Terms of Use
Date of last revision: June 11, 2007
1. Introduction
Please read these Terms of Use carefully before using this website of Swatch The Club (the "Website"). Accessing and using the Website indicates that you (the "User") accept these Terms of Use. If you do not accept these Terms of Use, do not use this Website.
This Website is operated, and these Terms of Use are issued by Swatch The Club, a division of Swatch Ltd., Jakob Stämpflistrasse 94, 2502 Biel, Switzerland ("SWATCH", "we", "us", "our").
SWATCH may at any time revise these Terms of Use by updating this posting. You are bound by any such revisions and should therefore periodically visit this page to review the then current terms to which you are bound.
2. Website Access and Use
This Website is an online service that allows different levels of using the Website, i.e. as a guest visitor, as a Community Member or as a Club Member. Guest visitors may freely visit this Website, insofar as not reserved to Community Members and Club Members, and without using any of the interactive services offered by SWATCH.
The services offered on this Website are intended solely for users who are 16 years of age or older. By using the services offered on this Website, you represent and warrant that you are at least 16 years old, and that you agree to and to abide by all of the terms and conditions of these Terms of Use.
Use of this Website as Community Member and Club Member requires registration and creation of a personal account providing certain user profile information as detailed in the registration process. However, none of your personal data such as full name, address, email address, date of birth or sex will be disclosed to other users (except if you disclose such data voluntarily), and access of other users to your registration information will be limited to the viewname you indicate upon registration, or as modified during membership, as well as to your member picture.
In addition, registration as Club Member implies online payment through this Website of a membership fee (in Swiss Francs) as detailed in the registration process. Registration as Club Member may be made also through ordinary (offline) registration using different payment methods. Please write to swatchtheclub@swatch.com if you wish to receive our registration material by ordinary mail.
Registration for, and membership as Community Member or Club Member is void where prohibited by local law.
When signing up as Community Member or Club Member, you will be required to choose an email address and password to enter your personal account. You are entirely responsible for maintaining the confidentiality of your password. You agree not to use the account, email address, or password of another member at any time or to disclose your password to any third party. You agree to notify SWATCH immediately if you suspect any unauthorized use of your account or access to your password. You are solely responsible for any and all use of your account.
3. Membership Services
The services offered by SWATCH to Community Members and Club Members are as detailed on this Website. This may include services for communication between members (blogs, forums, guestbook etc.), posting of personal profiles and photographs, as well as signing up for the Swatch The Club Newsletter (see below).
Additional services are offered exclusively to Club Members, in particular registration for certain events organized by SWATCH – which implies online payment through this Website of a participation fee (in Swiss Francs) as detailed on this Website – as well as access to our Online Shop for Swatch The Club merchandise articles (see below).
Services offered by SWATCH on this Website are for the personal use of Community Members and Club Members only and may not be used in connection with any commercial endeavours except those that are specifically endorsed or approved by SWATCH. Illegal and/or unauthorized use of the services, including collecting usernames and/or email addresses of members by electronic or other means for the purpose of sending unsolicited email or unauthorized framing of or linking to this Website is prohibited. Commercial advertisements, affiliate links, and other forms of solicitation may be removed from member profiles without notice and may result in termination of membership privileges.
4. Newsletter
Community Members and Club Members may subscribe to the Swatch The Club Newsletter. Please click here if you wish to subscribe to our Newsletter. You may unsubscribe from the Newsletter at any time by sending an email to swatchtheclub@swatch.com.
5. Online Shop
Club Members have the possibility to buy Swatch The Club merchandise articles through this Website. Please click here if you wish to access the Swatch The Club Online Shop. Any purchase of merchandise articles through this Website is subject to our Conditions of Sale.
6. User Content
Please be aware that whenever you post information to this Website (e.g. information to journals, blogs, forums, guestbook, personal profiles, photographs), such information can be accessed by other users (Community and Club Members). Thus, you should choose carefully the information you post on this Website and that you provide to other users of this Website.
SWATCH does not claim any ownership rights in the text, files, images, photos, video, sounds, works of authorship, or any other materials ("User Content") that you post on the Website. After posting your User Content on the Website, you continue to retain all ownership rights in such User Content, and you continue to have the right to use your User Content in any way you choose. By posting any User Content on or through the Website, you hereby grant to SWATCH a non-exclusive, sublicensable, transferable, fully-paid and worldwide license to use, modify, publicly perform, publicly display, reproduce, and distribute such User Content solely on and through this Website until you remove your User Content from the Website. You may modify, update or remove your User Content from the Website at any time.
You represent and warrant that: (i) you own the User Content posted by you on the Website or otherwise have the right to grant the license set forth above, and (ii) the posting of your User Content on the Website does not violate the privacy rights, publicity rights, copyrights, trademarks, contract rights or any other rights of any person.
You are solely responsible for the User Content that you post on the Website. You may not post, transmit, or share User Content on the Website that you did not create or that you do not have permission to post. User Content is not necessarily reviewed by SWATCH prior to posting and does not necessarily reflect the opinions or policies of SWATCH. SWATCH makes no warranties, express or implied, as to the User Content or to the accuracy and reliability of the User Content or any material or information that you transmit to other users.
SWATCH may delete any User Content that in the sole judgment of SWATCH violates these Terms of Use or which may be offensive, illegal or violate the rights, harm, or threaten the safety of any person.
7. Restrictions to User Content
You shall not post, modify, distribute, or reproduce in any way any copyrighted material or other proprietary information belonging to others without obtaining the prior written consent of the owner of such proprietary rights. Also, you shall not post, modify, distribute, or reproduce any User Content which violates these Terms of Use or which may be offensive, illegal or violate the rights, harm, or threaten the safety of any person.
When we discover, or receive proper notification of, alleged copyright infringement or any User Content which violates these Terms of Use or which is otherwise illegal or offensive as described herein, we promptly remove or disable access to the allegedly infringing, violating or illegal material and terminate the accounts and membership of repeated infringers.
In particular, you are prohibited from posting or transmitting to or from this Website any material:
- that is threatening, defamatory, obscene, indecent, seditious, offensive, pornographic, abusive, liable to incite hatred of any kind, discriminatory, racist, menacing, scandalous, inflammatory, blasphemous, in breach of confidence, in breach of privacy or which may cause annoyance or inconvenience; or
- that contains nudity, violence, or offensive subject matter or contains a link to an adult website; or
- promotes an illegal or unauthorized copy of another person's copyrighted work, such as providing pirated computer programs or links to them, providing information to circumvent manufacture-installed copy-protect devices, or providing pirated music or links to pirated music files; or
- involves the transmission of "junk mail," "chain letters," or unsolicited mass mailing, instant messaging, "spimming," or "spamming"; or
- involves commercial activities and/or sales without our prior written consent such as contests, sweepstakes, barter, advertising, or pyramid schemes; or
- which constitutes or encourages conduct that would be considered a criminal offence, give rise to civil liability, or otherwise be contrary to the law of or infringe the rights of any third party, in any country in the world; or
- which is technically harmful (including, without limitation, computer viruses, logic bombs, Trojan horses, worms, harmful components, corrupted data or other malicious software or harmful data); or
- for which you have not obtained all necessary licences and/or approvals.
You may not misuse this Website (including, without limitation, by hacking).
If you believe that any material on the Website infringes upon any copyright or other proprietary right which you own or control, or that any material is in violation of these Terms of Use or otherwise illegal as described herein, you may send a written notification of such infringement to swatchtheclub@swatch.com or use the online service "flag as inappropriate" on this Website.
SWATCH will co-operate fully with any law enforcement authorities or court order requesting or directing it to disclose the identity or locate anyone posting any material in breach of this paragraph.
8. Intellectual Property Rights
All content on the Website, including but not limited to designs, text, graphics, pictures, video, information, applications, software, music, sound and other files, and their selection and arrangement (the "Website Content"), are the proprietary property of SWATCH, its users or its licensors with all rights reserved. No Website Content may be modified, copied, distributed, framed, reproduced, republished, downloaded, displayed, posted, transmitted, or sold in any form or by any means, in whole or in part, without SWATCH's prior written permission, except that the foregoing does not apply to your own User Content that you legally post on the Website.
Provided that you are eligible for use of the Website, you are granted a limited license to access and use the Website and the Website Content and to download or print a copy of any portion of the Website Content to which you have properly gained access solely for your personal, non-commercial use, provided that you keep all copyright or other proprietary notices intact. Except for your own User Content, you may not upload or republish Website Content on any Internet, Intranet or Extranet site or incorporate the information in any other database or compilation, and any other use of the Website Content is strictly prohibited. Such license is subject to these Terms of Use and does not include use of any data mining, robots or similar data gathering or extraction methods. Any use of the Website or the Website Content other than as specifically authorized herein, without the prior written permission of SWATCH, is strictly prohibited and will terminate the license granted herein. Such unauthorized use may also violate applicable laws including without limitation copyright and trademark laws and applicable communications regulations and statutes. Unless explicitly stated herein, nothing in these Terms of Use shall be construed as conferring any license to intellectual property rights.
"SWATCH" and other SWATCH marks, logos, page headers, button icons, scripts and service names are registered or unregistered trademarks of SWATCH. SWATCH's trademarks may not be used, including as part of trademarks and/or as part of domain names, in connection with any product or service in any manner that is likely to cause confusion and may not be copied, imitated, or used, in whole or in part, without the prior written permission of SWATCH.
9. Disclaimer
While SWATCH uses reasonable efforts to include accurate and up to date information on this Website, SWATCH makes no warranties or representations with respect to the Website Content, which is provided "as is".
SWATCH assumes no responsibility, and shall not be liable for, any damages to, or viruses that may infect, your computer equipment or other property on account of your access to, use of, or browsing in the Website or your downloading of any materials, data, text, images, video, or audio from this Website.
SWATCH reserves the right to interrupt or discontinue any or all of the functionalities of this Website. SWATCH accepts no responsibility or liability whatsoever for any interruption or discontinuance of any or all functionalities of this Website, irrespective of whether this is the result of actions or omissions of SWATCH or of any other affiliated company of The Swatch Group Ltd., or of a third party.
The materials on this Website, including any information, may contain technical inaccuracies or typographical errors. SWATCH reserves the right to make changes, corrections and/or improvements to such materials (including information), and to the products and programs described in such information, at any time without notice.
10. Links to and from other websites
Because SWATCH has no control over and does not endorse any of the sites to which this Website is linked and because SWATCH has not reviewed any or all of the sites to which this Website is linked, you acknowledge that SWATCH is not responsible for the content of any off-site pages or any other sites linked to this Website. Responsibility for access to off-site pages and linked third-party sites rests solely with you.
Your linking to this Website, off-site pages or other sites is at your own risk. By making use of any such links, you understand that the legal statement and privacy policy of any linked site will apply and which may be different from those of SWATCH. If you would like to link to this Website, you may only do so on the basis that you link to, but do not replicate, the home page, and subject to the following conditions.
11. Service Access
While SWATCH endeavours to ensure that this Website is normally available 24 hours a day, it shall not be liable if for any reason this Website is unavailable at any time or for any period.
Access to this Website may be suspended temporarily and without notice in the case of system failure, maintenance or repair or for reasons beyond SWATCH's control.
12. Limitation of Liability
In as much as permitted by law, and except for damages caused by intent or gross negligence, SWATCH, and any other group company of The Swatch Group Ltd., including the officers, directors, employees, shareholders or agents of any of them, exclude all liability and responsibility for any amount or kind of loss or damage that may result to you or a third party (including without limitation, any direct, indirect, or consequential loss or damages, or any loss of income, profits, goodwill, or data) in connection with this Website in any way or in connection with the use, inability to use or the results of use of this Website, any websites linked to this Website or the material on such websites, including but not limited to loss or damage due to viruses that may infect your computer equipment, software, data or other property on account of your access to, use of, or browsing this Website or your downloading of any material from the Website or any websites linked to this Website.
13. Privacy
We care about your privacy and the protection of your personal data. Click here to read our Privacy Policy.
14. Miscellaneous
The failure of SWATCH to exercise or enforce any right or provision of these Terms of Use shall not operate as a waiver of such right or provision. The section titles in these Terms of Use are for convenience only and have no legal or contractual effect.
The invalidity or unenforceability of any provision of these Terms of Use do not affect or impair in any way the validity, legality and enforceability of the remaining provisions contained herein.
These Terms of Use shall be interpreted and governed in accordance with Swiss law, excluding the United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods. To the extent permitted by law, the competent courts at the place of the registered office of SWATCH, currently Biel/Switzerland, shall have exclusive jurisdiction in respect of any dispute arising from these Terms of Use and your use of this Website, subject to SWATCH's right to prosecute a user at his/her place of residence.
If you have any questions about these Terms of Use, email us at swatchtheclub@swatch.com.