Legal

Website terms

Last updated: April 2017

These terms govern your use of the sites (as defined below) including your participation in our online community (whether you're registered, contributing content or just browsing). Please read and check these terms regularly as they may change from time to time.

Using our sites
Lonely Planet trademarks and copyright
Contributing to the sites
Removal of content and termination of accounts
Reporting abuse
Reporting defamation
Reporting copyright infringements
Your privacy
Liability

Using our sites:

By using any website owned and operated by Lonely Planet, such as Lonelyplanet.com or Budgettravel.com (‘the site/s’) you agree to be bound by these terms.

No commercial use of sites is permitted. You may use the sites for personal, non-commercial purposes only.

If you are under the age of 18 you need your parents' permission before using the sites or registering.

Our Community Guidelines apply to your use of the sites, so read them.

Lonely Planet trademarks and copyright

All content on the sites is owned by Lonely Planet Global Inc. (us) or licensed to us by our registered users and other licensees. You may not copy, store, scrape or use any part of our site without permission.

Our trade marks (including but not limited to the Lonely Planet, Thorn Tree and Budget Travel trade marks) may not be used in any way or for any purpose without our permission.

More information about our intellectual property, can be found here.

Contributing to the sites

If you engage with someone else’s application on a site (e.g. using or posting content on the application), an independent legal relationship is formed between you and the application provider. An application provider may impose terms on your use of their application.

You agree that all of your contribution to the site is your own work. You license us the non-exclusive, perpetual, irrevocable, royalty-free, worldwide rights to reproduce, communicate, edit, store, adapt or otherwise use any content you upload to the site, including any feedback that you submit through the site, via third party applications available through the site, on the site and in our other products (your content). This includes the right to sublicense to others at our discretion.

You also consent to your content being altered, edited or adapted for such uses, or to ensure your content does not infringe these terms or breach the law, as we see fit. Although we generally attribute you as the author, it's not always possible. So you consent to us not attributing authorship to you, or only attributing your registered 'handle'. We will ask you before publishing your real name.

Prohibited content. You must ensure that your content does not contain anything that breaches any laws or rights, including by:

defaming any person
breaching any intellectual property rights
containing personal information (contrary to our privacy policy)
containing commercial advertising
containing excessively coarse language or content which would be rated R, RC or X by the Australian Classification Board (see www.classification.gov.au)

If you would like to include someone else's copyright material, trademark or other intellectual property in your content you must first obtain and keep their written permission.

Removal of content and termination of accounts

We may remove your content from the sites in our discretion.

We may terminate or suspend your registration (and any future accounts) if you have breached these terms multiple times or if the breach is serious.

Reporting abuse

IF YOU BELIEVE ANY CONTENT ON OUR SITES INFRINGES THESE TERMS, PLEASE USE THE REPORT ABUSE FUNCTION AVAILABLE THROUGHOUT THE SITES.

Reporting defamation

Pursuant to the Defamation Act 2013, a valid defamation notification must contain the following information:

Your name and email address;
The location of the comments on our website that you are referring to, including what the comments are and why you believe they are defamatory;
The meaning that you attribute to the comments and what aspects you believe are incorrect or just opinions;
Confirmation that you do not have sufficient contact details of the users who have posted the comments (the Poster/s) to pursue this matter directly with those Poster/s; and
Confirmation that you consent to Lonely Planet providing your name and/or email to the Posters.

Please note that your notification must be in writing and signed either by hardcopy or electronically by email to community@lonelyplanet.com with ‘Defamation notification’ in the subject line.

Upon receipt of a valid defamation notification, we will contact the Poster/s in relation to their comments.

Reporting copyright infringements

If you believe that any content on our sites infringes your copyright, please notify us by providing a DMCA notice to our designated copyright agent at dmca@lonelyplanet.com.

Your notification must include the following:

Identification of the copyrighted work or works you believe have been infringed and the holder of the copyright if you are acting on their behalf;
Identification of the material that you believe to be infringing including its location on the site;
Your contact information including name and address, e-mail and telephone number;
A statement that:
1. you believe in good faith that the use of the material was not authorised by the owner of the work, its agent, or the law;
2. the information in the notification is accurate, and under penalty of perjury, that you are, or are authorised to act on behalf of, the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed; and
3. you acknowledge that the notice will be sent to the user who uploaded the material at issue.
A physical or electronic signature of the copyright owner or a person authorised to act on their behalf.

Upon receipt of a valid DMCA notice, Lonely Planet will as soon as possible remove the infringing material and provide a copy of the notice to the user who uploaded the material.

Your privacy

The purposes for which we collect your personal information when you register or email us are: administering the site, sending you a password, contacting you about your content and keeping in touch with you.

You can access and update your personal information in the 'profile' section at any time.

We may disclose information about you to our authors (some of whom work on contract to us) and other Lonely Planet companies. If your content breaches these terms or the law, we may pass your details and IP address on to a law enforcement agency. Don't worry, we won't sell your contact details to marketing companies for spamming!

To find out more, please read our privacy policy.

Liability and Disclaimer

You must:

own all of the work you upload to the sites or have the permission from the owner of the content to upload it;
be able to grant Lonely Planet the rights under these Terms and Conditions (so, for example, you cannot grant us exclusive rights if you have already granted someone else exclusive rights); and
obtain the consent of the owner of any work incorporated into the content you upload on the sites;

because serious legal consequences can happen to you, Lonely Planet, and other parties if you do not (like legal action for infringement).

You indemnify Lonely Planet against all losses, costs and expenses directly incurred by Lonely Planet, in connection with a demand, allegation, action, proceeding or claim that you do not own all of your work, you are not able to grant Lonely Planet rights or you do not have the consent of an owner to incorporate their work into yours. Lonely Planet must take reasonable steps to mitigate its loss.

THE FOLLOWING APPLIES TO END USERS WHO LIVE OUTSIDE AUSTRALIA, THE UK AND THE EU:

WE ARE NOT RESPONSIBLE TO YOU OR ANYONE ELSE FOR ANY LOSS, DAMAGE, LIABILITY, COST OR EXPENSE SUFFERED IN CONNECTION WITH THE USE OF THE SITE OR ANY CONTENT OR SERVICES AVAILABLE VIA THE SITES. THE SITES ARE PROVIDED “AS IS”. THE INFORMATION ON THE SITES IS GENERAL AND MAY NOT BE SUITABLE FOR YOUR PARTICULAR NEEDS. YOU SHOULD VERIFY CRITICAL INFORMATION (LIKE ADVICE ABOUT VISAS AND HEALTH AND SAFETY) INDEPENDENTLY BEFORE YOU TRAVEL.

WE MAKE NO WARRANTIES OR REPRESENTATIONS ABOUT THE SITES OR THEIR CONTENT AND EXCLUDE, TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW, ANY LIABILITY WHICH MAY ARISE AS A RESULT OF THEIR USE. WE WILL NEVER BE LIABLE FOR ANY INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL OR CONSEQUENTIAL LOSS, OR LOSS OF PROFITS OR REVENUE ARISING OUT OF THE USE OF OUR SITES. YOU INDEMNIFY LONELY PLANET AGAINST EACH CLAIM, ACTION, PROCEEDING, JUDGMENT, DAMAGE, LOSS, EXPENSE OR LIABILITY INCURRED OR SUFFERED BY, OR BROUGHT, MADE OR RECOVERED AGAINST US IN CONNECTION WITH ANY BREACH BY YOU OF THESE TERMS.

Nothing in this Agreement excludes liability for death or personal injury caused by negligence, or liability for fraudulent misrepresentation. Subject to the previous sentence, our liability to you under this Agreement is limited to resupply of the content or services accessed via the sites.

THE FOLLOWING APPLIES TO END USERS WHO LIVE WITHIN AUSTRALIA, THE UK AND THE EU:

WE USE REASONABLE CARE AND SKILL TO ENSURE THE ACCURACY OF THE INFORMATION PROVIDED ON THE SITES. INFORMATION CONTAINED ON THE SITES MAY NOT BE FULLY ACCURATE AND IS PROVIDED “AS IS”.

However, certain laws also provide non-excludable statutory guarantees, conditions or warranties for the supply of certain goods or services. Nothing in this Agreement is to be taken to exclude, restrict or modify any guarantee, condition or warranty that Lonely Planet is prohibited by law from excluding restricting or modifying.

Subject to your rights under law (which cannot be excluded), Lonely Planet:

DOES NOT WARRANT OR GUARANTEE THAT THE SITES WILL BE 100% ACCURATE OR CONTINUOUS AT ALL TIMES. THE INFORMATION CONTAINED ON THE SITE IS GENERAL AND MAY NOT BE SUITABLE FOR YOUR PARTICULAR NEEDS; and
is not responsible for:
- loss that was not reasonably foreseeable;
- loss that was not caused by Lonely Planet’s breach of contract or by Lonely Planet’s negligence;
- business losses (such as lost data, lost profits or business interruptions) or loss suffered by non-consumers;
- losses caused by factors which could reasonably be considered to be outside Lonely Planet’s control (such as faults in third party equipment); and
- any loss caused, or contributed to, by your breach of contract or your negligence.

Subject to the above paragraph, Lonely Planet is responsible for:

loss suffered by you as a result of a serious breach of contract by Lonely Planet if the loss was reasonably foreseeable by both you and Lonely Planet when this Agreement was entered into; and
damage to property caused by Lonely Planet’s negligence if the loss was reasonably foreseeable at the time when this Agreement was entered into.