Welcome to the Talk City Community

As a member of our Community, we request that you abide by the Talk City Standards and our Terms of Service. These Standards and Terms of Service apply to all areas of the Talk City site and all services offered to users as part of their Talk City Membership. Users who violate the terms of our Standards,  our Terms of Service Agreement, or our Privacy Policy, may have their use of the Talk City Services interrupted, suspended or terminated without notice or refund. You may also wish to review our Terms of Service and Privacy Policies.

Talk City is a commercial community/chat service, and not a public chat network. Your right to speak freely here must be exercised with courtesy and self-restraint. When you enter Talk City, it is the same as entering any real privately owned facility, like a conference room, theater, restaurant, or shopping mall. The manners and laws of real life apply, and we have the right to remove you if you violate the Standards or our Terms of Service.

When you enter a chat room, forum, or other facility in Talk City, it constitutes your acceptance of all Terms, Conditions, Standards, and Policies published on our site. If you do not agree to abide by such, please do not enter Talk City chat rooms or post on Talk City message boards.

No Harassment

We welcome all people age thirteen and over of any race, religion, gender, national origin, sexual orientation and point of view. We do not tolerate expressions of bigotry, hatred, harassment or abuse, nor will we tolerate threats of harm to anyone.

Because we encourage discussion and exchange of ideas, we do not allow threatening, defamatory, abusive, or illegal statements. For the same reason, we do not allow sexually explicit material in conversations, room titles, room topics or nicknames.

Impersonation of other members will be considered a form of harassment, and will not be tolerated.

Privacy

We encourage Talk City participants not to give personal identifying information or passwords to anyone in the chat rooms. Users should be aware that, when they disclose personal identifying information, such as their actual name or email address, in a chat room, the information may be collected and used by others to send that person unsolicited email from other parties.

Illegal Activities

We will not allow any illegal activities. Specifically, we won't let you advocate illegal conduct or participate in illegal or fraudulent schemes. You cannot use our chat rooms (channels) to distribute unauthorized copies of copyrighted material, including photos, artwork, text, recordings, designs, or computer programs. In addition, we do not allow the trading or swapping of images that are sexually explicit, obscene or vulgar. Because there can be no way of ensuring compliance with this section, rooms titled for the purpose of exchanging or swapping images are not allowed.

Stalking of others, in our chat rooms or in another manner, is a serious offense. In many areas, such behavior is considered to be a criminal act. We reserve the right to release information to the proper authorities, because of a violation of our standards, or because of unlawful acts, if the information is subpoenaed, and if we deem it necessary and/or appropriate.

Room Owners

Talk City is now a member-managed community. Members and room owners have certain responsibilities in such a community, primarily those of keeping the community a safe, pleasant place to interact with others.

Because this is a community service, and the room owners are the ones that will attract members to the community, they have certain special obligations. Room owners, as community leaders, should set good examples of responsible behavior for the TC community, as demonstrated by their own behavior in other Talk City rooms. Each room owner should determine the acceptable content and behavior of the chatters in their rooms, and should encourage adherence to those standards by using the tools at their disposal. These include setting clear rules of acceptable behavior, appointing chat moderators, use of gag, kick, and lockout commands, and notifying TOS of violations to Talk City's Terms of Service. Each room owner shall assume responsibility to their TC community, by virtue of their own behavior in all Talk City rooms. Attempts to sabotage other rooms in any way, shape, or form, shall be considered a breach of their community responsibility. Interference with the operation of any Talk City room, message board, or other service will be considered a TOS violation, and appropriate action may be taken, up to and including loss of room ownership, membership on Talk City, and loss of any and all fees paid. Room owners should participate in the Owners Lagoon forum to keep updated on TC news, and information.

Room Owners must follow our City Standards in choosing a room name, topic, and content. We reserve the right to limit the number of redundant open rooms, rooms not starting with a letter in the alphabet, rooms with extraneous characters such as !@#$%&, etc.. or extremely long room names. We reserve the right to delete any chat room, topic, or welcome message that does not meet City Standards.

Commercial Activity

Posting or transmitting unauthorized or unsolicited advertising, promotional materials, or any other forms of solicitation to other users, in Talk City, except in those areas that maybe designated for such a purpose, is not allowed.

Disruption of Services

Talk City does not allow posting or use of computer programs that contain destructive features, such as viruses, worms, or Trojan horses.. We also do not allow the use any bots or automated scripts, whether they are benign or destructive in intent unless they have been specifically approved by us. We discourage disruptive conduct: persistent off-topic comments in a topic-oriented conference, statements that incite others to violate the City Standards, Terms of Service or Privacy Policies, or the physical act of "scrolling" - in any form - all are considered disruptive. The use of pop-ups that are excessively long (more than two lines of text), and the use of pop-ups or sound waves in a repetitive manner that disrupts the topic or conversation in a room, are not allowed. Users inviting others to visit Web sites with content that do not comply with Talk City Standards are considered to be in violation of our Standards. Talk City also prohibits the use of third party, or customized IRC clients, except by those that have been approved, or supplied by us.

Changes in Standards Document

Talk City, Delphi Forums, and Mzinga reserve the right to modify this document at any time. This document is a companion to our Terms of Service, and not a replacement for it.