Terms of Use

Welcome to Front Porch Forum. Our mission is to help neighbors connect and foster community at the neighborhood level. Thank you for participating.

1. ACCEPTANCE OF TERMS

Front Porch Forum, Inc. (referred to hereafter as "Front Porch Forum") provides a collection of online resources, including forums, classified ads, advertising, and various email services, ("the Service") subject to the following Terms of Use ("Terms"). By using the Service in any way, you are agreeing to comply with these Terms. In addition, when using particular Front Porch Forum services, you agree to abide by any applicable posted guidelines for all Front Porch Forum services, which may change from time to time at the sole discretion of Front Porch Forum. Should you object to any term or condition of these Terms, any guidelines, or any subsequent modifications thereto or become dissatisfied with Front Porch Forum in any way, your only recourse is to immediately discontinue use of Front Porch Forum.

2. MODIFICATIONS TO THIS AGREEMENT

We reserve the right, at our sole discretion, to change, modify or otherwise alter these terms and conditions at any time. Such modifications shall become effective immediately upon the posting thereof. You must review this agreement on a regular basis to keep yourself apprised of any changes. You can find the most recent version of these Terms at:

https://frontporchforum.com/terms-of-use

3. CONTENT

You understand that all postings, messages, text, files, images, photos, video, sounds, or other materials ("Content") posted on, transmitted through, or linked from the Service, are the sole responsibility of the person from whom such Content originated. You are entirely responsible for all Content that you post, email or otherwise make available via the Service. You understand that Front Porch Forum does not control, and is not responsible for Content made available through the Service, and that by using the Service, you may be exposed to Content that is offensive, indecent, inaccurate, misleading, or otherwise objectionable. Furthermore, the Front Porch Forum site and Content available through the Service may contain links to other websites, which are completely independent of Front Porch Forum. Front Porch Forum makes no representation or warranty as to the accuracy, completeness or authenticity of the information contained in any such site. Your linking to any other websites is at your own risk. You agree that you must evaluate, and bear all risks associated with, the use of any Content, that you may not rely on said Content, and that under no circumstances will Front Porch Forum be liable in any way for any Content or for any loss or damage of any kind incurred as a result of the use of any Content posted, emailed or otherwise made available via the Service. You acknowledge that Front Porch Forum does not necessarily pre-screen or approve Content, but that Front Porch Forum shall have the right (but not the obligation) in its sole discretion to refuse, delete or move any Content that is made available via the Service, for any reason or no reason whatsoever.

4. THIRD PARTY CONTENT, SITES, AND SERVICES

The Front Porch Forum site and Content available through the Service may contain features and functionalities that may link you or provide you with access to third party content which is completely independent of Front Porch Forum, including web sites, directories, servers, networks, systems, information and databases, applications, software, programs, products or services, and the Internet as a whole.

Your interactions with organizations and/or individuals found on or through the Service, including payment and delivery of goods or services, and any other terms, conditions, warranties or representations associated with such dealings, are solely between you and such organizations and/or individuals. You should make whatever investigation you feel necessary or appropriate before proceeding with any online or offline transaction with any of these third parties.

You agree that Front Porch Forum shall not be responsible or liable for any loss ,damage or injury of any sort incurred as the result of any such dealings. If there is a dispute between participants on this site, or between users and any third party, you understand and agree that Front Porch Forum is under no obligation to become involved. In the event that you have a dispute with one or more other users, you hereby release Front Porch Forum, its officers, directors, shareholders, employees, agents, affiliates and successors in rights from claims, demands and damages (actual and consequential) of every kind or nature, known or unknown, suspected and unsuspected, disclosed and undisclosed, arising out of or in any way related to such disputes and / or our service. If you are a California resident, you waive California Civil Code Section 1542, which says: "A general release does not extend to claims which the creditor does not know or suspect to exist in his favor at the time of executing the release, which, if known by him must have materially affected his settlement with the debtor."

5. NOTIFICATION OF CLAIMS OF INFRINGEMENT

If you believe that your work has been copied in a way that constitutes copyright infringement, or your intellectual property rights have been otherwise violated, please notify Front Porch Forum's agent for notice of claims of copyright or other intellectual property infringement ("Agent"), at

membersupport@frontporchforum.com

or:

Copyright Agent
Front Porch Forum
PO Box 8219
Essex Junction, VT 05451

Please provide our Agent with the following Notice:

a) Identify the material on the Front Porch Forum site that you claim is infringing, with enough detail so that we may locate it on the website;

b) A statement by you that you have a good faith belief that the disputed use is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law;

c) A statement by you declaring under penalty of perjury that (1) the above information in your Notice is accurate, and (2) that you are the owner of the copyright interest involved or that you are authorized to act on behalf of that owner;

d) Your address, telephone number, and email address; and

e) Your physical or electronic signature.

Front Porch Forum will remove the infringing posting(s), subject to the the procedures outlined in the Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA).

6. PRIVACY AND INFORMATION DISCLOSURE

Front Porch Forum has established a Privacy Policy to explain to users how their information is collected and used, which is located at the following web address:

https://frontporchforum.com/privacy-policy

Your use of the Front Porch Forum website or the Service signifies acknowledgement of and agreement to our Privacy Policy. You further acknowledge and agree that Front Porch Forum may, in its sole discretion, preserve or disclose your Content, as well as your information, such as email addresses, IP addresses, timestamps, and other user information, if required to do so by law or in the good faith belief that such preservation or disclosure is reasonably necessary to: comply with legal process; enforce these Terms; respond to claims that any Content violates the rights of third-parties; respond to claims that contact information (e.g. phone number, street address) of a third-party has been posted or transmitted without their consent or as a form of harassment; protect the rights, property, or personal safety of Front Porch Forum, its users or the general public.

7. CONDUCT

You agree not to post, email, or otherwise make available Content:

a) that is unlawful, harmful, threatening, abusive, harassing, defamatory, libelous, invasive of another's privacy, or is harmful to minors in any way;

b) that is pornographic or depicts a human being engaged in actual sexual conduct.

c) that harasses, degrades, intimidates or is hateful toward an individual or group of individuals on the basis of religion, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, race, ethnicity, age, or disability; or economic, housing, or immigration status (also see https://frontporchforum.com/racial-justice);

d) that violates the Fair Housing Act by stating, in any notice or ad for the sale or rental of any dwelling, a discriminatory preference based on race, color, national origin, religion, sex, familial status or handicap (or violates any state or local law prohibiting discrimination on the basis of these or other characteristics);

e) that impersonates any person or entity, including, but not limited to, a Front Porch Forum employee, or falsely states or otherwise misrepresents your affiliation with a person or entity (this provision does not apply to messages that are lawful non-deceptive parodies of public figures.);

f) that includes personal or identifying information about another person without that person's explicit consent;

g) that is false, deceptive, misleading, deceitful, misinformative, or constitutes "bait and switch" (also see the FPF Coronavirus / Covid-19 Content Policy);

h) that infringes any patent, trademark, trade secret, copyright or other proprietary rights of any party, or Content that you do not have a right to make available under any law or under contractual or fiduciary relationships;

i) that constitutes or contains "multi-level marketing," "affiliate marketing," "link referral code," "junk mail," "spam," "chain letters," "pyramid schemes," or unsolicited commercial advertisement;

j) that constitutes or contains any form of advertising or solicitation if: posted in areas of the Front Porch Forum sites which are not designated for such purposes; or emailed to Front Porch Forum users who have not indicated in writing that it is ok to contact them about other services, products or commercial interests.

k) that includes links to commercial services or web sites, except as allowed in "services";

l) that advertises any illegal service or the sale of any items the sale of which is prohibited or restricted by any applicable law, including without limitation items the sale of which is prohibited or regulated by law.

m) that attempts to sell, buy, give away, solicit, trade or barter weapons, firearms/guns and components or accessories, BB/pellet, stun, and spear guns, ammunition, clips, cartridges, reloading materials, gunpowder, fireworks, explosives, and US military items not demilitarized in accord with Defense Department policy.

n) that advertises the sale of pets or stud services for pets. Pets are defined as cats, dogs, or wolf-hybrids.

o) that contains software viruses or any other computer code, files or programs designed to interrupt, destroy or limit the functionality of any computer software or hardware or telecommunications equipment;

p) that disrupts the normal flow of dialogue with an excessive number of messages (flooding attack) to the Service, or that otherwise negatively affects other users' ability to use the Service; or

q) that employs misleading email addresses, or forged headers or otherwise manipulated identifiers in order to disguise the origin of Content transmitted through the Service.

Additionally, you agree NOT to:

r) contact anyone who has asked not to be contacted;

s) "stalk" or otherwise harass anyone, including verbal personal attacks of neighbors;

t) collect data, including email addresses, about other users for political, commercial or unlawful purposes;

u) use automated means, including spiders, robots, crawlers, data mining tools, or the like to download data from the Service - unless expressly permitted by Front Porch Forum;

v) post non-local or otherwise irrelevant Content, repeatedly post the same or similar Content or otherwise impose an unreasonable or disproportionately large load on our infrastructure;

w) submit postings to Front Porch Forum that promote competing services;

x) attempt to gain unauthorized access to Front Porch Forum's computer systems or engage in any activity that disrupts, diminishes the quality of, interferes with the performance of, or impairs the functionality of, the Service or the Front Porch Forum website;

y) use any form of automated device or computer program that enables the submission of postings on Front Porch Forum without each posting being manually entered by the author thereof (an "automated posting device"), including without limitation, the use of any such automated posting device to submit postings in bulk, or for automatic submission of postings at regular intervals;

z) register with Front Porch Forum or for a particular Neighborhood Forum using an incomplete or false name, street address or email address. Anonymous or false registration is not permitted;

aa) badger or otherwise aggressively, repeatedly and/or abusively contact Front Porch Forum staff or other representatives (constructive criticism and reasonable feedback are always appreciated);

bb) use Front Porch Forum in a way counter to its community-building mission. Misuse includes, but is not limited to, public shaming, leveling accusations or insults, making personal attacks or otherwise antagonizing neighbors, repetition, dominating the discussion, making inflammatory or divisive statements, inciting violence, or otherwise driving away other members (see details about Keeping It Civil);

cc) use Front Porch Forum to repeatedly post political statements of your own, or from other sources. FPF is intended for announcements, requests, offers, updates and conversation between neighbors; it is not a forum for continually promoting one’s political views;

dd) use Front Porch Forum to proselytize about religious beliefs;

ee) post misinformation meant to incite fear, hate, prejudice, or violence; misleading information about medical issues; or content that misleads people about elections or other civic processes; or

ff) submit postings to Front Porch Forum that violate our Coronavirus/COVID-19 Content Policy.

Front Porch Forum in its sole and absolute discretion reserves the right to determine whether conduct or Content violates these Terms, and any such determination shall be conclusive and binding on all parties.

8. NO SPAM POLICY

You understand and agree that sending unsolicited email messages or advertisements to email addresses harvested from Front Porch Forum, or through Front Porch Forum computer systems, is expressly prohibited by these Terms. Any unauthorized use of Front Porch Forum computer systems is a violation of these Terms and applicable federal and state laws. Such violations may subject the sender and his or her agents to civil and criminal penalties.

9. LIMITATIONS ON SERVICE

You acknowledge that Front Porch Forum may establish, in its sole discretion, limits concerning use of the Service, including the maximum number of days that Content will be retained by the Service, the maximum number and size of postings, email messages, or other Content that may be transmitted or stored by the Service, and the frequency with which you may access the Service. You agree that Front Porch Forum has no responsibility or liability for the deletion or failure to store any Content maintained or transmitted by the Service. You acknowledge that Front Porch Forum reserves the right at any time to modify or discontinue the Service (or any part thereof) with or without notice, and that Front Porch Forum shall not be liable to you or to any third party for any modification, suspension or discontinuance of the Service.

10. ACCESS TO THE SERVICE

Front Porch Forum grants you a limited, revocable, nonexclusive license to access the Service for your own personal use. This license does not include any collection, aggregation, copying, duplication, display or derivative use of the Service nor any use of data mining, robots, spiders, or similar data gathering and extraction tools for any purpose unless expressly permitted by Front Porch Forum. A limited exception is provided to general purpose internet search engines and non-commercial public archives that use such tools to gather information for the sole purpose of displaying hyperlinks to the Service, provided they each do so from a stable IP address or range of IP addresses using an easily identifiable agent.

Front Porch Forum permits you to display on your website, or create a hyperlink on your website to, individual postings on the Service so long as such use is for noncommercial and/or news reporting purposes only (e.g., for use in personal web blogs or personal online media). If the total number of such postings displayed or linked to on your website exceeds one hundred (100) postings, your use will be presumed to be in violation of these Terms, absent express permission granted by Front Porch Forum to do so. You may also create a hyperlink to the home page of Front Porch Forum sites so long as the link does not portray Front Porch Forum, its employees, or its affiliates in a false, misleading, derogatory, or otherwise offensive matter.

Front Porch Forum may offer various parts of the Service in RSS format so that users can embed individual feeds into a personal website or blog, or view postings through third party software news aggregators. Front Porch Forum permits you to display, excerpt from, and link to the RSS feeds on your personal website or personal web blog, provided that (a) your use of the RSS feed is for personal, non-commercial purposes only, (b) each title is correctly linked back to the original post on the Service and redirects the user to the post when the user clicks on it, (c) you provide, adjacent to the RSS feed, proper attribution to 'Front Porch Forum' as the source, (d) your use or display does not suggest that Front Porch Forum promotes or endorses any third party causes, ideas, web sites, products or services, (e) you do not redistribute the RSS feed, and (f) your use does not overburden Front Porch Forum's systems. Front Porch Forum reserves all rights in the content of the RSS feeds and may terminate any RSS feed at any time.

Use of the Service beyond the scope of authorized access granted to you by Front Porch Forum immediately terminates said permission or license. In order to collect, aggregate, copy, duplicate, display or make derivative use of the Service or any Content made available via the Service for other purposes (including commercial purposes) not stated herein, you must first obtain a license from Front Porch Forum.

11. TERMINATION OF SERVICE

You agree that Front Porch Forum, in its sole discretion, has the right (but not the obligation) to delete or deactivate your account, block your email or IP address, or otherwise terminate your access to or use of the Service (or any part thereof), immediately and without notice, and remove and discard any Content within the Service, for any reason, including, without limitation, if Front Porch Forum believes that you have acted inconsistently with the letter or spirit of the Terms. Further, you agree that Front Porch Forum shall not be liable to you or any third-party for any termination of your access to the Service. Further, you agree not to attempt to use the Service after said termination. Sections 2, 4, 6 and 10-16 of these Terms shall survive any such termination.

12. PROPRIETARY RIGHTS

The Service is protected to the maximum extent permitted by copyright laws and international treaties. Content displayed on or through the Service is protected by copyright as a collective work and/or compilation, pursuant to copyrights laws, and international conventions. Any reproduction, modification, creation of derivative works from or redistribution of the site or the collective work, and/or copying or reproducing the sites or any portion thereof to any other server or location for further reproduction or redistribution is prohibited without the express written consent of Front Porch Forum. You further agree not to reproduce, duplicate or copy Content from the Service without the express written consent of Front Porch Forum, and agree to abide by any and all copyright notices displayed on the Service. You may not decompile or disassemble, reverse engineer or otherwise attempt to discover any source code contained in the Service. Without limiting the foregoing, you agree not to reproduce, duplicate, copy, sell, resell or exploit for any commercial purposes, any aspect of the Service.

Although Front Porch Forum does not claim ownership of content that its users post, by posting Content to any public area of the Service, you automatically grant, and you represent and warrant that you have the right to grant, to Front Porch Forum an irrevocable, perpetual, non-exclusive, fully paid, worldwide license to use, copy, perform, display, and distribute said Content and to prepare derivative works of, or incorporate into other works, said Content, and to grant and authorize sublicenses (through multiple tiers) of the foregoing. Furthermore, by posting Content to any public area of the Service, you automatically grant Front Porch Forum all rights necessary to prohibit any subsequent aggregation, display, copying, duplication, reproduction, or exploitation of the Content on the Service by any party for any purpose.

13. DISCLAIMER OF WARRANTIES

YOU AGREE THAT USE OF THE FRONT PORCH FORUM SITE AND THE SERVICE IS ENTIRELY AT YOUR OWN RISK. THE FRONT PORCH FORUM SITE AND THE SERVICE ARE PROVIDED ON AN "AS IS" OR "AS AVAILABLE" BASIS, WITHOUT ANY WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND. ALL EXPRESS AND IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, WITHOUT LIMITATION, THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, AND NON-INFRINGEMENT OF PROPRIETARY RIGHTS ARE EXPRESSLY DISCLAIMED TO THE FULLEST EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW. TO THE FULLEST EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW, FRONT PORCH FORUM DISCLAIMS ANY WARRANTIES FOR THE SECURITY, RELIABILITY, TIMELINESS, ACCURACY, AND PERFORMANCE OF THE FRONT PORCH FORUM SITE AND THE SERVICE. TO THE FULLEST EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW, FRONT PORCH FORUM DISCLAIMS ANY WARRANTIES FOR OTHER SERVICES OR GOODS RECEIVED THROUGH OR ADVERTISED ON THE FRONT PORCH FORUM SITE OR THE SITES OR SERVICE, OR ACCESSED THROUGH ANY LINKS ON THE FRONT PORCH FORUM SITE. TO THE FULLEST EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW, FRONT PORCH FORUM DISCLAIMS ANY WARRANTIES FOR VIRUSES OR OTHER HARMFUL COMPONENTS IN CONNECTION WITH THE FRONT PORCH FORUM SITE OR THE SERVICE. Some jurisdictions do not allow the disclaimer of implied warranties. In such jurisdictions, some of the foregoing disclaimers may not apply to you insofar as they relate to implied warranties.

14. LIMITATIONS OF LIABILITY

UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES SHALL FRONT PORCH FORUM BE LIABLE FOR DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, CONSEQUENTIAL OR EXEMPLARY DAMAGES (EVEN IF FRONT PORCH FORUM HAS BEEN ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES), RESULTING FROM ANY ASPECT OF YOUR USE OF THE FRONT PORCH FORUM SITE OR THE SERVICE, WHETHER THE DAMAGES ARISE FROM USE OR MISUSE OF THE FRONT PORCH FORUM SITE OR THE SERVICE, FROM INABILITY TO USE THE FRONT PORCH FORUM SITE OR THE SERVICE, OR THE INTERRUPTION, SUSPENSION, MODIFICATION, ALTERATION, OR TERMINATION OF THE FRONT PORCH FORUM SITE OR THE SERVICE. SUCH LIMITATION SHALL ALSO APPLY WITH RESPECT TO DAMAGES INCURRED BY REASON OF OTHER SERVICES OR PRODUCTS RECEIVED THROUGH OR ADVERTISED IN CONNECTION WITH THE FRONT PORCH FORUM SITE OR THE SERVICE OR ANY LINKS ON THE FRONT PORCH FORUM SITE, AS WELL AS BY REASON OF ANY INFORMATION OR ADVICE RECEIVED THROUGH OR ADVERTISED IN CONNECTION WITH THE FRONT PORCH FORUM SITE OR THE SERVICE OR ANY LINKS ON THE FRONT PORCH FORUM SITE. THESE LIMITATIONS SHALL APPLY TO THE FULLEST EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW. In some jurisdictions, limitations of liability are not permitted. In such jurisdictions, some of the foregoing limitation may not apply to you.

15. INDEMNITY

You agree to indemnify and hold Front Porch Forum, its officers, subsidiaries, affiliates, successors, assigns, directors, officers, agents, service providers, suppliers and employees, harmless from any claim or demand, including reasonable attorney fees and court costs, made by any third party due to or arising out of Content you submit, post or make available through the Service, your use of the Service, your violation of the Terms, your breach of any of the representations and warranties herein, or your violation of any rights of another.

16. GENERAL INFORMATION

The Terms constitute the entire agreement between you and Front Porch Forum and govern your use of the Service, superceding any prior agreements between you and Front Porch Forum. The Terms and the relationship between you and Front Porch Forum shall be governed by the laws of the State of Vermont without regard to its conflict of law provisions. You and Front Porch Forum agree to submit to the personal and exclusive jurisdiction of the courts located within the county of Chittenden, Vermont. The failure of Front Porch Forum to exercise or enforce any right or provision of the Terms shall not constitute a waiver of such right or provision. If any provision of the Terms is found by a court of competent jurisdiction to be invalid, the parties nevertheless agree that the court should endeavor to give effect to the parties' intentions as reflected in the provision, and the other provisions of the Terms remain in full force and effect. You agree that regardless of any statute or law to the contrary, any claim or cause of action arising out of or related to use of the Service or the Terms must be filed within one (1) year after such claim or cause of action arose or be forever barred.

17. VIOLATION OF TERMS

Please report any violations of the Terms by emailing:

membersupport@frontporchforum.com

You understand that the following violations may result in our seeking damages:

a) If you post messages in violation of any provision of these Terms of Use.

b) If you aggregate, display, copy, duplicate, reproduce, or otherwise exploit for any purpose any Content (except for your own Content) in violation of these Terms without Front Porch Forum's express written permission.

Front Porch Forum may, at its sole discretion, elect to issue a warning before assessing damages.

Our failure to act with respect to a breach by you or others does not waive our right to act with respect to subsequent or similar breaches.

In the case of a violation as described above, you agree to pay Front Porch Forum's actual damages, to the extent such actual damages can be reasonably calculated. Notwithstanding any other provision of these Terms, Front Porch Forum retains the right to seek the remedy of specific performance of any term contained in these Terms, or a preliminary or permanent injunction against the breach of any such term or in aid of the exercise of any power granted in these Terms, or any combination thereof.

18. AGE RESTRICTIONS

Members must be 14 years old to post messages through this service. Front Porch Forum encourages parents and/or guardians to work with their children to practice safe and responsible use of the internet.

19. ELECTION USE

Members are welcome to use FPF around elections (both for public office and for ballot measures) within the following guidelines. The intent of these guidelines is to promote fair access to FPF around elections:

1. FPF offers a "paid campaign posting" option for both public office and ballot measure campaigns. Click here for details.
2. Select public officials may join FPF and participate in all the neighborhood forums covering their districts. Postings should be limited to subjects related to each public servant's official duties.
3. In CAMPAIGNS for PUBLIC OFFICE: Postings from public officials related to campaigns for public office are not permitted across multiple neighborhood forums. (See 19.1 above.)
4. In CAMPAIGNS for BALLOT MEASURES: Public officials are invited to share their views with their constituents through FPF about ballot measures. We ask officials to strike a balance -- informing their constituents, without taking advantage of access to FPF. FPF works best when many varied voices are heard in civil and constructive exchange. Ballot measure-related postings from public officials should be submitted no later than four days before the associated election.
5. FPF may reduce or eliminate the ability to post on FPF neighborhood forums in a period of time before an election for selected categories of public officials.
6. Each FPF member is encouraged to post to their own (“home”) forum on any topic. Political campaign postings are welcome from individuals (including incumbents) in their single home forum only. Postings should be submitted at least four days before the election.
7. Candidates and political parties are encouraged to ask their supporters to post campaign messages on their behalf, each supporter on their single home forum only.
8. Announcements about political party organizing meetings are welcome (1,000 character limit). Local public officials with access to multiple FPF neighborhood forums may post this type of item broadly. Political parties without access are welcome to submit items to Front Porch Forum for consideration.
9. When disagreeing with others on FPF, people posting should address the idea, not the neighbor.
   
10. FPF retains the right to not publish postings, and to close associated accounts, that violate FPF Terms of Use or the spirit of FPF's community-building mission.

20. PUBLIC CONTRACT NEGOTIATIONS

Postings on FPF to multiple forums from a public official's account about contract negotiations between public entities (e.g., municipalities and school districts) and labor unions will only be published as Paid Campaign Postings. Click here for details.