Author Terms of Service

PLEASE READ THE FOLLOWING CAREFULLY. THESE AUTHOR TERMS OF SERVICE, AS AMENDED FROM TIME TO TIME (“Terms”), ARE INCORPORATED INTO A BINDING AGREEMENT (“Agreement”) BETWEEN YOU (the person who is submitting or has submitted content to us, referred to as “You”) AND SKILLBITES LLC (referred to as “SkillBites”, or we or us).

By using the service available at www.skillbites.net and affiliated domains (collectively referred to as the “Site”) or otherwise offered by SkillBites, You agree to these Terms and all other terms in any agreement for the service or services you have requested that SkillBites provide for you in the Agreement (the “Service”).

SkillBites reserves the right to change any of the terms and conditions contained in these Terms or any policies or guidelines governing the Site or Service at any time and in its sole discretion. Any changes will be effective thirty (30) days after posting of the notice of the revisions on the Site. Each notice of changes to these Terms will be posted on the Site for thirty (30) days. You are responsible for reviewing the notice and any applicable changes. Changes to referenced policies and guidelines may be posted without any other notice to you. Your continued use of this site and the Service following SkillBites’ posting of any changes will constitute your acceptance of such changes or modifications. If you do not agree to any changes to these Terms, you must notify us in writing of the change which you do not accept and your intention to terminate pursuant to Section 19 below.

The following describes the rights and responsibilities of You, as the person or entity who posts a Work (as defined below), and SkillBites.

Some Definitions.
1. These Terms may use the term You, Author and Author’s Agent interchangeably, and unless the context indicates otherwise, each of these terms includes the other terms as well.
2. The term “Author” refers to the person who created the Work.
3. The term “Author’s Agent” refers to the Author’s duly authorized representative, who is fully authorized and empowered to act on behalf of the Author in all matters described in this Agreement, and who may be authorized to collect and receive directly the monies otherwise payable to Author.
4. Unless specifically indicated to refer to an individual Work, the term “Work” refers to each and every submission that You make to sell through SkillBites.
Eligibility. Use of the Service is limited to parties that lawfully can enter into and form contracts under applicable law. For example, minors are not allowed to use the Service. You represent and warrant that you have all requisite right, power and authority to enter into this Agreement and perform your obligations hereunder.
Contact Information. You are responsible for keeping the phone number, mailing address and email address associated with your account current. If you have an account, you are also responsible for keeping your account password confidential and secured and preventing unauthorized access to your account. You accept full responsibility for all activities that occur within your account while you are using the Service or the Site. You consent to receive electronic communications from SkillBites whether addressed to the email address associated with your account or posted on the Site. You acknowledge and agree that any communication via email or by postings on the Site satisfies any legal requirement that such communications be made in writing and that notice be given to you.
The Grant. You hereby grant and assign to SkillBites the right to bundle the Work with related content available for sale from SkillBites and use the Work as otherwise provided herein.
Work Delivery, Acceptance, and Withdrawal.
1. Delivery. All submissions (“Work”) delivered to SkillBites must be free of computer viruses, worms, and any other potentially harmful or disrupting code. Manuscripts are to be submitted in Microsoft Word as a .doc or .docx file, and illustrations and images must be submitted as individual high resolution jpg files. If You are providing your own book cover, the book cover files you submit must comply with the cover specifications of Amazon, IngramSparks and any other printer you request.
2. Acceptance of Services. You shall be deemed to accept the Services if you do not notify us of any failure of the Services to meet the specifications for such Services within five (5) business days from the date such Services are performed.
3. Work Rejection. SkillBites is entitled to determine what content we accept and distribute in our sole discretion. SkillBites does not accept, for instance, content that is illegal, libelous, infringing, offensive, harmful or potentially harmful, threatening, harassing, legally obscene, defamatory, or intentionally hateful in any regard. SkillBites also reserves the right to review any Work and return the Work to Author for editing before it agrees to publish the Work.
Marketing. You agree that we may use (and allow our contractors and agents to use) the cover of your Work in any and all marketing, without further need for permission from You, and without further royalties or payments to You. SkillBites reserves the right to distribute and display via download all front matter of a Work and up to fifteen percent (15%) of a Work’s content (nonexclusive of a Work’s front matter) free as a sampler.
Compliance with laws. You are responsible for knowing and following all local, national, or international laws regarding publishing content that are relevant to You or your business.
Pricing. If we offer your Work for sale in a different currency than US Dollars (the “Sale Currency”), we may convert the list price to the Sale Currency at an exchange rate determined by us, and convert the royalties from sales in the Sale Currency to US Dollars at an exchange rate determined by us.
Infringement.
1. Removal of Infringing or Defamatory Work of Author. SkillBites takes claims of infringement seriously and may take immediate action upon notice from someone claiming to be an infringed party. Generally, upon receipt of a written notice from a party claiming to have been infringed or defamed by an Author’s material (or someone purporting to be his agent, publisher, attorney in fact or assign), SkillBites will remove the Author’s Work and reserves the right to remove any and all information about the Author, the Author’s Work or the publisher from the Site.
2. Infringement by Others Upon Author’s Work. If an Author or copyright holder learns that a third party is violating the Author’s copyright or pirating or illegally distributing a SkillBites-published work, the Author shall inform SkillBites; however, it is the Author’s responsibility to seek relief from the offending parties. If the offending party’s work is published on SkillBites, SkillBites will remove it per Section 9(a) above.
3. Rights Clearances and Other Legal Matters. It is the Author’s responsibility to secure permissions to the Work prior to the time the Author submits such Work if any material from the Work belongs to, or has been licensed to, someone else.
Copyright. The copyright in the Work shall belong to the Author or the party that the Author cites as the copyright holder. The Author shall be solely responsible for filing its copyrights and any other intellectual property with the appropriate governmental body. It is the Author’s responsibility to place a copyright notice on the copyright page or some other prominent place in the Work.
Payment and Fees.
1. You agree to set aside adequate time to fulfill your obligations in a timely manner, including time to discuss the project, provide constructive criticism and feedback and answer questions as needed. If, within six months from the date of purchase, You have not delivered to SkillBites the Work or other materials required for us to perform the Services, or if the delivery of Services is delayed by more than six months due to delay on your part, you shall pay SkillBites the difference between the fee you paid for the Services and the then-current charge for such Services at the time you deliver the Work or other materials to SkillBites to perform the Services. If your delay extends beyond one year, SkillBites is entitled to terminate the agreement. Except as expressly provided in Section 19, in no event will SkillBites be required to refund any amounts paid to SkillBites.
2. If we schedule a meeting or call and you need to postpone that meeting or call, you must notify us at least 24 hours in advance of the scheduled meeting or call. If you postpone an in-person or telephonic meeting multiple times or provide less than 24 hours’ notice, you agree that we can charge you an additional $25 for each subsequent postponement.
3. Taxes. In the event that the sale or delivery of any Work in any format to any end user is subject to any sales, use, good and services, value added or similar tax under applicable law, SkillBites will collect such tax and remit it to the taxing authorities. You are responsible for any income or other taxes due and payable resulting from payments to You by SkillBites under this Agreement. Accordingly, unless otherwise stated, the amounts due to You hereunder are inclusive of any taxes that may apply to such payments. SkillBites maintains the right, however, to deduct or withhold any and all applicable taxes from amounts due by them to You, and the amounts due, as reduced by such deductions or withholdings, will constitute full payment and settlement to You.
4. Limitation on Claims. You may not maintain any action or proceeding against us in respect of any statement or payment unless You commence that action or suit within six (6) months after the date the statement or payment is rendered. Any such action or proceeding shall be limited to a determination of the amount of monies, if any, payable by us to You for the accounting periods in question, and your sole remedy shall be the recovery of those monies with no interest thereon.
Statements and Payments of Author Royalties: SkillBites pays You (or Author or Author’s Agent, as the case may be) Royalty Payments less any offsets by check or electronic funds transfer on a quarterly basis, approximately 60 days following the close of each calendar quarter, provided that accrued earnings are $50.00 or more. If accrued earnings are less than the threshold, SkillBites may delay payment until such quarterly period as the total earnings due exceed the threshold.
Author’s Warranties. The warranties and representations contained in this Agreement extend to Author and its licensees and successors and assigns. By submitting content to SkillBites, You agree that any violation of the warranties below may result in immediate deletion of your account and the forfeiture of accrued earnings, in addition to any other legal remedies that SkillBites may have.
1. By submitting Your Work to SkillBites for publication, You warrant and represent that the Work is complete and the Author has the full right, power, and authority to enter into this Agreement and to grant the rights granted herein.
2. You further warrant that the Work contains no materials which:
  1. violate any right of privacy, are libelous or violate any personal right or other right of any kind of any person or entity (this includes publishing a person’s private email address without their permission);
  2. would violate any of Your contracts or would disclose any information given to You on the understanding that it would not be published or disclosed;
  3. plagiarize or pirate any other work or infringe upon any copyright, trademark or other proprietary right;
  4. violate any local, state or federal laws;
  5. advocate hateful, discriminatory or racist views or actions toward others;
  6. advocate or condone violence against another person, whether or not the other party is a willing participant;
  7. advocate illegal activities;
  8. contain images or illustrations depicting individuals perpetrating graphic violence upon another individual or individuals;
  9. contain SEO keyword spam, either in your manuscript or your metadata tags; and
  10. contain graphic images of nudity (either photographic or illustrated) or persons involved in sex acts, or of children or underage minors engaged in sexual acts or situations, witnessing such situations, considering sexual acts, or thinking about sexual acts.
3. You further warrant the Work meets the following standards for originality:
  1. the Work does not include word-for-word scrapes – or is not a compilation – from Wikipedia or other public domain, government or commercial services;
  2. the Work does not and will not appear elsewhere on the Internet authored by people other than yourself;
  3. none of your Work content, either in part or in its entirety, is sourced from “Private Label” rights, articles, eBooks or information sources which license the same content to other people; and
  4. the Work does not contain or comprise machine-generated language translations (all translated books must be human-translated and edited, not translated by language translation software such as Google Translate);
4. You further warrant that
  1. You have expertise in the subject matter contained in the Work and that the content of the Work is accurate; and
  2. the use, with reasonable care and skill, of any instruction, material, or advice contained in the Work is not likely to result in personal injury or property damage and the Work includes appropriate warnings and safety precautions concerning any particular hazards that may be involved in the use of any such instruction, material or advice.
5. You further warrant that any electronic files You deliver to SkillBites are free of computer viruses, worms, and any other potentially harmful or disrupting code.
Indemnification.
1. General. You will indemnify and hold SkillBites and its licensees, successors and assigns, and its and their distributors, customers, officers, directors, members, employees and agents, harmless against any expense (including, but not limited to, reasonable attorneys’ fees and disbursements) or judgment, settlement or other liability arising out of any claim or legal proceeding asserting claims contrary to any warranty or representation made by You in this Agreement, or arising out of any claim or legal proceeding asserting claims concerning the content of any Work.
2. Notice of Claim. Upon receiving notice of any claim, demand, action or suit or other legal proceeding alleging facts inconsistent with or contrary to any of the warranties or representations contained herein or otherwise relating to the content of a Work, SkillBites shall have the right to withhold any sums payable to You or the Author in reasonable amounts as security for the payment of your potential obligations pursuant to the indemnity contained in this Section 14.
Ownership Rights. SkillBites retains all ownership rights in and to the copyrights and all other rights and interests in and to the Service, the Site, and all related content thereof. SkillBites is solely responsible for, and will have full discretion with respect to the terms, features, and operation of the Service and the marketing therefore, provided that our use of the Work pursuant to the rights granted herein will be subject to the terms of this Agreement. In the event that You provide suggestions, advice, ideas or other feedback (“Feedback”) to SkillBites in conjunction with the Service, SkillBites shall be free to use and exploit such Feedback without restriction and without any need to remunerate or otherwise compensate You. SkillBites retains the right to determine the content, appearance, design, functionality and all other aspects of the Site and the Service (including the right to re-design, modify, remove and alter the content, appearance, design, functionality, and other aspects of the Site and the Service and any element, aspect, portion or feature thereof, from time to time).
DRM, Piracy and the “Trust” System. SkillBites is a strong proponent of author’s rights, and the right of authors and copyright owners to receive compensation for their digitally published Works. Therefore, SkillBites strongly discourages piracy/infringement of Author Work and encourages customers to purchase licensed copies. Although there are some mechanisms that deter customers from piracy, they cannot completely prevent piracy or infringement. Moreover, customers resent the limitations that such mechanisms place on their ability to consume the Author’s Work and thus they detract from the customer’s interest in purchasing additional products. Accordingly, SkillBites does not publish works containing digital rights management schemes that limit the customer’s ability to consume Author’s Work as they see fit. Therefore, SkillBites cannot completely prevent piracy/infringement of Author’s Work. When You purchase publishing services from SkillBites, You are trusting the consumer to honor the legal copyright. You understand that SkillBites is distributing the Work in the manner described herein.
WARRANTY DISCLAIMER. The Service is provided to You “AS IS” and “WITH ALL FAULTS.” THE ENTIRE RISK AS TO THE USE OF THE SERVICE OR ANY MODIFICATIONS THERETO IS WITH YOU. SKILLBITES DOES NOT WARRANT THAT THE SITE WILL MEET YOUR REQUIREMENTS AND DOES NOT WARRANT THAT ANY PROOFREADING SERVICE PROVIDED TO YOU WILL BE 100% FREE OF ERROR. SKILLBITES MAKES NO OTHER REPRESENTATIONS OR WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING WITHOUT LIMITATION THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, TITLE, AND NON-INFRINGEMENT;
LIMITATION ON DAMAGES. IN NO CASE SHALL SKILLBITES BE LIABLE TO YOU, AUTHOR OR ANY OTHER THIRD PARTY FOR ANY SPECIAL, INCIDENTAL, INDIRECT, EXEMPLARY, PUNITIVE, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES OF ANY KIND INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, LOSSES OF BUSINESS, REVENUE OR ANTICIPATED PROFITS. THE FOREGOING LIMITATIONS OF LIABILITY WILL APPLY REGARDLESS OF THE CAUSE OF ACTION UNDER WHICH SUCH DAMAGES ARE SOUGHT, WHETHER FOR BREACH OF CONTRACT, NEGLIGENCE, STRICT LIABILITY, OR OTHER TORT, WHETHER OR NOT THE PARTIES WERE OR SHOULD HAVE BEEN AWARE OR ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE, REGARDLESS OF ANY NEGLIGENCE ON THE PART OF SKILLBITES AND REGARDLESS OF WHETHER ANY REMEDY FAILS OF ITS ESSENTIAL PURPOSE. IN NO CASE SHALL SKILLBITES OR ITS RETAILERS BE LIABLE FOR ERRORS OF ANY KIND THAT RESULT IN SHIPMENT OR AVAILABILITY DELAYS, MISPRICINGS, OR INACCURATE OR INCOMPLETE PRODUCT LISTINGS. It is your responsibility to monitor retailer listings and report errors to SkillBites, in which case SkillBites will strive to work with the retailer to correct the error. IN THE EVENT THAT SKILLBITES IS FOUND LIABLE FOR ANY DAMAGES, FOR ANY REASON WHATSOEVER, YOU HEREBY EXPRESSLY AGREE THAT IN NO EVENT WILL SKILLBITES’ LIABILITY TO YOU EXCEED THE AMOUNTS COLLECTED BY SKILLBITES FOR THE WORK IN QUESTION FOR THE SIX MONTH PERIOD PRECEDING THE EVENT GIVING RISE TO THE LIABILITY.
Term and Termination. The term of our Agreement will begin upon your acceptance of it and will continue until completion of the Services and payment of all amounts due, or the Agreement is earlier terminated by us or by You in accordance with these Terms or the termination provision in our Agreement. You are entitled to terminate the Agreement due to changes in these Terms by providing notice to us within thirty (30) days from the posting of the revised Terms on the Site. If the changes in these Terms are within one year from your execution of our Agreement, and you exercise your right to terminate the Agreement, we will refund to you the portion of any fees you have paid to us for Services not yet rendered. We are entitled to terminate or suspend this Agreement and your access to your Service account if you are in violation of any of the Terms, as determined in our discretion. We may also terminate your Service account at any time with or without notice to You, if we terminate the Service.
MISCELLANEOUS.
1. Neither Party shall be liable for failing or delaying performance of its obligations resulting from any condition beyond its reasonable control, including but not limited to, governmental action, acts of terrorism, earthquake, fire, flood or other acts of God, labor conditions, power failures, and Internet disturbances.
2. The Parties hereto are and shall remain independent contractors, and nothing herein shall be deemed to create a partnership or joint venture between the Parties hereto.
3. Any notice or other communication to be given hereunder will be in writing and given: (i) by us via email, or via a posting on the Site; or (ii) by You via email to info@skillbites.net with a hard copy by mail to SkillBites, Attention: General Counsel, PO Box 352, Valley Forge, PA 19481-0352 or to such other addresses as we may specify in the Service Policies. The date of receipt will, in the case of email, be deemed the date on which such notice is transmitted.
4. This Agreement is the entire agreement between the parties concerning the subject matter hereof.
5. This Agreement shall be governed by and construed in accordance with the substantive laws of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. If any portion of this Agreement is held invalid, the parties agree that such invalidity shall not affect the validity of the remaining portions of this Agreement.
6. No agency, partnership, joint venture or other joint relationship is created hereby.
7. Venue for all purposes hereunder shall be in Chester County, Pennsylvania, and the parties hereto hereby consent to such jurisdiction and venue. If any action or other legal proceeding relating to this Agreement or the enforcement of any provision of this Agreement is brought against any party hereto, the prevailing party shall be entitled to recover reasonable attorneys’ fees, costs and disbursements (in addition to any other relief to which the prevailing party may be entitled).
8. The following provisions of this Agreement will survive termination of this Agreement: Sections 5, 9, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17 and 18 and any other provisions that, by their nature, are intended to survive. All rights to Works acquired by customers will survive termination.
9. By using the Service, You acknowledge that You have read these Terms, understand them and will be bound by them.