THE PLAIN ENGLISH VERSION OF ALL THE STUFF BELOW:
Getting into business school is a process that might be bolstered via advice, such as the advice provided by this site, but rejection from business school can be caused by an infinite number of factors, ranging from a candidate’s competitiveness prior to finding this site (we’re good, but we’re not miracle workers), to whether or not the admissions committee member reading the application is suffering from indigestion on a given day or if the applicant has the same first name as the admissions committee member’s narcissistic ex-boyfriend, to any one of a million reasons in between. We therefore can not at all promise that you will get in, anywhere, and if anyone promises you that, they are probably super shady. Also, there are a ton of schools out there and their information is constantly changing. We do our absolute best to be up to date for everything, but it’s up to you to double-check things first, since we’re only human, etc. and can’t be held responsible for errors in the site. If you find any errors in the site, please be a nice person and let us know, and give us a chance to make it right. This is actually true for anything — if you’re not happy about things in the site, talk to us about it first and give us a chance to make it right. We’re creating this to level the playing field and are doing our best – please let us know how we’re doing before complaining in a public forum – since we’re charging so much less, we don’t have the same resources as The Big Companies in this space, so come to us first, please! The information and advice contained here is our subjective opinion, and while we are acting in good faith to make the advice as amazing as possible (otherwise, why bother creating a site like this?), we are not liable if that’s not the case. In addition, this is an interactive platform where YOU need to do the work. While we hold the subjective opinion that our process results in you needing to do less work, and/or that work will be less painful & less stressful, there is still much work to be done. Until someone invents a magical Sorting Hat that instantly matches you to the MBA program you are destined for (Gryffindor, natch) with no effort on your part, applying to business school is always going to require you to do work. The nice thing is, once you are in business school, you won’t need to do much work at all for one or two years! Then you will graduate. And you will work really hard for the rest of your life! Um, yay? Anyway, a literal ton or two of mental energy and effort has gone into the design and development of this site. You’re actually looking at the third version of it. Because of that, please don’t steal. Please don’t steal our advice, please don’t steal our methodology, please don’t steal our tech ideas. We’ve actually got a patent pending on a most of the tech elements (cool, huh?), so if you work for a competitor of ours and want to “borrow” ideas like our drag-n-drop outline interface, please, save us both a boatload of legal bills and talk to us about licensing instead. Besides, we’re super-nice social-enterprisey types, so taking our ideas would be terrible karma, right? Now, if you’re digging around on the site and find that we have in any way violated copyrighted material that belongs to you, we promise that it is unintentional / accidental and we’d be aghast to discover that. So, if you find something like that, let us know and we’ll take a look, and if you’re right, we will immediately remove it! Finally, you, as the user: all of the work done in here is your work and your IP. We do not “own” your essays, brainstorming ideas, etc. If we think you did a great job on stuff, we might ask you nicely if we can share it with others, but until you give us written consent that you’re cool with it, then all work in here is your own. The stuff below this was written by a lawyer, and every time I look at it, I feel a wave of relief that I did an MBA and not a JD.
1. YOUR ACCEPTANCE
These Terms of Use (the “Terms”) constitute a legally binding contract that governs your visits to applicantlab.com (the “Site”) as a Seller. The Site is owned and operated by ApplicantLab, Inc. (“We,” “Us,” or “Our”). By visiting the Site, you indicate your acceptance of these Terms, as well as the Privacy Policy. If you disagree with any provision of the aforementioned documents, you may not visit the Site.
2. VENUE
OUR Site is a neutral PLATFORM to assist users with their applications to an MBA program. much of the information provided on our site is our personal opinion. we do not guarantee that our information is complete, accurate or up-to-date. IT IS YOUR RESPONSIBILITY TO VERIFY THAT ANY INFORMATION ABOUT A SCHOOL OR PROGRAM IS ACCURATE. we disclaim all liability arising out of or related to site CONTENT, exercises, conduct and arrangements. We are not liable for any INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS INFRINGEMENT COMMITTED USING OUR SITE. our online venue is provided to be used at your own risk, with no warrantIES of any kind. AFFILIATE compensation, IF ANY, in no way affects the opinions offered on the site.
3. INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY
a. IP Ownership. You own all intellectual property rights to the content and data you submit to the Site. We own all intellectual property rights to the Site. Site features, look and feel, design, registered and unregistered trademarks are protected by the U.S. and international copyright, trademark, trade secret, and other intellectual property or proprietary rights laws. In addition, many elements of the platform itself, both in isolation and combined into a series of exercises, is patent-pending. Anyone attempting to replicate the interactive features of the site, including but not limited to its recommendation engine, its front-end interface, etc. should be aware that we reserve all rights under our patent application. Users own all intellectual property rights, if any, to user submitted content, and we do not acquire any ownership over user content.
b. DMCA Takedown Requests. We are strongly committed to protecting the intellectual property rights of others. Any claimed copyright infringement is unintentional, since we believe in the Golden Rule. Therefore, all claims of copyright infringement committed using our Site will be investigated if reported to our designated Copyright Agent via email: [email protected]. If we believe that any posted material violates any applicable law, we will remove or disable access to any such material and/or terminate or suspend the offending user’s account.
c. Indemnification. You agree to defend, indemnify and hold harmless the Site, its affiliates and licensors and their respective officers, directors, employees, contractors, agents, and licensors from and against any claims, liabilities, damages, judgments, awards, losses, costs, expenses or fees (including reasonable attorneys’ fees) resulting from your violation of these Terms of Use or your use of the Site, including, without limitation, any content submitted by you.
4. OUR OBLIGATIONS
By accessing the Site, you represent, warrant and agree that:
b. We may terminate any user account with or without notice using our sole reasonable discretion.
c. You will treat your login credentials as confidential. Do not disclose them to any third party and do not allow other login to your account. You should use particular caution when accessing your account from a public or shared computer so that others are not able to view or record your password or other personal information.
d. We reserve the right to change the offerings, packages and pricing at any time.
e. If you are not satisfied with our service, you will bring your complaints to our attention, prior to airing these complaints in a public forum, so we can have a fair chance to address your concerns.
f. You will treat all Site users and administrators respectfully, online and offline.
g. We may withdraw or change our Site in any way we deem appropriate without prior notice to you. We are not be liable if for any reason all or any part of the Site is unavailable at any time or for any period to registered users or visitors. We are not liable if for technical reasons any data is lost or damaged.
h. We have the right to disable any user identification provided by our Site and disable your whole account on our Site at any time for any reason or no reason without notice or explanation.
i. Each account is meant for the sole use of one person. It is a violation of these terms to share an account, or to “re-sell” access to an account. Any fraudlent action of this nature will result in immediate removal from the system, with absolutely no refunds granted.
5. PROHIBITED CONDUCT
You must not:
a. Use the Site for any illegal purpose, upload, post, link to, copy or republish copyrighted material without permission from the rights holder.
b. Share accounts between more than one person, or “re-sell” an account. This constitutes fraud and will result in immediate termination of your ability to access the site (with no refund being granted). We may also contact the school(s) that you are applying to to alert them to the fact that you attempted to commit fraud. You have been forewarned, and thus we are under no legal liability for any adverse effects to your candidacy that may result from unethical behavior on your part.
c. Copy or reproduce any of our advice so that it may be consumed off-site: including but not limited to copy-n-paste, screenshots, or any other attempt to steal our content.
d. Take any action that imposes, or may impose, in our sole discretion, an unreasonable or disproportionately large load on our infrastructure.
e. Deep-link to any portion of this Site for any purpose without our express written permission.
f. Use a false name or impersonate any other person or entity.
g. Post or transmit to other users any defamatory, abusive, obscene, profane, offensive, threatening, harassing, racially offensive, or objectionable material. We reserve the right to judge what constitutes “objectionable” material.
h. Transmit, or procure the sending of, any advertising or promotional material and unsolicited mass communication without our prior written consent.e. Deep-link to any portion of this Site for any purpose without our express written permission.
i. Access the Site to build a competing service, or share the advice within the service publicly.
j. Introduce any viruses or other harmful material, use any device, software or routine that interferes with the proper working of the Site.
k. Attempt to gain unauthorized access to, interfere with, damage or disrupt any parts of the Site, the server on which the Site is stored, or any server, computer or database connected to the Site.
l. Otherwise attempt to interfere with the proper working of the Site or anyone’s use and enjoyment of it.
6. REFUNDS
If you are not satisfied with our service for any reason, you may request a refund. However, refunds will be given at our discretion, and require that you: 1) request it within 7 calendar days of purchase, and 2) answer a questionnaire designed to help us improve our service and 3) did not do a substantial amount of work in the product (a request for a refund will grant us permission to look in your account to see how much advice you read /work you did) nor sign up for a paid service that is only available to upgraded users (since this is clearly an attempt at fraud, which will not be tolerated). The reason for this is that it would be easy for a person to sign up, power through all of the modules, take all of the benefit of the service, and then pretend to be unhappy to get their money back. Obviously, someone as nice as you would never do such a thing, but we do need to protect ourselves from being taken advantage of by others.
7. MONITORING AND ENFORCEMENT; TERMINATION
We have the right to take any action that we deem necessary or appropriate if we believe that a user violates the Terms of Use, infringes any intellectual property right or other right, threatens the personal safety of users of the Site and the public. We may:
a. Fully cooperate with any law enforcement authorities or court order requesting or directing us to disclose the identity of anyone posting any materials on or through the Site.
b. Disclose your identity to any third party who claims that material posted by you violates their rights, including their intellectual property rights or their right to privacy.
c. Terminate or suspend your access to all or part of the Site for any or no reason, including without limitation, any violation of these Terms of Use.
d. Block violator’s IP address and/or notify his or her Internet Site Provider.
e. Take appropriate legal action.
8. DISCLAIMER OF WARRANTY
a. YOUR USE OF THE SITE, ITS CONTENT IS AT YOUR OWN RISK. WE DO NOT WARRANT THAT THE SITE WILL MEET YOUR EXPECTATIONS OR REQUIRMENTS. WE DO NOT GUARANTEE THAT YOU WILL BE ACCEPTED TO THE SCHOOL OF YOUR CHOICE. WE HEREBY DISCLAIM ALL WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EITHER EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, STATUTORY OR OTHERWISE, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO ANY WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, NON-INFRINGEMENT AND FITNESS FOR PARTICULAR PURPOSE.
b. We do not guarantee that the information provided on the Site is complete, accurate or up-to-date. You are responsible for implementing sufficient procedures to satisfy your particular requirements for the safety of your personal information, anti-virus protection and accuracy of data input and output. WE WILL NOT BE LIABLE FOR ANY LOSS OR DAMAGE CAUSED BY A DISTRIBUTED DENIAL-OF-SERVICE ATTACK, VIRUSES OR OTHER TECHNOLOGICALLY HARMFUL MATERIAL THAT MAY INFECT YOUR COMPUTER EQUIPMENT, COMPUTER PROGRAMS, DATA OR OTHER PROPRIETARY MATERIAL DUE TO YOUR USE OF THE SITE OR ANY SERVICES OR ITEMS OBTAINED THROUGH THE SITE OR TO YOUR DOWNLOADING OF ANY MATERIAL POSTED ON IT, OR ON ANY SERVICE LINKED TO IT.
9. LIMITATION OF LIABILITY
IN NO EVENT WILL WE, OUR EMPLOYEES, AGENTS, OFFICERS OR DIRECTORS BE LIABLE FOR DAMAGES OF ANY KIND, UNDER ANY LEGAL THEORY, ARISING OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH YOUR USE, OR INABILITY TO USE, THE SITE, ANY SITES LINKED TO IT, ANY CONTENT, INCLUDING ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, SPECIAL, INCIDENTAL, CONSEQUENTIAL OR PUNITIVE DAMAGES, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PERSONAL INJURY, PAIN AND SUFFERING, EMOTIONAL DISTRESS, LOSS OF REVENUE, LOSS OF PROFITS, LOSS OF BUSINESS OR ANTICIPATED SAVINGS, LOSS OF USE, LOSS OF GOODWILL, LOSS OF DATA, AND WHETHER CAUSED BY TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE), BREACH OF CONTRACT OR OTHERWISE, EVEN IF FORESEEABLE. IN NO EVENT WILL OUR MAXIMUM LIABILITY EXCEED ONE HUNDRED US DOLLARS ($100US). NO CLAIM, SUIT OR ACTION MAY BE BROUGHT AGAINST US AFTER SIX MONTHS FROM THE UNDERLYING CAUSE OF ACTION.
10. LINKING TO THE SITE
We have the right to take any action that we deem necessary or appropriate if we believe that a user violates the Terms of Use, infringes any intellectual property right or other right, threatens the personal safety of users of the Site and the public. We may:
a. Fully cooperate with any law enforcement authorities or court order requesting or directing us to disclose the identity of anyone posting any materials on or through the Site.
b. Disclose your identity to any third party who claims that material posted by you violates their rights, including their intellectual property rights or their right to privacy.
c. Terminate or suspend your access to all or part of the Site for any or no reason, including without limitation, any violation of these Terms of Use.
d. Block violator’s IP address and/or notify his or her Internet Site Provider.
e. Take appropriate legal action.
11. DISPUTES BETWEEN USERS
As a neutral venue, we do not offer mediation, arbitration or any other forms of dispute resolution and do not actively monitor user interactions. Therefore, you are solely responsible for your interactions and disputes with other users. We reserve the right, but have no obligation, to facilitate and resolve disputes between Site users. This section is not really needed now, since right now users do not interact with each other, but in case someday we implement a discussion forum or something similar, we decided to put this language here.
12. ASSIGNMENT
You may not assign your rights and obligations under these Terms of Use without our prior written consent. In plain English, this means that you can’t pay for the site and then share it with others – we’d consider that to be a severe violation (i.e., totally uncool) and will delete your account immediately with, of course, no refund. If the price being charged poses a financial hardship for you, drop us a note and let’s talk. We may transfer, assign or subcontract the rights, interests or obligations under the Terms of Use, at our sole discretion, without obtaining your consent.
13. SEVERABILITY AND NON-WAIVER
a. Should any part of these Terms of Use be rendered or declared invalid by an appropriate authority, such invalidation of such part or portion of these Terms of Use should not invalidate the remaining portions thereof, and they shall remain in full force and effect.
b. Enforcement of these Terms of Use is solely in our discretion, and failure to enforce the Terms of Use in some instances does not constitute a waiver of our right to enforce them in other instances.
14. GOVERNING LAW AND JURISDICTION
These Terms of Use shall be governed by the laws of California, without regard to its conflict of law principles that would result in application of any other law. Any claim where the total amount in controversy is less than US$10,000, shall be resolved via binding, non-appearance-based arbitration initiated through the American Arbitration Association (“AAA”). The AAA Rules are available online at www.adr.org. AAA and the parties must comply with the following rules: (a) the arbitration shall be conducted by telephone, online and/or be solely based on written submissions, the specific manner shall be chosen by the party initiating the arbitration; (b) the arbitration shall be conducted by an arbitrator who is approved or otherwise affiliated with the AAA; (c) the arbitration shall not involve any personal appearance by the parties or witnesses unless otherwise mutually agreed by the parties in writing; (d) the arbitrator may award injunctive or declaratory relief only in favor of the individual party seeking relief and only to the extent necessary to provide relief warranted by that party’s individual claim; (e) unless otherwise mutually agreed by the parties in writing, the arbitrator may not consolidate more than one person’s claims, and may not otherwise preside over any form of a representative or class proceeding; and (f) any judgment on the award rendered by the arbitrator may be entered in any court of competent jurisdiction. YOU UNDERSTAND AND AGREE THAT THIS ARBITRATION CLAUSE MEANS THAT YOU ARE WAIVING THE RIGHT TO A TRIAL BY JURY OR TO PARTICIPATE IN A CLASS ACTION WITH RESPECT TO THE CLAIMS COVERED BY THIS ARBITRATION CLAUSE.
15. CHANGES TO THE TERMS OF USE
We update these Terms of Use every once in a while as we deem appropriate, without notifying you. We then post the changes on this page. Please check this page from time to time to take notice of any changes we made, as they are binding on you. Your continued use of the Site following the posting of revised Terms of Use constitutes your acceptance of the changes.
All feedback, comments, requests for technical support and other communications relating to the Site should be directed to [email protected].
17. THANK YOU
If you’ve actually read the whole way through, thank you! We hope to be able to help you.
