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• Legal Note
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• Linking Policy
• Accessibility Statement
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German law requires this sort of a legal note, so here we go:

Volker Eick @

Freie Universität Berlin / John F. Kennedy-Institut für Nordamerikastudien
Abteilung Politik
Lansstr. 7-9
D - 14195 Berlin
phone: ++49 (0)30 - 838 52887
fax: ++49 (0)30 - 838 52642

Please use the form, to contact us. We are kind of shy when it comes to email addresses on websites.

We recognize and respect your need for privacy and security as you visit our site. When you visit our site to view any pages, read product information, or use our flash demos, you do so without telling us who you are and without revealing any personal information. While we do not collect identifying information about visitors to our site, we do use standard software to collect information for the strict purpose of tracking activity on our site (We use Google Analytics, see below for details). This allows us to better understand how many people use our site and which pages and features are most popular. The only information we normally collect and store is:

• The name of your Internet service provider.
• The web site that referred you to us (if any).
• The date and time the pages were accessed.
• The page or pages you requested.

There are instances where you may elect to provide us with personal information. If you fill out one of our feedback or request forms or send us an email, you are transmitting the information that appears to you in the form or the message. This will typically include information like your name, email address, the kind of request you are making, and any other information necessary to fulfill your request. You never transmit personally identifying information that you do not enter yourself. And this is always your option; this information cannot be collected unless you specifically elect to send it to us. This information is used internally only for the purpose of fulfilling the request or for contacting you directly and is not given or sold to any other organization. In every email we send you, we include an unsubscribe option.

This website uses Google Analytics, a web analytics service provided by Google, Inc. ("Google"). Google Analytics uses "cookies", which are text files placed on your computer, to help the website analyze how users use the site. The information generated by the cookie about your use of the website (including your IP address) will be transmitted to and stored by Google on servers in the United States. Google will use this information for the purpose of evaluating your use of the website, compiling reports on website activity for website operators and providing other services relating to website activity and internet usage. Google may also transfer this information to third parties where required to do so by law, or where such third parties process the information on Google's behalf. Google will not associate your IP address with any other data held by Google. You may refuse the use of cookies by selecting the appropriate settings on your browser, however please note that if you do this you may not be able to use the full functionality of this website. By using this website, you consent to the processing of data about you by Google in the manner and for the purposes set out above.

If you DO NOT LIKE THIS, do this:

Put this line into your hosts file

(Do this only, if you know what you are doing! Fooling around with your host file may easliy break your internet connection)

127.0.0.1 www.google-analytics.com

Are you kidding?

We share Boing Boing's contempt for "linking policies" and took our "linking policy" from their site:

"policing-crowds doesn't believe in linking policies. They're dangerous, have no basis in law, and they break the norms that make the Web possible. They're a wicked, stupid idea.

That said, if you believe in linking policies - that is, if you believe that people who make websites should be able to control who links to those sites and how -  then have we got a policy for you:

No site with a linking policy (other than a policy such as this one, created to deride and undermine the idea of linking policies) may link to us. Ever. "

Go to the their site, lots of stupid examples

 We made an effort to make this website standard compatible and accessible. As of late May 06 we passed the tests for valid xhtml and css (see footer). Accessibility is quite annother matter. Last Sunday most of our pages passed automated validation for SECTION 508 and the W3C Recommendations (1,2,3). Most - tables are still a challenge (register.html, world-cup.html. contact-us.html etc).

We are running out of time and resources and the next couple of weeks will be rather active with lots of changes to this site. Here is our lessons confirmed by many other websites:

Accessibility is NOT a product (ie something you can buy). It is a process and requieres constant dedication and resources - resources we cannot provide this point in time.

But here is our promise:

Later this summer (after both the conference and the world cup) we will devote a weekend to quality assurrance, getting rid of all the typos and try to achieve accessibility again!

Why are we doing this?

We are the good guys, remember? We put some effort in this and want the site to look good in any standard compatible browser (does not include your Internet Explorer!). And we want our content to be accessible and available. Our current search enginge ranking confirms that there are benefits in compatibility and accessibility :-)

As said in the "Who are we?" section - we are political scientists. So web design was not a core issue of our education. We received a lot of help from people and from projects.

People:

A big hug to Katja Peters, who took care of our header and reviewed the rest of the site with a critical, trained eye (art historian cum screen queen!). And a venceremos to comrade Hiram Villalobos who provided us with the domain and numerous hints concerning the depths of typo3. That said - all the obvious flaws are on our own account.

Projects:

First and foremost: The typo3 community! Version 4 is really something! Keep up the good work!

A close second: The YAML CSS Framework by Dirk Jesse and its typo3 integration by Dieter Bunkerd - we would have never achieved a standard compliant website without your help (and we are almost certain, that we will spoil your good work in the weeks to come, sorry)