Terms and Conditions of Use

Updated: March 2014

Legal Note: The only legal binding language of these Terms and Conditions of Use is German and even though there may be translations of these Terms and Conditions into languages other than German, the German version shall be the definitive and binding version and German shall be the only language used in the interpretation of these Terms and Conditions.

Preamble

The following terms and conditions of use for the internet platform “www.lecturio.com” and www.lecturio.com, by the company Lecturio GmbH, Käthe-Kollwitz-Str. 1, 04109 Leipzig, hereafter referred to as “Lecturio”, form the basis of use of the internet platform and the services offered on it insofar as they require registration. The here specified “small print” enables not just our but also your (hereafter referred to as “you” or “user”) protection and provides an important foundation for a secure and safe use of our services. We therefore ask for your understanding that the use of our services is possible solely on the basis of the following terms and conditions.

I. Scope of Validity and Contractual Agreement

These terms and conditions shall apply to all internet services requiring registration by the Lecturio GmbH, Käthe-Kollwitz-Str. 1, 04109 Leipzig (hereafter referred to as “Lecturio”), which are accessible via the URLs www.lecturio.de and www.lecturio.com. If you register with Lecturio as a member, you have to consent to these terms and conditions. After giving your consent and finishing registration, a legally binding contract comes into effect between you and Lecturio, based on these terms and conditions. Lecturio delivers its services exclusively based on these terms and conditions.
Authoritative is the version of terms and conditions current at the time of conclusion of the contract. You will be notified of these in the course of the registration.
These terms and conditions also apply when you use services offered from other websites that provide access to these services in full or in part.
In addition to the terms and conditions there may be, depending on the type of use or status of the user, further contractual agreements. In case there are further agreements for the use of a Lecturio service, it will be clearly indicated where such agreements apply. In the event of contradictions between the regulations of these terms and conditions and the regulations in additional agreements, the latter have priority.
In addition to the access to the content on www.lecturio.de and www.lecturio.com, there are several functions available to the user, e.g. comments of users, revision notes, tags and similar (hereafter referred to as “user content”).
Terms and conditions for e-authors are defined separately and accessible via www.lecturio.de and www.lecturio.com.

II. Registration with Lecturio

Most of Lecturio’s services can only be accessed if you register. The registration as “general user” results from opening a user account, which requires your consent to these terms and conditions. Underage users need to send a written consent form signed by their parent or legal guardian to Lecturio (see preamble for address) prior to their registration.
The registration with Lecturio is free of charge.
For the use and execution of the offered services, Lecturio has permission to obtain, store, process and use certain personal data of the user. Handling of your data is always carried out according to statutory regulations. More information about data protection in connection with the services offered by Lecturio can be found in our Data Privacy Policy.
During your registration you are obliged to provide truthful and complete details and to keep these details up-to-date. After your registration you will receive a confirmation e-mail to the e-mail address you provided us with. Through clicking on the link specified in the e-mail you confirm the truthfulness of the details given by you and complete the registration. Lecturio will send you any notifications specified in the terms and conditions (e.g. changes in the terms and conditions, cancellation of access etc.) to the e-mail address provided by you.
You must keep your access details secret all the time. You are solely responsible for any activities that are undertaken via your user account (more information see fig. V and VII).
Lecturio reserves the right to decline registration requests. In this case, Lecturio can inform you via e-mail about the reasons for the decline; though it is not obliged to do so.

III. Services Offered by Lecturio, Utilization of Content

Lecturio provides an internet platform on which educational content covering various topic categories in the form of videos, screencasts and documents or in other forms (“educational content”) is offered and can be accessed.
The services and educational content offered by Lecturio are provided partly free of charge and partly requiring payment. Offers requiring payment are always clearly indicated.
The content offered on Lecturio, regardless whether it is user content or educational content, is only to be used by registered users for their own purpose according to the contractual agreements, meaning online on Lecturio and offline via the Lecturio app or by other Lecturio provided mediums. A download by the user outside of the ways provided by Lecturio is illegal, no matter for what purpose. If content is available for download, the download is only allowed consistent with the communicated terms and conditions (e.g. payment) and is not allowed to be copied, used beyond the scope of the terms or assigned to third parties. The right to download does not imply a transfer or concession of intellectual property rights; all rights not expressly granted to the user remain reserved by Lecturio. Content available for download is always marked as such.
To use the services offered by Lecturio you have to fulfill certain technical requirements that are not part of the services offered by Lecturio (in particular you need to have a computer with internet access and software that is required for the use of our services (e.g. internet browser, Flash plugins, etc.)).

IV. Utilization of Educational Content Requiring Payment

With regards to payments on www.lecturio.de or www.lecturio.com, we offer the payment methods direct debit, PayPal and credit card to German customers. Payment options outside of Germany may be more restricted.
If you pay with credit card or PayPal, the debit of your account will be applied after completion of your order. If you pay with direct debit, we will transfer the debit order to our payment service provider. The debiting of your account will be applied within the following days.
When choosing the payment method direct debit, thereby providing the customer’s bank details, Lecturio is authorized to collect the invoiced amount from the account of the customer. If the debit cannot be collected due to insufficient funds, false bank details, or if the customer refuses the debit, although he does not have the rights to do so, the customer has to bear the fees generated for any refund or failed transaction by the respective credit institution if they result from his actions. The debit of your account will take place after conclusion of your order.
If you make a payment on www.lecturio.de or www.lecturio.com, a contract for a service is formed. At the moment we offer two types of services that require payments:
1. Subscription for paid content;
2. Direct payment.
By claiming the type (a.) services (subscription), you purchase the access to the content against a subscription fee which has to be paid in the agreed upon cycle (e.g. monthly, quarterly), as long as you have not cancelled the subscription within the period agreed upon. By claiming the type (b.) services (direct payment), you purchase the right to use the content within the agreed upon period. The prices and time periods applicable are those indicated at the time of the transaction.
The representation of products in our online shop shall not constitute a legally binding offer, but rather a non-binding online catalogue. By clicking on the “Place Order” button, you are placing a binding order for the items contained in the shopping cart. The confirmation of receipt of the order and acceptance of the order follows immediately after the placement through an automated e-mail. For new customers without an existing Lecturio account: with the confirmation of your e-mail address by clicking on the confirmation link in the confirmation e-mail, the registration is completed and the contract is concluded.
Lecturio or the e-author can remove content from the platform at any time. Offers for using the content are subject to change and non-binding. There is no claim for the continuous and permanent availability of all Lecturio content provided at a certain moment in time and therefore no claim for all content available at the beginning of a subscription being available for the entire period. Should there be several user options on offer (e.g. basic, premium or other options), the differences at conclusion of the contract are clearly marked and constitute a part of the contract with you. Any user rights include only you (if not explicitly agreed otherwise with Lecturio in writing, e.g. mass licenses). A transfer of the access details to third parties or the joint use with third parties, who have not purchased access, is not permitted.
By using content requiring payment, you form a contract with Lecturio. All payment procedures are processed by Lecturio or a third party with which Lecturio is working for the purpose of handling the payment transactions (at the moment e.g. PayPal, Braintree).
Lecturio has the right to charge user fees for additional services at a future time or charge for services previously available free of charge. You still have the right to decide whether you want to use services that require payment after such changes or not.
During a transaction we store the wording of a contract and send you the order details and terms and conditions via e-mail. The terms and conditions can also be accessed anytime on this page. Your order details are no longer accessible via the internet for security reasons.
Payments via Apple Subscriptions
1. Your payment will be charged to your iTunes Account at confirmation of your purchase
2. The subscription automatically renews unless auto-renew is turned off at least 24-hours before the end of the current period
3. Your account will be charged for renewal within 24-hours prior to the end of the current period, and identify the cost of the renewal
4. The subscriptions may be managed by you and auto-renewal may be turned off by going to the user’s Account Settings after purchase
5. Any unused portion of a free trial period, if offered, will be forfeited if you purchase a subscription in the App, where applicable

V. User Obligations

You are obliged to keep your access details (username, password) secret and not to enable access to your account through third parties. Your user account cannot be transferred to third parties. Specifically, it is expressly forbidden to give third parties access to your user account and the services of Lecturio to avoid potential fee payments. You are obliged to inform Lecturio immediately if there are any indication for the abuse of your user account or when you receive the information that a third party has gained access to your account details without authority.
You are obliged, when using Lecturio, to abide by the law and statutory provisions. Especially you are not allowed to publish or make accessible any content, material or information on Lecturio that breaches legal regulations and/or these terms and conditions. Especially the duplication, publishing and distribution (including via radio, TV or the internet) of Lecturio content (videos, downloads, other provided material), no matter in what form, is expressly forbidden. No copyright of any kind is transferred to you.
You are not allowed, no matter in what way, to misuse the services. Misuse is present for example in the following cases:
1. Use that goes beyond the personal purposes specified in the contract, especially use that requires the granting, transfer or exercise of copyrights;
2. Publication or distribution of pornographic, obscene, sexist, defamatory, slanderous, insulting, threatening, seditious, or racist content, information, software or other material;
3. Any kind of advertising for products or services, including the use of data for dissemination of advertising, as long as Lecturio has not explicitly given its written consent in advance;
4. Commercial use of the services offered by Lecturio, without Lecturio having given consent for commercial use in advance (e.g. indication of value adding service numbers or hyperlinks for internet offers requiring payment);
5. Engaging in any activity that affects or could affect the functionality of services offered by Lecturio (for example through use of “robot”, “spider” or “offline reader” software to create automatic user requests via the internet; e-mail bombing; denial of service attacks; incorporation of harmful components like viruses, worms, Trojan horses etc.);
6. Modification or distribution of elements of the offering, including elements by other users, that have not explicitly been made available to the user;
7. Each use of the user feedback system that goes against the purpose of the feedback system. This especially implies the release of untrue or unjustified ratings, which e.g. are in no relation to the use and quality of the offered content or the service as such;
8. Publication of contributions and information with deceptive and/or untruthful content.

VI. Rights to User Content

If you publish comments, revision notes, tags or similar material on Lecturio (“user content” in the sense of Sec. I Para. 5), the rights remain with you to the degree possible. You only grant us rights to the extent needed in order to publish this user content according to intended purpose as part of our services and to make it available publicly.
You can remove user content published by yourself at any time (for e-author regulations, see their terms and conditions). You can also send an e-mail to account@lecturio.com with the request to remove certain user content. We attempt to execute such requests within 14 days of receipt. With the removal any usage rights of the content granted to us according to the above Para. 1 are voided.

VII. Responsibility for User Content

For the responsibility of user content Sec. III in the terms and conditions applies for e-authors (responsibility of educational content) respectively.

VIII. Liability of Lecturio

Lecturio only assumes liability according to the following liability rules.
Towards companies, Lecturio is only liable for claims if Lecturio’s legal agents, executive employees or any other executive assistants (auxiliary persons) have acted with intention or gross negligence, except for the case of breach of fundamental contractual obligations. In the case of breach of material contractual obligations, Lecturio is liable for negligence of its legal agents, executive employees or any other persons employed in performing an obligation.
Towards consumers, Lecturio is only liable for damages in the case of intention and gross negligence. In the case of breach of material contractual obligations, Lecturio is liable for each culpable conduct.
In the case of damages to assets or wealth caused by slight negligence, Lecturio provides indemnity in case of material breach of contract conditions. In such a case the liability for damage is limited to the amount foreseeable and typical for this type of contract at the time of the conclusion of the contract.
Material contract obligations as aforementioned are duties which are fundamental for the due fulfillment and the observation of which the contractual partner can have justified trust in.
The aforementioned liability exclusions and limitations of liability towards business clients or consumers do not come into force in the case of explicit warranties declared by Lecturio; in the case of willful misrepresentation and damage to life, body or health as well as obligatory legal regulations (e.g. claims under the Product Liability Act).
Liability for data loss on your end will only be assumed under previously mentioned provisions.
Lecturio shall not–except for the previous rules–be liable for the correctness, quality, completeness, reliability, nature or kind of information and content on its website or third party websites that are linked to from or mentioned on www.lecturio.de and www.lecturio.com. Content that is no specifically marked as created by Lecturio itself belongs to the e-authors or other users. They do not reflect Lecturio’s opinion and are not reviewed and controlled by Lecturio. Liability claims against Lecturio which arise from physical or immaterial damage caused by the use or non-use of the offered information or through the use of erroneous and incomplete information exist only under the above provisions.
Any further liability is excluded.
The above liability exclusions apply both to contractual as well as to non-contractual claims. They also apply to employees of Lecturio.

IX. Terms of the Usage Agreement, Removal of Content and Use Exclusions

The Usage Agreement is made for an indefinite period. Routine notice of termination may be given by either party within a period of three months towards the end of the month without giving reasons for cancellation, yet at the earliest with the expiration of a free or paid course or with the use of any other of our services. In all events, notice terminating the Usage Agreement must be given via e-mail to account@lecturio.com or in written form to Lecturio’s postal address mentioned in the preamble.
If you use a paid service offered by Lecturio (e.g. in the context of a subscription), the contract duration and period of notice for the utilization of the services result from the price and service list valid at the moment of the conclusion of contract.
The parties’ right to extraordinary termination of the usage relationship shall remain unaffected by the regulations in the terms of use. An important reason for extraordinary termination for Lecturio exists especially when you have given wrong details during the registration or/and if you have breached your obligations that arise through the terms of use, especially the ones listed in Sec. II and V.
The service offering is in the discretion of Lecturio; all offers are non-binding and subject to change. Lecturio reserves the rights to change, add or delete–without giving reason–the content partly or completely or to stop the services temporarily or completely. In particular, Lecturio reserves the rights to limit the data storage made available for single services and/or the data transfer volume, as long as this doesn’t discriminate you contrary to the principle of good faith and trust. In case of dismissal of services already paid for that Lecturio has not fulfilled at the time of the dismissal, the services are refunded.
If Lecturio obtains information indicating that you have breached your obligations in Sec. II or Sec. V of these terms of use intentionally or negligently, Lecturio reserves the right without having to give reasons to cancel your access temporarily or permanently, to block or remove your content and/or to limit the use and functionality of the services. If your user account has been blocked, you can only obtain a new access to the services with written consent by Lecturio. Lecturio decides about your new access at its own discretion.
Lecturio also reserves the right to block your access without giving reasons if you haven’t used our services for a longer period of time and if the access is free of charge for you. In such a case, you can request a new access or register again.
You have the right to delete your user account at any time without having to give reasons. To do so you must send an e-mail to account@lecturio.com. The removal will then be implemented as soon as possible. If you wish for your personal data that was stored by Lecturio to be removed, you must send another e-mail to account@lecturio.com. An account removal does not release you from your contractual payment obligations.

X. Changes to the Terms and Conditions

Basis for the usage contract are the terms and conditions of the website during the registration of the user. Lecturio reserves the right to make subsequent changes to these terms and conditions, as long as this seems necessary and as long as this does not cause you significant and insufferable disadvantages that are contrary to the principle of good faith and trust.
Subsequent changes to the terms and conditions normally serve to improve the services requiring registration offered by Lecturio in your interest. Changes can also be necessary due to changes in legislation and/or the implementation of laws and unforeseeable changes that Lecturio does not initiate and on which Lecturio has no influence and which would–without adjusting or adding to the terms of use–make the execution of the contract more difficult or impossible. Substantial deviations from the terms and conditions valid upon conclusion of the contract and fundamental changes to the user contract are explicitly excluded from the aforementioned right to amend and may only be made by consent between you and Lecturio.
You will be notified in written form or electronically with a minimum of 4 weeks notice about any changes or additions to the terms and conditions. The changes or additions will become an effective part of the contract if you do not object within six weeks of the announcement and/or if you continue using any of our services that require registration after such time. If the user should object to the modifications, either party shall have the right to terminate the contract in accordance with the provisions for termination valid before the modifications. When announcing the modifications, Lecturio shall explicitly notify the user about his right to object and the consequences thereof.

XI. Other Provisions

Individual deviations and agreements with single users about changes and additions to the terms and conditions–including the waiver of form requirement–and all its components require a written form and the explicit mention that such agreements are changes or additions made to these terms and conditions. This also applies to possibly contradicting conditions of contract of a user.
Should any or several provisions of this agreement be ineffective, the effectiveness of the agreement as a whole and the effectiveness of the other provisions shall remain unaffected. The ineffective or unfeasible provision shall, insofar as legally permissible, be deemed to be replaced by a legally effective provision which corresponds as closely as possible to the commercial intent and purpose of the ineffective provision. The same is valid for possible omissions in regulations.
The terms and conditions are subject to the law of the Federal Republic of Germany, with the exclusion of UN purchasing law.
If Lecturio waives the execution of these terms and conditions in particular cases, this does not imply a modification of the terms and conditions as such.
If the customer is a merchant, a legal entity under public law or public-law special funds or without legal venue in Germany, the legal venue for any disputes under this contract shall be Leipzig.
In the first quarter of 2016, the European Commission will provide an internet platform for online dispute resolution (the so-called ODR-platform). On this website, users will be able to reach out-of-court settlements with regard to contractual obligations that resulted from online sales agreements. The ODR-platform will be available at http://ec.europa.eu/consumers/odr/.

Terms and Conditions for e-authors

Updated: March 2014

E-authors are also “users” of Lecturio. Hence, the regulations in the general terms and conditions of use also apply to them. The following provisions only contain special regulations beyond the general terms of use for e-authors and their content.

I. Registering as an e-author

Only professors, instructors and other experts can register as “e-author”.
Only users that are registered as e-authors can upload their own educational content to Lecturio and offer them to other users on the platform for free or in exchange for payment. The authorization to become an e-author at Lecturio and to publish own educational content is not granted to you by the (generally automated) registration. Therefore a request to e-autoren@lecturio.com with declaration of the subject and teaching domain, specification of the minimum amount of lectures, as well as, if existing, statement of the associated educational institution is necessary. Lecturio checks on receipt of request whether you fulfill all the requirements of an e-author (e.g. teaching staff of an institution of higher education, professor, expert in a specific area etc.). Only after this review–if all requirements are fulfilled–you will be activated as an e-author. The decision for activation is at the sole discretion of Lecturio. There is no right to being activated as an e-author.
The registration as e-author is free of charge.

II. Educational content provided by e-authors

If you upload educational content and/or other content and/or information to Lecturio, it will be made available–according to your decision–as restricted or unrestricted to the public and for the use by third parties via Lecturio’s servers.
The copyrights as well as all other rights of uploaded and displayed educational content that you made available as an e-author stay with you to the degree possible. Through posting content on Lecturio you grant Lecturio a non-exclusive, revocable (see bottom, Para. 6), temporally and geographically unlimited, free of charge, sub-licensable and transferable license for duplicating, editing, publishing, publicly broadcasting or publicly making available and distributing the educational content provided by you on Lecturio. This license includes the right to use the content in the context of rendering similar services to institutions that are connected to or in a contractual relationship with Lecturio.
As registered e-author you can choose if you want to offer your educational content on Lecturio for free or for a charge. If you offer it for a charge, it gives rise to liabilities towards the paying user that you have to adhere to (see general terms and conditions of use, Sec. IV). If it comes to chargeable use, Lecturio will take care of the handling of payments and pays you the user fee after the deduction of the part of the total sum that Lecturio receives from the sales. Further details result from the compensation agreements for e-authors.
On request, we will remove any educational content provided by you from the Lecturio platform within 14 days, if possible. Your request must contain your name, your e-mail address as well as a concrete description of what content is to be removed and must be sent to account@lecturio.com. If, according to Sec. II Para. 2 of the terms and conditions of use, you have granted us rights to the content, these shall no longer apply after removal. Rights which have been granted to third parties before removal will not be affected by this.
If you offer your educational content as an e-author with costs, there can be limitations about removal options towards the customer (see general terms and conditions of use, Sec. IV). You have to ensure the fulfillment of your responsibilities. Only in certain cases will Lecturio react to requests of removal of content to protect the interest of the user.
You grant us the right to use the content posted on Lecturio by you for advertising and marketing purposes. This also includes the right, in context with the content, to make advertising and sponsoring notices available or to use the content in parts (e.g. teasers) to advertise our services and raise awareness for our offering.
When posting of educational content you are not allowed to harm rights of third parties, Sec. V of the general terms and conditions applies respectively. By posting your educational content on Lecturio, you agree that you own all the rights needed for the use of the above mentioned educational content on Lecturio. This includes all authorities (e.g. copyrights of right of use, required granting of personal rights, trademark law and similar) that you need to publish content on Lecturio as well as the right to grant us the above mentioned rights. Should you not possess these rights and should Lecturio be harmed through that, you will be liable (see Sec. III). You can also be liable towards third parties if you aren’t authorized for the unlimited use of content uploaded on Lecturio.
The regular saving of your data is solely your responsibility. Lecturio is not conducting data storage for you and is not liable for any damage that arises due to incorrect saving of your data (see below Sec. III).

III. Responsibilities for educational content

Lecturio isn’t able to review all user content posted on our platform or check for its right lawfulness. Lecturio reserves the right to control certain content at random and to suspend it from the public. It is therefore your responsibility that the educational content as well as other content posted by you on Lecturio is not violating the law, terms and conditions of use for e-authors, general terms and conditions of use or other binding regulations. In addition, you are not allowed to link to content of third parties or to other content that violates the law or terms and conditions of use.
If you are violating the rights of third parties or the confirmation according to Sec. II Para. 7 and if Lecturio is held responsible for this by third parties, you exempt us from any damage that was caused by this. The exemption also includes any costs that arose through this violation (including legal costs that were necessary for legal proceedings).
If you are pursued by third parties due to an infringement which occurred on Lecturio, you have to inform us immediately and make all information available to us that is necessary for the assessment of claims and preparation for an eventual defense.

If you are violating these terms and condition or laws and if we, as a result, delete all or some educational content provided by you or block you (see general terms and conditions, Sec. IX), we reserve the right to charge a general processing fee of 75 Euro if you are the cause of the offence. This does not apply if you can prove that there has not been any or only very minor damage to us.