we currently host at http://masses.tao.ca/lists/listinfo.
Lists granted by tao.ca are not to be used for commercial purposes, nor for mass-mailing surveys, spam or petitions. List workers are not to auto-subscribe individuals to lists without permission of the person being subscribed. OAT will terminate lists where these practices are engaged in.
Lists are to be self-managed and those that have been abandoned by the list workers may be terminated by OAT if a suitable list worker replacement can't be found. The OAT Collective will not take responsibility for managing abandoned lists.
11. Copyright and Third Party Rights
tao.ca does not support copyright law in any way, however, if threatened with legal action over "copyrighted" material being hosted in the tao.ca facilities, we reserve the right to remove such material in accordance with the interests of all users on the system.
12. Chat
OAT is a part of an activist SILC network. This is a secure chat facility that is primarily accessed via the shell. Members requiring access to SILC for organizing purposes should contact oat@tao.ca for further assistance.
13. Communications from OAT
OAT may use e-mail to communicate with you from time to time. E-mails from OAT will be sent to your primary tao.ca e-mail address. We will consider the e-mail delivered at the same time that it is sent. All system members have a compulsory subscription to the system-bulletin mailing list which is only used by members of the OAT Collective to communicate important system news to all members.