Effective November 19, 2009

Privacy Policy for Personal Use

This privacy policy applies to your use of the CommonGoods website located at www.commongoods.net (“the Site"), but not does apply to any third party sites that may be linked to them, or any relationships you may have with the business listed on the Site.

The terms "we", "us", and "CommonGoods" refer to CommonGoods Network Inc. The terms "you" and "your" refer to you, as a user of any of the Site. The term "personal information" means information that you provide to us which personally identifies you to be contacted or identified, such as your name, phone number, email address, images, and any other data that is tied to such information.

BY USING THE SITE, YOU AGREE TO BE BOUND BY THE TERMS OF THIS PRIVACY POLICY. IF YOU DO NOT AGREE WITH THESE TERMS, PLEASE DO NOT USE THE SITE.

Information We Collect and How We Use It

We use commercially reasonable efforts to ensure that the collection of personal information is limited to that which is necessary to fulfill the purposes identified below. If we use your information in a manner different than the purpose for which it is collected, then we will ask you for your consent prior to such use.
1. Account information. If you create an account to take advantage of the full range of services offered on the Site, we ask for and record personal information such as your name, email address, address of residence, employment information, salary, and photo identification.
  1. Name. One of the primary purposes of CommonGoods is to create a transparent economy. As such it is important that our users are accountable for the User Content that they provide. We will use your Name only for identification purposes, primarily in an effort to prevent Users from opening multiple accounts and to prevent other users from impersonating you.
  2. Email address. We use your email address to send you updates and news, and contact you on behalf of other users (such as other users who send you compliments, personal messages, or favorite reviews). You may choose not to receive e-mail of this type by accessing the "Account" tab on the Site and updating your notification settings.
  3. Address of residence. We use your address of residence to help ensure that your search results are geographically relevant. We may also use your Address of residence in combination with your email address and Name to prevent you from opening multiple accounts or to prevent other users from impersonating you. We may also use your geographic information in combination with that of other users to help member businesses understand their target consumer base and to track the geographic growth of our community.
  4. Employment information. If you choose to submit your employment information, we will use that information to cross-check data submitted by your employer to determine the accuracy of the information provided by your employer. We may also use this information in combination with your voluntary assessment of your employer’s labor practices to help educate other users on the relative equity of your employer’s practices in comparison to labor practices of other businesses. In any case, you have the ability to remain anonymous when leaving feedback about your employer for which you have reason to believe your employer may unfairly punish you for disclosing. We will not make your employment information available to any third parties. If you choose to disclose your job title, we will display it below your name and picture in the “employees” section of your employer’s business profile page.
  5. Salary information. If you choose to submit your salary information, we will use that information to cross-check data submitted by your employer to determine the accuracy of the information provided by your employer. We may also use this information to assess the fairness of your employer’s compensation practices. Neither your employer nor other users will have access to the salary information you provide. We will not make your salary information available to third parties.
  6. Photo Identification. If you choose to submit a photo of yourself, we will display it on your profile page on the site and next to any comments or feedback you provide relating to businesses listed on the site. If you list yourself as an employee of a business on the site, then we will display your photo in the “employees” section of your employer’s business profile page on the site.
2. Submissions. We store and may publicly display your submissions in order to provide the services that we offer. When we display your submissions, we do so together with your account name (first name and last initial) and the photo you provide (if any). For the purposes of transparency, you must supply either your true legal name, or the name you generally are known by to CommonGoods when creating your account and you are fully bound by the Terms of Use. The term "submissions" refers to the information that you submit or post to the Site for public display, such as business ratings, reviews, photos, compliments, and the information that you display as part of your account profile.
3. Feedback. If you contact us to provide feedback, register a complaint, or ask a question, we will record any personal information and other content that you provide in your communication so that we can effectively respond to your communication.
4. Activity. We record information relating to your use of the Site, such as the searches you undertake, the pages you view, your browser type, IP address, requested URL, referring URL, and timestamp information. We use this type of information to administer the Site and provide the highest possible level of service to you. We also use this information in the aggregate to perform statistical analyses of user behavior and characteristics in order to measure interest in and use of the various areas of the Site. You cannot be identified from this aggregate information.
5. Cookies. We may send cookies to your computer in order to uniquely identify your browser and improve the quality of our service. The term "cookies" refers to small pieces of information that a website sends to your computer's hard drive while you are viewing the site. We may use both session cookies (which expire once you close your browser) and persistent cookies (which stay on your computer until you delete them). Persistent cookies can be removed by following your browser help file directions. If you choose to disable cookies, some areas of the Site may not work properly or at all.
6. Enforcement. We may use the information we collect in connection with your use of the Site (including your personal information) in order to investigate, enforce, and apply our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy.
Transfer of Information

We may distribute your submissions to third parties, as permitted pursuant to our Terms of Use. The third parties may in turn publicly display or publish your submissions in connection with their own websites and media platforms. When we distribute your submissions to third parties, we typically include your account name (first name, last initial) but not your personal information unless you include your personal information in your submissions.

We may share your personal information with third parties to provide you with services that we offer through the Site, conduct quality assurance testing, facilitate creation of accounts, provide technical and customer support, or provide specific services, such as synchronization of your contacts with other software applications, in accordance with your instructions. These third parties are required not to use your personal information other than to provide the services requested by you.

We may share your personal information with our subsidiaries, joint ventures, or other companies under a common control (collectively, "Affiliates") that we may have now or in the future, in which case we will require them to honor this Privacy Policy. If another organization acquires our corporation or our assets, that organization will possess your personal information, and will assume the rights and obligations with respect to that information as described in this Privacy Policy.

We may disclose your personal information to third parties in a good faith belief that such disclosure is reasonably necessary to (a) take action regarding suspected illegal activities; (b) enforce or apply our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy; (c) comply with legal process, such as a search warrant, subpoena, statute, or court order; or (d) protect our rights, reputation, and property, or that of our users, affiliates, or the public. Please note that we are not required to question or contest the validity of any search warrant, subpoena or other similar governmental request that we receive.

We may disclose information in the aggregate to third parties relating to user behavior in connection with actual or prospective business relationship with those third parties, such as content distributors and businesses with profile pages. For example, we may disclose the number of users that have been exposed to, or clicked on, a business profile page.
Others' Information

You may choose to provide us with another person's e-mail address so that person may be invited to create an account on this website and become your friend. We use this information to contact and, if necessary, remind that person about the invitation. By providing us with another person's e-mail address, you represent to us that you have obtained the consent of the person concerned as regards such disclosure to us of their personal information. All invitees are provided with the option not to receive further invitations. We may disclose such information if required to do so in order to comply with legal process, as described above.
Links

The Site may contain links to third party websites to which we have no affiliation. Except as set forth herein, we do not share your personal information with those third parties, and are not responsible for their privacy practices. We suggest you read the privacy policies on all such third party websites.
Controlling Your Personal Data

To the extent you include personal information in your submissions (such as a photo of yourself), third parties may be able to identify you, associate you with your user account, and contact you. Third parties may also associate you with your user account using the member lookup feature on the Site, but only if the third party already knows your full name and you include information in your submission that allows the third party to distinguish you from other users who might share the same full name. Please do not include information in your submissions that you expect to keep private.

Please also note that the personal messages you send or receive using the Site' personal messaging feature are only private to the extent that you and the sender/recipient keep them private. For example, we do not have any control over whether a recipient of one of your personal messages publicly posts the contents of such a message.

As a registered CommonGoods user, you can modify some of your personal information and your privacy preferences by accessing the "Account" section of this website. For example, you may choose not to receive e-mail solicitations from CommonGoods by accessing the "Account" tab on the Site and updating your notification settings. Upon your request, CommonGoods will use commercially reasonable efforts to close your account, and cease displaying your submissions on the Site; nevertheless, we may still retain your personal information in our systems. Registered users who wish to close their account should click here.
Security

Your account is password protected. We use industry standard measures to protect the personal information that is stored in our database. We limit the access to your personal information to those employees and contractors who need access to perform their job function, such as our customer service personnel. If you have any questions about the security on the Site, please contact us. Although we take appropriate measures to safeguard against unauthorized disclosures of information, we cannot assure you that your personal information will never be disclosed in a manner that is inconsistent with this Privacy Policy.

You hereby acknowledge that CommonGoods is not responsible for any intercepted information sent via the internet, and you hereby release us from any and all claims arising out of or related to the use of intercepted information in any unauthorized manner.
E-mails and Opt-out

You may opt-out of receiving personal messages from specific users. In addition, you may opt-out of receiving notifications from us by changing your notification settings under the "Account" tab after you log on to a CommonGoods Site. Unregistered users who receive e-mails from us may also opt-out of receiving further e-mails by following the instructions contained in our e-mails. Despite your indicated e-mail preferences, we may send you notices of any updates to our Terms of Use or Privacy Policy.
Terms and Modifications to this Privacy Policy

We may modify this Privacy Policy at any time, and we will post any new versions on this page. If we make any material changes in the way we use your personal information, we will notify you by sending an e-mail to the last e-mail address you provided to us and/or by prominently posting notice of the changes on our website. Any such changes will be effective upon the earlier of thirty (30) calendar days following our dispatch of an e-mail notice to you or thirty (30) calendar days following our posting of notice of the changes on our website. These changes will be effective immediately for new users of the Site. Please note that at all times you are responsible for updating your personal information to provide us with your most current e-mail address. In the event that the last e-mail you have provided us is not valid, or for any reason is not capable of delivering to you the notice described above, our dispatch of the e-mail containing such notice will nonetheless constitute effective notice of the changes described in the notice. In any event, changes to this Privacy Policy may affect our use of personal information that you provided us prior to our notification to you of the changes. If you do not wish to permit changes in our use of your personal information, you must notify us prior to the effective date of the changes that you wish to deactivate your account with us. Continued use of the Site following notice of such changes shall indicate your acknowledgement of such changes and agreement to be bound by the terms and conditions of such changes.
Dispute Resolution

If you believe that CommonGoods has not adhered to this Privacy Policy you may write to the CommonGoods Privacy Office at the following address:

CommonGoods Network Inc.
Privacy Officer
PO Box 5034
Eugene, OR 97405

E-mail: legal@commongoods.net

In your letter, please describe in as much detail as possible ways in which you believe the Privacy Policy has not been complied with. We will investigate your complaint promptly.
Contacting the Website and Access to Your Personal Information

Upon written request, subject to certain exceptions, CommonGoods will inform you of the existence, use, and disclosure of your personal information and will give you access to that information. Access requests should be sent to our Privacy Officer, using the contact information above. When requesting access to your personal information, we may request specific information from you to enable us to confirm your identity and right to access, as well as to search for and provide the personal information that we hold about you. We may charge you a fee to access your personal information to cover our costs; however, we will advise you of any fee in advance, which will be no more than any maximum fee prescribed by law.

If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy, the privacy practices of this website, or if you want to exercise any of the rights that you are given under this Privacy Policy, you can contact us using the contact information listed above.