General terms and conditions of business

1. General

1.1. The agreement at hand regulates under what terms and conditions the customer (hereinafter referred to as “Customer”) may use the photos, illustrations and other media content (hereinafter “contents”) made available by LimesMedia (hereinafter “LimesMedia”) on the website www.Limes.Media.
In case of conflict between the Customer licence agreement and the terms and conditions of use, the provisions of the Customer licence agreement at hand shall apply.

Regardless of any conflict contained herein, LimesMedia shall not incur any liability for damage, costs or losses which are due to changes to the pictures or the context in which the pictures are used by you.

2. Licences

2.1. Standard licence

2.1.1 LimesMedia hereby grants the Customer a non-exclusive licence to use the contents for the permitted uses in agreement with the terms and conditions below, which is unrestricted in terms of time and location.

2.1.2 All further rights concerning the contents and in respect of the contents, including all copyright shall remain with LimesMedia and/or the copyright holder of the contents.

2.1.3
(a) As a rule, the licence shall not be capable of being assigned.
(b) Exception: The right of use in respect of the contents may only be further assigned to one third party, to the extent that the further assignment takes place within the framework of fulfilment of a Customer project, for example through a media or Internet agency. Repeated use in projects shall not be permitted In such a case, an extended licence must be purchased from LimesMedia for this purpose.

2.1.4 Processing right The contents may be amended, provided it can be assured that the changes will not disadvantage the copyright holder, the illustrated model or other third parties, for example interference with the moral rights of the right holders, damage to reputation or property rights. Under no circumstances by the contents be warped by means of the processing.

2.1.5 Purpose of use

(a) The contents may be used by the Customer in all medias (for example online use of any kind, print use, TV, cinema, theatre, videogram, CD, DVD, interactive and multimedia use) in accordance with the purchased licence, with the restriction that these are not the basis or primary component of the product or draft (for example template) distributed by the Customer.
The said restriction shall apply to all contents within the framework of a re-selling product (goods which are not handed over free-of-charge, but rather are offered for sale, such as calendars, posters, postcards, canvases, mugs, playthings, cuddly toys, sporting articles, items of clothing, illustrated books, website, email or print templates or other items of merchandise). For use within the framework of a re-selling product, the Customer shall require an extended licence.

(b) Should the contents be identified with the “only for editorial purposes” endorsement, then the use of the contents shall only be permitted for editorial purposes (for example news, reporting, teaching materials).

2.2. Extended licences

2.2.1 Should the contents be identified with the “only for editorial purposes” endorsement, then the purchase of an extended licence shall not be possible.

2.2.2. Extended rights can be purchased in addition to the provisions of the standard licence The granting of rights in accordance with the standard licence shall remain the basis for this.

2.2.3 The rights set out below can be purchased individually or in an additional package to the standard licence as an extension, depending on the agreement.

(A) Unlimited use for one year (valid for 1 year): The licence can be assigned to associated companies as defined in §15 of the German Stock Corporation Act (AktG), as well as to franchise companies. Associated companies are legally independent businesses which are related to each other in a majority ownership and majority shareholding companies, dependent and controlling companies, competitor companies, mutually owned companies or contractual components of a company contract.

(B) Merchandising licence The licence contains the right of commercial exploitation by means of the manufacture and distribution of goods of all types (re-sell products such as calendars, posters, pictorials, books, games, sporting articles, items of clothing, pamphlets, sound carriers, buttons and other merchandising products, interactive and multimedia products, such as computer games for example).

(C) Template licence The contents may be used for an unlimited number of electronic drafts for electronic greeting cards or similar cards, for Internet or application developments, for PowerPoint or other presentation applications, for apps, screen savers, as well as for website, email or brochure patterns and other electronic and print drafts, and may be sublicensed together with the respective template.

(D) Cover licence The contents may be used to an unlimited number once for the production of a print article (for example book cover, magazine cover, return envelope etc).

(E) Exclusive licence The Customer shall have the option of requesting an exclusivity of the picture materials to be purchased. Thereby the picture materials concerned shall be withdrawn from sale for a period of time to be defined by both contracting parties. Licences which were already sold to other customers in the past shall not be affected.

2.3. Licence for layout pictures/contents

2.3.1 On request, LimesMedia shall grant a restricted use for all contents with or without watermarks for the sole purpose of production of designs, draft layouts and demo presentations in respect of the purchase of contents.
The free-of-charge layout pictures may not be used in end products, neither for internal nor external purposes. Layout pictures and contents may not be made publicly accessible.

2.4. Rights of use

2.4.1 The rights of use are assigned at the time of conclusion of the order process.

2.4.2 The said assignment is subject to the resolutory condition of payment of the due licence fee within the payment deadline stated in the invoice.

2.4.3 In case of late payment, the rights of use shall be returned to LimesMedia. The payment obligation of the Customer shall not be affected thereby. On payment the rights of use shall be regranted with retrospective effect of the time of the first assignment.

3. Copyright notice

3.1. Within the framework of use for editorial purposes in the manner which is customary for the respective use and to the extent that is technically possible in respect of the contents, the Customer shall name both LimesMedia and the copyright holder with its named title at the time of uploading of the contents in the following form: “© LimesMedia/Name of the copyright holder”.

4. Non-permitted use

The picture materials may not be used for:

(A) Pornographic, sexist, defamatory, slanderous or racist images or pictures which offend minorities or religions.

(B) A manner which degrades the copyright holder or represented person and if it can be assumed that the copyright holder or the represented person would not be in agreement with the publications (despite the presence of a so-called model release = approval declaration). For clarification: This concerns all pictures which represent the said person in a situation which could infringe their personality, including sexual or insinuated sexual acts or preferences, use or abuse of drugs, crimes, physical or mental abuse or suffering, as well as any other situation which would justifiably appear to be offensive to the person represented in the content (for example dating sites, escort services, erotic, pornographic images, pages which endanger children, advertising for contraceptives). In such a case, the express written consent of the person concerned must be obtained via LimesMedia (in consideration of a fixed fee).

(C) Unauthorised means of communications, either directly or indirectly (for example spamming).

(D) As a trademark, registered design, local or company identification as a part thereof.

(E) For any non-permitted or unlawful acts.

5. Assignment of the rights of use

5.1 The rights of use are assigned at the time of conclusion of the order process in accordance with the respective licence.

5.2 The said assignment is subject to the resolutory condition of payment of the due licence fee within the payment deadline stated in the invoice. The receipt of the payment by LimesMedia shall be decisive concerning compliance with the payment deadline.

5.3 In case of late payment, the rights of use shall be returned to LimesMedia. The payment obligation of the Customer shall not be affected thereby.

5.4 On payment, the rights of use shall be regranted with retrospective effect of the time of the first assignment.

6. Licence fee

6.1 The fee shall become due immediately following conclusion of the order process. The licence payment conditions of the terms of use shall apply in this respect.

6.2 Should the Customer not publish or use the contents, LimesMedia shall not be obliged to retake possession or refund the licence fee.

7. Restricted representations and warranties

7.1 The Customer shall be responsible for acquiring the necessary permits for the respective use of the contents, should these not be present. This shall apply in particular in respect of images of persons, artistic works or architecture, spaces which are not publicly accessible, as well as other images which contain names, companies, trademarks, registered design patents or copyright protected works (§2 of the German Copyright Act – UrhG) or other third party property rights.

7.2 To the extent that, in the picture description, the existence of a model approval (model release) is not stated in the data, the rights of use shall be issued without a model approval (model release). The Customer shall be responsible for obtaining all necessary approvals. However, LimesMedia is prepared to assist the Customer in obtaining such approvals (in consideration of a fixed fee).

7.3 To the extent that the existence of an ownership approval (property release) is not stated in the data concerning the contents of the website, the rights of use shall be issued without an ownership approval (property release). The Customer shall be responsible for obtaining all necessary approvals (see 7.4 for an approval in respective of any existing property rights alongside a property release). However, LimesMedia is prepared to assist the Customer in obtaining such approvals (in consideration of a fixed fee).

7.4 LimesMedia is not in possession of manufacturer approvals/permits concerning commercial products (for example vehicles, aircraft, packaging, designer clothing etc). However, approvals can often be obtained on a case-by-case basis. The Customer shall be solely responsible for ascertaining as to whether a permit of the holder of the property rights is necessary in connection with a corresponding use of the contents. The Customer shall be responsible for obtaining all necessary approvals. However, LimesMedia is prepared to assist the Customer in obtaining such approvals (in consideration of a fixed fee).

7.5 Regardless of the above, LimesMedia shall not be obliged to carry out such co-operation, not shall it be responsible for ensuring success.

7.6 The liability of LimesMedia, as well as that of its vicarious agents for breach of contractual obligations, as well as in tort, shall be limited to intention and gross negligence. This shall not apply in case of injury to life, body and health, claims due to breach of cardinal obligations and the reimbursement of default losses (§ 286 of the German Civil Code – BGB). To this extent, LimesMedia shall incur liability in accordance with its level of culpability or that of its vicarious agents.

7.7 The liability for the breach of obligations whose fulfilment enables proper fulfilment of the contract and on whose compliance the Customer may regularly rely (so-called cardinal obligations) shall be limited to the loss which is foreseeable and typical.

8. Closing provisions

8.1 For customers which are businessmen, legal persons under public law or a special fund under public law, the exclusive place of jurisdiction shall be Bad Homburg, Germany.

8.2 This contract shall be subject to the material law of the Federal Republic of Germany, to the exclusion of the provisions of the conflict of laws and the UN Convention on the International Sale of Goods.

8.3 Should any individual clauses be ineffective, the validity of the remaining provisions shall not be affected.

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