Terms and Conditions

1. Scope and Operator

These Terms and Conditions govern the use of the Art platform (the "Platform"), a non-commercial web application accessible at https://art-is-what-you-need.de.

The Platform is operated by:

Paula Schwalm
Student, University of Applied Sciences Velika Gorica
Zagrebačka Ul. 5
10410 Velika Gorica
Croatia
E-Mail: paula.schwalm@mni.thm.de

By registering or using the Platform, you agree to these Terms. If you do not agree, please refrain from using the Platform.

2. Purpose of the Platform

Art is an editorial platform dedicated to art history, contemporary art, museum discovery, and art research. It was created as a semester project in the Advanced Web Programming and PHP Programming course at University of Applied Sciences Velika Gorica and is operated exclusively for educational and non-commercial purposes.

The Platform allows:

• Visitors to browse published articles, museum entries, and art categories
• Registered users (Editors) to create and manage editorial content
• Administrators to manage users, categories, and museums

3. Registration and User Accounts

3.1 Account Activation

After registration, new accounts are assigned the role Guest and require activation by an administrator before editorial features become available. We reserve the right to decline or revoke account activation without giving reasons.

3.2 Account Security

You are responsible for keeping your login credentials confidential. You must notify us immediately at paula.schwalm@mni.thm.de if you suspect unauthorised access to your account.

3.3 Account Termination

You may request the deletion of your account at any time via your profile settings or by contacting us. We reserve the right to suspend or permanently terminate accounts that violate these Terms.

4. User Roles and Permissions

Role	Permissions
Guest	Read access to public content; access to Research area; awaiting admin activation
Editor	Create, edit, and delete own articles; access dashboard
Admin	Full access: manage all content, users, categories, and museums

Role assignments are at the sole discretion of the platform administrators.

5. User-Generated Content

5.1 Responsibility

You are solely responsible for all content (articles, images, descriptions) you publish on the Platform. You warrant that your content does not infringe any third-party rights (including intellectual property rights) and does not violate applicable law.

5.2 Prohibited Content

The following content is strictly prohibited:

• Content that is unlawful, defamatory, obscene, or harassing
• Content that infringes copyrights, trademarks, or other intellectual property rights
• Spam, advertising, or unsolicited commercial communications
• Misinformation or deliberately false content
• Content containing malware, viruses, or malicious code

5.3 Licence Grant

By publishing content on the Platform, you grant the operator a non-exclusive, royalty-free, worldwide licence to display, store, and distribute the content for the purpose of operating the Platform. This licence terminates when the content is deleted.

5.4 Content Removal

We reserve the right to remove any content that violates these Terms or applicable law, without prior notice and without liability to you.

6. Images and Third-Party Media

When uploading images or embedding image URLs, you confirm that you hold the necessary rights or licences to use those images. The platform accepts no liability for copyright infringements caused by user-uploaded content.

Operator-provided images on this platform are sourced from:

• Pexels — free stock photography licensed under the Pexels Licence.
• Wikimedia Commons / Wikipedia — public domain and freely licenced artwork images. Each image is subject to the licence stated on its respective Wikimedia page.
• Art Institute of Chicago & Metropolitan Museum of Art APIs — open-access artwork images made available under a CC0 Public Domain Dedication.

Please use only images that are in the public domain or licenced under terms that permit reproduction and modification (e.g. Creative Commons).

7. Third-Party Open-Source Libraries

This platform is built with the following open-source tools and libraries:

Library	Licence	Purpose
Laravel	MIT	PHP web application framework
Livewire	MIT	Server-side reactive UI components
Alpine.js	MIT	Lightweight JavaScript interactions
Leaflet.js	BSD 2-Clause	Interactive museum map
Font Awesome Free	CC BY 4.0 / SIL OFL 1.1 / MIT	UI icons
Tailwind CSS	MIT	Utility-first CSS framework

8. RSS Feeds — Third-Party Content Disclaimer

The Discover section of this Platform aggregates publicly available RSS / Atom feeds from external art-related websites and displays their content (headlines, summaries, publication dates, and links to the original articles).

No liability for feed content. The operator of this Platform exercises no editorial control over the content of third-party RSS feeds. Feed items are reproduced automatically as published by their respective sources. The operator expressly assumes no liability for:

• The accuracy, completeness, or currency of aggregated feed content
• Copyright, trademark, or other intellectual property rights in feed content
• Offensive, unlawful, or harmful material within third-party feeds
• Availability or continuity of external feed sources
• Any damages arising from reliance on aggregated content

All RSS feed items include a link to the original source. The copyright in each aggregated item remains with its respective author or publisher. If you are a rights holder and believe that content displayed via RSS aggregation infringes your rights, please contact us at paula.schwalm@mni.thm.de and we will remove the relevant feed promptly.

Feed items are automatically deleted after 30 days.

9. Availability and Platform Changes

As a student project, the Platform is provided on a best-effort basis. We do not guarantee uninterrupted availability, a specific response time, or the long-term operation of the Platform. The Platform may be modified, suspended, or shut down at any time, especially after the conclusion of the academic semester.

10. Intellectual Property

All Platform code, design, and operator-created content are the intellectual property of the operator unless otherwise stated. The source code of this project is available on GitHub under the terms indicated in the repository.

11. Limitation of Liability

To the extent permitted by law, the operator shall not be liable for:

• Any indirect, incidental, or consequential damages arising from use of the Platform
• Loss of data or content
• Downtime or unavailability of the Platform
• Content published by other users
• Content or services accessible via external links

Liability for intentional misconduct or gross negligence remains unaffected (§ 309 Nr. 7 BGB).

12. Applicable Law and Jurisdiction

These Terms are governed by the laws of the Federal Republic of Germany, excluding the UN Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods (CISG). Where legally permissible, the place of jurisdiction is Gießen, Germany.

EU consumers benefit from the mandatory consumer protection laws of their country of residence. The European Commission's Online Dispute Resolution platform is available at ec.europa.eu/consumers/odr. We are not obliged to participate in alternative dispute resolution proceedings and do not voluntarily do so.

13. Severability

If any provision of these Terms is found to be unenforceable or invalid, the remaining provisions shall remain in full force and effect.

14. Amendments

We reserve the right to amend these Terms at any time. Significant changes will be communicated to registered users by e-mail or via a notice on the Platform. Continued use of the Platform after changes take effect constitutes acceptance of the revised Terms.

15. Contact

For any questions regarding these Terms, please contact us at paula.schwalm@mni.thm.de.