NTI - ISP Terms of Service & Policies

WARNING: PLEASE READ THESE TERMS AND CONDITIONS CAREFULLY BEFORE OPENING OR CONTINUING A DIAL-UP ACCOUNT WITH NTI - PLEASE ALSO FAMILIARIZE YOURSELF WITH NTI POLICIES. These Terms and Conditions, in conjunction with Acceptable Use Guidelines, represent the complete Agreement and understanding between NTI ("NTI.") and you, the NTI subscriber ("Subscriber") and supersede any other written or oral agreement pertaining to your NTI services, other than applicable software license agreements. By using NTI services or NTI software, or both, you agree to be bound by and to comply with this Agreement, just as if you had signed it. Violation of any provision of this Agreement is grounds for immediate termination of your NTI account.

IF YOU DO NOT AGREE TO BE BOUND BY THIS AGREEMENT, YOU SHOULD IMMEDIATELY DISCONTINUE YOUR USE OF NTI SERVICES AND NTI SOFTWARE, AND NOTIFY NTI SO THAT NTI MAY INITIATE A CLOSURE OF YOUR ACCOUNT.

1. A list of ways to contact NTI is available on the World Wide Web at http://www.nti.net. Specific questions about this Agreement should be directed to tos@nti.net.

2. Upon notice either published on-line via NTI services, or by postal mail, NTI may modify the Terms and Conditions or Policies, amplify them, and/or modify the prices of its services, as well as discontinue or change the services offered. Your continued use of NTI services following such notification will be deemed acceptance of the modification.

3. Subscriber acknowledges that Internet sites and use of the Internet might consist of, include and/or provide access to images, sound, messages, text and other content and material that may be unsuitable for children and that may be objectionable to many adults. Subscriber acknowledges that NTI is not responsible for any such content or material and agrees that access to same through use of the Service is at Subscriber's sole risk. Subscriber acknowledges that, when using the Internet, Subscriber generally is using a physical network and accessing content, information and other services not owned, supported, monitored or controlled by NTI Subscriber acknowledges that safeguards relative to copyright, ownership, decency, obscenity, reliability and integrity of content may be entirely lacking with respect to the Internet and content accessible through it. Subscriber assumes all risk and liability of its use of the Internet, including continuous compliance with this Service Agreement. You understand further that the Internet contains unedited materials some of which are sexually explicit or may be offensive to you. You access such materials at your own risk. NTI has no control over and accepts no responsibility whatsoever for such materials.

4. Subscriber is responsible for and must provide all telephone and other equipment and services necessary to use the Service. Subscriber represents that he/she is at least 18 years of age and has the right and ability to enter into this Service Agreement. Subscriber is responsible for installing, establishing and setting up the account(s) and parameters under which the Service will be used; these account functions may be performed only by a person at least 18 years of age, without exception.

5. Unless otherwise agreed, Subscriber's right to use the Service or to designate users is not transferable and is subject to any limits established by NTI or by Subscriber's credit card company or other billing institution, as applicable.

6. You agree to provide NTI with accurate and complete billing information, including your legal name, address, and telephone number, and to update this information within 30 days of any change. Payment for a NTI account or service by fraudulent means will result in immediate and permanent termination of the account, and possible criminal penalties.

7. Your NTI account will be considered delinquent if your credit card company refuses for any reason to pay the amount billed to it. Accounts that are delinquent may be suspended, archived, or purged from the system. Suspended accounts continue to accrue charges until reinstated or canceled, even if the account is not used by the Subscriber. You acknowledge responsibility for any account you have opened until payment in full is made.

8. NTI reserves the right to charge a service reconnection fee to reinstate suspended accounts.

9. You the Subscriber hereby agree that the one time Set Up Fee charged by NTI is non-refundable.

10. There is a $20.00 service charge for each returned check.

11. If you believe NTI has billed you incorrectly, you must contact NTI no later than 90 days after the closing date on the first billing statement in which the error or problem appeared, in order to receive an adjustment or credit. Inquiries should be directed to NTI and should include all available information about the suspected error. Please send e-mail to: billing@nti.net.

12. NTI's Address: 21 East 17th Street Anniston, AL 36201.

13. When your credit card expires, NTI, in its discretion, may either assume that your card has been renewed for one year, or require that you furnish updated credit card information, including the new expiration date and any other information needed to process your account payments. If NTI is unable to obtain payment from your credit card bank because you have not renewed your card, because your credit card information has become outdated, or because you have not provided new information to NTI when requested, NTI may consider your account to be delinquent by more than one account cycle and suspend, archive or purge your account.

14. To cancel your account, you must contact NTI via e-mail, fax, postal mail or phone. Cancellation requests must include the account's log in name, and your name, address and phone number and other identifying information as they appear in NTI's billing records. If the information provided to NTI for an account does not match the account's records or leaves any ambiguity as to the account being cancelled, cancellation may be delayed or prevented.

15. NTI may terminate any account, without cause or notification to the Subscriber, at any time.

16. NTI may terminate sessions at any time, with or without notification to the subscriber, at NTI sole discretion.

17. All NTI charges must be paid in full before a cancellation will be considered complete. Service charges will extend to the end of the month in which the account is canceled.

18. If a NTI account is canceled, suspended or terminated, NTI may maintain the account for 30 days. You may contact NTI within that time to inquire about reopening a suspended account, or forwarding mail or files to another address. NTI reserves the right to refuse to forward the mail and/or files of any account terminated for violation of any provision of the Terms and Conditions or NTI's Policies. If you do not contact NTI within 30 days, your account and associated files will be deleted from NTI's servers, and NTI will not be able to reopen it or restore files. NTI is not responsible for maintaining material that it deletes from its servers as a result of a determination that the material violates any provision of its Terms and Conditions, or NTI's Policies.

19. "As Is" Services. You acknowledge that NTI services are provided "as is". NTI, its employees, agents, suppliers, vendors and distributors make no warranty of any kind, either expressed or implied, regarding the quality, accuracy, or validity of the data and/or information available on its systems, or residing on or passing through its interconnecting networks, or that NTI services will be uninterrupted or error free. NTI expressly excludes any implied warranty of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose to the fullest extent possible by law. You acknowledge that NTI provides all computer hardware and services "as is" unless expressly stated in writing by NTI authorized representative.

20. You also understand that NTI cannot and does not guarantee or warrant that files available for downloading through the Service will be free of infection or viruses, worms, Trojan horses or other code that manifest contaminating or destructive properties. You are responsible for implementing sufficient procedures and checkpoints to satisfy your particular requirements for accuracy of data input and output, and for maintaining a means external to the Service for the reconstruction of any lost data. You assume total responsibility and risk for your use of the service and the Internet. NTI does not make any express or implied warranties, representations or endorsements whatsoever (including without limitation warranties of title or non-infringement, or the implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose) with regard to the service, any merchandise, information or service provided through the service or on the Internet generally, and NTI shall not be liable for any cost or damage arising either directly or indirectly from any such transaction. It is solely your responsibility to evaluate the accuracy, completeness and usefulness of all opinions, advice, services, merchandise and other information provided through the service or on the Internet generally. NTI does not warrant that the service will be uninterrupted or error-free or that defects in the service will be corrected. The service and any software are provided on an "as is, as available" basis.

21. Pursuant to the Electronic Communications Privacy Act of 1986, Title 18, United Stated Code, Section 2510 and following, notice is hereby given that NTI does not provide by its system for sending and receiving "private" or "confidential" messages. The system operator and anyone so designated by the system operator can and may read messages transmitted to or from any account holder.

22. NTI will store email on our servers for at least 14 days to allow you the opportunity to retrieve it. NTI reserves the right to periodically purge the servers of mail that has been retained for longer than 14 days.

23. You agree to waive and hold NTI harmless from any claims relating to any action taken by NTI as part of its investigation of a suspected violation of this Agreement or as result of its conclusion that a violation of this Agreement has occurred. This means that you cannot sue or recover any damages whatsoever from NTI as a result of NTI's decision to remove material from its servers, cancel a news group posting, warn you, suspend or terminate your account, or take any other action during the investigation of a suspected violation or as a result of NTI's conclusion that a violation has occurred. This waiver applies to all violations described in the Terms and Conditions and in the Acceptable Use Guidelines.

24. IN NO EVENT SHALL NTI BE LIABLE FOR ANY INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, PUNITIVE OR OTHER CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, WITHOUT LIMITATION, LOST PROFITS) ARISING OUT OF OR IN RELATION TO THIS AGREEMENT OR THE SUBSCRIBER'S USE OF OR INABILITY TO USE NTI's SERVICES AND/OR COMPUTER SYSTEMS/MAINTENAINCE. NTI's ENTIRE LIABILITY AND YOUR EXCLUSIVE REMEDY SHALL BE AT NTI's OPTION. EITHER RETURN OF THE SERVICE FEES PAID FOR THE CURRENT MONTH OF SERVICE AND ANY SET-UP FEES PAID, OR REPLACEMENT OF CONNECTION SERVICES OR PRODUCTS. In any case, NTI's entire liability under or arising out of this Agreement shall be limited to the amount you paid for the service in the twelve (12) months prior to the act or injury that gave rise to the liability. However, some jurisdictions may not allow a limitation on liability for negligence that causes death or personal injury, and NTI limits its liability in such jurisdiction only to the degree allowed by the applicable laws.

25. Account holder agrees that NTI has the right to monitor NTI's services electronically and to disclose any information.

Questions or comments, please send mail to: tos@nti.net

POLICIES of DIAL-UP ACCOUNTS: 

Subscriber and its Users agree to use dial-up accounts solely on an active dial-up basis, meaning only as needed and in no way on a standby or inactive basis in order to maintain a connection. Without limitation of the foregoing, Subscriber and its Users shall abide by the following provisions regarding usage:

The following are violations of NTI policies:

1. Revealing your account password to others or allowing use of your account by others (other than authorized users in your household). At no time can there be simultaneous use of the same user name and password combination.

2. Using a personal account for high volume usage (commercial or otherwise). If you would like to provide high-volume or commercial services, please contact NTI for information about opening up a commercial account.

3. Using a personal account for dedicated access (IMPORTANT: see below definition of "dedicated access"). Please contact NTI for information about dedicated access accounts or for an explanation of the policy on such use.

4. Using NTI services for illegal purposes, or in support of illegal activities. NTI reserves the right to cooperate with legal authorities and/or injured third parties in the investigation of any suspected crime or civil wrong. Activities which are prohibited as potentially illegal include, but are not limited to:

a) Unauthorized copying of copyrighted materials including, but not limited to, digitization and distribution of photographs from magazines, books, or other copyrighted sources, and copyrighted software.

b) Exporting software or technical information in violation of U.S. export control laws.

 

c) Posting or e-mailing of scams such as 'make-money-fast' schemes or 'pyramid/chain' letters.

 

d) Making fraudulent offers of products, items, or services originating from your account.

5. You may not post or transmit charity requests, petitions for signatures, chain letters or letters relating to pyramid schemes. You may not post or transmit any advertising, promotional materials or any other solicitation of other users of the Service for goods for services except in those areas (e.g., a classified bulletin board) that are designated for such purposes.

6. Threatening bodily harm or property damage to individuals or groups.

7. Attempting to access the accounts of others, or attempting to penetrate beyond security measures of our or other systems (referred to as hacking) whether or not the intrusion results in corruption or loss of data.

8. Harassing others by 'mail-bombing' or 'news-bombing'. 'Mail-bombing' constitutes sending more than ten (10) similar e-mail messages to the same e-mail address. 'News-bombing' constitutes sending more than 10Mbytes of data to a news group.

9. You may not post or list articles which are off-topic according to the description of the group or list or send unsolicited mass e-mailings to more than twenty-five (25) e-mail users, regardless of whether such unsolicited mailings provoke complaints from the recipients.

10. Forging any message header, in part or whole, of any electronic transmission, originating or passing through NTI services.

11. Distributing viruses to or from NTI systems.

12. Use of software or any device that would allow your account to stay logged on while you are not actively using NTI services or use the account for the purpose of operating a server of any type.

13. Operating any type of dial-up service that allows a user to log into a machine, for fee or otherwise, while it is connected to the NTI network.

14. Cross-posting advertisements for products, items, or services to ten (10) or more unrelated news groups.

15. Disrupting any news group with frivolous, excessively vulgar or repetitious postings.

16. Posting of binary, or excessively large, unrelated text files to non-binary news groups that have specifically requested such material not be posted in the group's FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions).

17. Installation of 'auto-responders', 'cancel-bots' or similar automated or manual routines which generate excessive amounts of net traffic, or disrupt net news groups or e-mail use by others.

18. Engaging in any of the above activities using the service of another provider but channeling such activities through a NTI account or re-mailer, or using a NTI account as a mail drop for responses.

Subscribers found in violation of the NTI usage policies may be subject to $2.00 an hour in addition to their monthly membership fee and other damages as a result of violation of this agreement.

 

INACTIVITY DISCONNECT POLICY FOR DIAL-UP ACCOUNTS:

NTI reserves the right to disconnect a dial-up account after 20 minutes of inactivity, as detected by NTI through electronic means. This time is approximate and subject to change without notice in NTI sole discretion. Electronic or mechanical means to avoid an inactivity disconnect are strictly prohibited. Electronic or mechanical means include, but are not limited to "pinging" the mail server, employing electronic or software auto-dialer features to maintain an active connection or repeatedly checking for mail by auto log in to the mail server. NTI reserves the right to electronically audit connections to enforce the above requirements.

 

UNLIMITED ACCESS POLICY FOR DIAL-UP ACCOUNTS:

NTI provides "unlimited access" to it's network and Internet resources for supervised, non-dedicated, non-continuous sessions only and is intended for use in a fashion consistent with a subscriber and/or his or her family members, guests, etc. sitting around the computer as a source of entertainment, work or education where the user is present at the computer during the entire time the connection to NTI is active. NTI DOES NOT PROVIDE ANY TYPE OF DEDICATED OR UNSUPERVISED CONNECTION OF ANY KIND IN EXCHANGE FOR OUR STANDARD DIAL-UP RATES!. NTI reserves the right to act as sole judge of what is "unlimited access" and what is "dedicated access" without remedy to or argument by the subscriber. The use of the Service by persons sitting at the computer in a home entertainment or work type of setting for a few minutes or hours would be acceptable usage and would certainly be within our definition of acceptable "unlimited access", whereas having the connection active continuously for several hours (especially more than 10) or even days - or ANY significant length of time during which the connected computer is unattended - would certainly fall under our definition of unacceptable "dedicated access" and WILL NOT be provided by NTI unless specifically negotiated IN WRITING beforehand, and certainly not in exchange for the standard dial-up rate.

Permanent account disconnection policy for "dedicated access" abuses:
At least one (1) warning via telephone, e-mail or mail will be given for using NTI dial-up account for what we determine is "dedicated access", after which your account may be subject to permanent disconnection without further notice or warning as a result of any future such attempts to use your NTI standard dial-up connection in a manner consistent with dedicated service. While we regret having to take such a stern stand on this policy, we could not continue to deliver such high quality service at such low rates without doing so. We would have a few web-greedy customers leaving their connections active all day and night, and in the process spoiling it for everybody else and causing busy signals. In simple terms, use it as much as you want, as often as you want for personal entertainment or work, etc., WHILE YOU ARE PRESENT at the computer, but when you're done and ready to leave your computer, for Pete's sake SIGN OFF and let someone else use the connection, or we will be forced to sign off for you and it might just be permanently!

 

ABSOLUTE DISCONNECT POLICY FOR DIAL-UP ACCOUNTS:

NTI reserves the right to disconnect a dial-up account after 4 hours of connect time, regardless of the circumstances. This policy is primarily to protect against accidental or deliberate failure to disconnect at the end of a session. The subscriber may immediately reconnect after such a disconnection if the subscriber is interactively using the dial-up connection but may not use an automatic means such a as a program to initiate the reconnection (which falls under "dedicated access" again - see above). Failure on the part of NTI to enforce the 4 hour disconnect rule for any given account or connection shall not be construed as a repeal or change of the policy in any way.

 

Use of Services:

1. During an investigation, NTI may suspend the account or accounts involved and/or remove the material involved from its servers. If NTI believes, in its sole discretion, that a violation of these guidelines has occurred, it may take responsive action. Such action may include, but is not limited to, additional hourly charges of $2.00 an hour in addition the monthly fees, damages, temporary or permanent removal of material from NTI servers, the cancellation of news group posts, warnings to the Subscriber or Subscribers responsible, and the suspension or termination of the account or accounts responsible. NTI in its sole discretion, will determine what action will be taken in response to a violation on a case-by-case basis. Violations of these Policies could also subject the Subscriber to criminal or civil liability.

2. The Subscriber of record is responsible for all use of the account, with or without the knowledge or consent of the Subscriber.

3. The Subscriber may not store or distribute certain other types of material on NTI servers. Examples of prohibited material include, but are not limited to, programs containing viruses or trojans and tools to compromise the security of their sites.

4. NTI staff may monitor the security of Subscriber's passwords at any time. An Subscriber with an insecure password may be directed to change the password to one which complies with the above rules. Subscribers who repeatedly choose insecure passwords may be assigned a password by NTI; continued failure to maintain password security may be grounds for account termination.

5. The Subscriber is prohibited from utilizing NTI services to compromise the security or tamper with system resources of accounts on computers at NTI or at any other site. Use or distribution of tools designed for compromising security is prohibited. Examples of these tools include, but are not limited to password guessing programs, cracking tools or network probing tools.

6. Subscribers, may not run programs which provide network services from their accounts. Examples of prohibited programs include, but are not limited to, mail, game, http and irc servers and multi-user interactive forums.

7. You may not post or transmit any message anonymously or under a false name.

8. You may not post or transmit any message which is libelous, defamatory or which discloses private or personal matters concerning any person. You may not post or transmit any message, data, image or program which is indecent, obscene or pornographic.

9. You may not interfere with other users' use of the Service.

10. You may not post or transmit any message which is harmful, threatening, abusive or hateful. It is not the Service's intent to discourage you from taking controversial positions or expressing vigorously what may be unpopular views; however, NTI reserves the right to take such action as it deems appropriate in cases where the Service is used to disseminate statements which are deeply and widely offensive and/or harmful.

NTI shall not be held responsible for any changes in the operation of any computer system whether new or used, whether good or bad in nature, including (but not limited to) changes caused by NTI staff following configuration for Internet services, or following the installation of software such as browser or e-mail client applications which have been provided in good faith by NTI personnel for the customer's convenience at no charge (or for a small fee).