Deleting photos and posts

To avoid any confusion, I wanted to be clear on the ZooChat policy relating to removing posts and photos. Here is a summary of the Terms of Use for the site (this link is at the bottom of every page).

1. We reserve the right to remove or edit anything you upload or post to this site. This includes any content we deem inappropriate or content which has the potential to cause us (and you!) legal problems.

By "edit" I am specifically referring to editing posts to remove inappropriate content as an alternative to removing the post completely. Inappropriate photos are removed, not edited.

2. You should not upload or post any content which may cause offense to other people due to race, religion, gender or any other factor. You should also not upload or post any content which is not generally considered "family friendly", or "appropriate for work". Such content will be removed at our discretion.

If you find any content which you may believe to be inappropriate, please use the "Report Post" facility to let the moderators know and we will deal with it at our discretion.

Note that due to the international nature of this forum, some content which may be generally considered appropriate in some cultures or countries may not be considered appropriate in others. As such we generally take a fairly conservative approach when determining which content is inappropriate.

Please do not be offended by our actions - even though to some they may seem overzealous. We have a responsibility to ensure the site is maintained in an acceptable manner for a very broad audience - and as such, must act to preserve the integrity of the site and protect ourselves from potential legal problems that may arise from certain types of content.

3. You should not upload any content you do not wish other people to see. This is a publically accessible website visible to anyone on the internet. We cannot control who sees the photos or posts that you upload.

Even if posts are edited or deleted, there are many mechanisms by which content may be reproduced elsewhere on the internet (eg Google or other search engine cache's), and we have no control over the content there and cannot guarantee that the content will not remain online after it has been removed from the ZooChat website.

As such, before you upload, please consider the nature of what you are posting and whether you may regret posting it in the future.

Note that if you take photos or produce other content professionally, you should be aware that there is very little we can do to avoid people copying photos or other material that you upload to ZooChat. However, we do currently limit photos to a maximum resolution of 1600x1200 (or you could choose to upload smaller sized photos such as 1024x768), which does somewhat limit the value of someone else copying your photo. Many professional online galleries take this approach - show a lower resolution version online and then provide a high resolution version to paying customers.

Be aware that many zoos do not allow professional photographers to publish (for profit) photos taken at the zoo without permission. Please take this into consideration before uploading photos.

4. You should not upload or post any content you do not have permission to upload or publish on the internet. This includes copyrighted material, photos of other people in private locations, photos you did not take yourself, photos of locations not generally accessible to the public (such as behind the scenes at a zoo).

Zoo guides, zoo maps, zoo memorabilia and such are often considered copyrighted and should not be reproduced without permission.

It is recommended that you avoid uploading photos that clearly identify other people without the permission of the people in them. This includes zoo staff. Photos which only contain people (rather than animals or zoo features) are generally not appropriate and will likely be removed. Photos of animals taken during a presentation or demonstration which also happen to show the zoo staff presenting would generally be acceptable, provided that the photo is not mostly about the staff - it should be about the animals.

5. We will remove posts and photos as requested by members only at our discretion and only on a case-by-case basis. You may request that a moderator take action to edit or remove a photo or post (easiest way is to use the "Report post" feature and explain what you would like done and why).

Note that due to technical limitations, moderators cannot currently remove photos, only the administrator can (me).

If you have difficulty uploading a photo, or inadvertently upload duplicates, just let me know where they are and I'll clean them up for you.

We will not generally agree to remove all the photos or posts made by a user. If specific posts or photos may cause issues for you, we will consider them on a case-by-case basis, but if you decide that you no longer wish to be a part of the community - we will not agree to simply removing all of your posts and photos. Please take this into consideration before deciding what to upload or post on this site.

Our reasoning behind this is that you are contributing to a community and other parts of the community will respond to what you post or upload and will add value in their own way. If we were to remove all of your posts and photos, then it would generally cause contributions by other parts of the community to be removed as well. This is not a personal photo sharing site - it is a zoo community and you are contributing to the community as a whole when you post or upload content.

You do retain copyright ownership of photos you own and you may republish them elsewhere and do with them what you like - all you have provided us with (by uploading photos or posting content), is an irrevocable license to reproduce that content via our website.

6. If you would like to discuss any action taken by myself or the moderators, feel free to discuss it directly with me. Best is to contact me using the Contact form (see link at the top of the page) or directly email support [at] zoochat.com

Issues which are general in nature can be discussed here in the "Help and Feedback" forum. Specific issues relating to your own account are not generally appropriate for posting on the forum - please email me directly or use the contact form instead.

7. I will not tolerate any abuse directed at the moderators as a result of their actions in enforcing this policy that I have set. If you have an issue, take it up with me directly. Moderators work voluntarily and strive to maintain the forum for the good of the whole community because they are passionate about this community and what it stands for.

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This is all set out in our Terms of Use (which hasn't changed - it's always been this way). I've had some questions about some of these issues recently, so I thought it best to explain exactly what our policy is.