Smokedot.org is dedicated, among other things, to restoring the privacy and Constitutional rights that are constantly being taken away by the so-called "War on Drugs" in America. In keeping with this philosophy, your privacy and rights on this website are very important to us. The following is our privacy policy, which goes into effect on April 20th, 2008, and is retroactive for all previously created user accounts, comments, and stories since Smokedot's creation at the beginning of April, 2000.
Table of Contents
Email Privacy
Age Issues
Your Information
Account Revocation
Comments
Trolls and Idiots
Legal Issues
Questions or Concerns?
The email address which you provided when creating a user account has always, and will always, remain private and confidential. We will not give, sell, or otherwise pass your email on to a 3rd party, for any reason (for a possible exception to this rule, please see Legal Issues, later in this page). Your email address will not be used for ANY purpose except for the emailing of your password or other administrative tasks. You will not receive spam or other unsolicited email due to providing your email address here.
Because Smokedot deals with subjects of an illegal nature, you must be 18 years of age or older to read the information contained herein. However, because there is currently no way to reliably verify the age of a visitor, we will not hassle our readers with inaccurate and intrusive verification methods, and will instead simply provide this notice; if you are under the age of 18, please leave now and come back when you are a bit older. Smokedot makes no attempt to attract underage readers, and instead discourage those who are not old enough to both not read our website and to abstain from using any drugs, including alcohol - wait until you're older.
Your information that you provide to Smokedot is completely optional (with the exception of email address, which is used for account verification), and you can edit this information in the "My Account" section. Once you have your account, feel free to change the stored email address to a bogus value if you want; this will permanently erase all records of your real email address from our database. If you feel uneasy about providing your email address but still want an account, do that - even if we wanted to later retrieve your email address for some reason, we wouldn't be able to.
The ability to post to Smokedot is a priviledge, not a right. If you abuse the system, including, but not limited to, spamming either the comments section or the submissions queue, your account may be revoked or your IP address or subnet banned. We don't put up with that type of stuff on Smokedot and we want to keep the signal-to-noise ratio as high as possible.
Smokedot is primarily a discussion site for you guys, the readers. You can choose whether or not you want to participate in the conversation, or simply read the stories (but we prefer if you participate, it makes Smokedot better for everybody :) However, if you participate, please try to use logic and intelligence rather than flaming and AOL-speak ("fuck u, ur a idiot. plz go away." None of that.)
Comments may be deleted by an admin - see Trolls and Idiots for more details.
Regarding the further uses of your comments, we will not reprint your comments in any form, commercial or otherwise, without explicit written permission from the author.
I'll only say this once: if you don't have something intelligent or funny to say, don't say anything at all. Trolls[1] and asshole posts will be deleted on sight, and if you continue to do this, we will not hesitate to ban your IP address or subnet. We want to maintain our chilled out, friendly atmosphere and try to keep our discussions from degenerating into a disgusting mess, and because this is a privately owned and operated website, we can do something about it. If you don't like what somebody said or a story that was posted, explain why you don't like it. Trolling and flaming is unacceptable on Smokedot.
1. By trolls, I mean Slashdot-style trolls - spammers, idiots, and the like. "Real" trolls, those cleverly written to ignite people's emotions and promote discussion, are OK. If you have a problem with the deletion of a comment and think that the decision was not made fairly, email me and we'll talk about it further. But in the end, I (Cobain) have the final say in what constitutes abuse and may delete any comment I please. I won't, but I can.
Because the War on Drugs is still in full force in the United States, the use of currently illegal drugs is prosecuted heavily by law enforcement. The Smokedot authors recommend that you do not make a statement which could imply that you are planning to engage in an illegal activity, such as using an illegal substance, growing or producing an illegal substance , or selling an illegal substance (however, if you say, in the past tense, that you previously commited such a "crime," law enforcement cannot use that as evidence against you [but don't take that as the final word of the law. If you're in doubt, check with your attorney.]). Be careful about what you say here, because there is not a whole lot we can do in the event of a subpoena of Smokedot's logs and user database. Don't say something stupid , like "If anybody wants some of this weed I'm going to grow, email me." Don't ask where you can get drugs. If somebody asks where they can get drugs, ignore them. Be smart about what you say, and there won't be any problems.
Smokedot does not promote the use, manufacture, or sale of drugs which the United States' Government has deemed "illegal," although we do support changing the laws which make them illegal. However, many of our readers choose to use illegal drugs, and we provide a forum to discuss the issues involving their recreational drugs of choice. This is free speech, protected absolutely by the First Amendment to our Constitution.
If you have any questions or concerns regarding our privacy policy, feel free to email me at cobain@smokedot.org. I'll try to address your concerns as best I can.
