Terms & Conditions

Contest Rules:

The Search for the XML Superstar (“The Contest”) is open to professionals (working full-time or part-time) and students (enrolled full-time or part-time at an accredited educational institution). Proof of enrollment in academic institution (student id and/or institution confirmation) may be required. Entrants who have not registered for the contest will not be eligible to submit an entry to the contest.

IDUG (International DB2 Users Group), subsidiaries, affiliates and related companies and each of their respective officers, directors, employees and agents, including but not limited to co-sponsors of the contest in any country will hereafter be referred to as the "contest parties".

Participants must be at least 18 years old. The Contest is open to individuals or teams of up to five people, but not to corporate entries. Employees of the “contest parties” and IBM, judges of the contest and their immediate family members and household members are not eligible to enter/participate in the contest.

All entrants agree to be bound by the official contest rules.

Contest Regulations:

All information and content is provided on an "as is" basis. None of the contest parties make any representations or warranties, express or implied, concerning use of the website, the content, or the completeness or accuracy of the content or information obtained from the website. All contest parties specifically disclaim all warranties with regard to the implied warranties of non-infringement, merchantability and fitness for a particular purpose. The contest parties do not warrant uninterrupted or error-free operation of any content, nor are they responsible for the results obtained from the use of the content or information obtained from the website.

Limitation of liability: In no event will any of the contest parties be liable to any party for any direct, indirect, special or other consequential damages for any use of this website, the use of content from this website, or on any other hyper linked web site, including, without limitation, any lost profits, business interruption, loss of programs or other data on your information handling system or otherwise, even if any of the contest parties are expressly advised of the possibility of such damages.

No recourse to judicial or other procedures: To the extent permitted by law, the rights to litigate, to seek injunctive relief or to make any other recourse to judicial or any other procedure in case of disputes or claims resulting from or in connection with this contest are hereby excluded, and any participant expressly waives any and all such rights.

IDUG reserves the absolute right to cancel or abandon the program and/or to change the terms and conditions contained herein and/or, any other rules and regulations in respect of the program at any time without any notice, without assigning any reason and without any liability whatsoever.

IDUG may, in its sole discretion, discontinue the website, any service provided on or through the website, as well as limit or discontinue access to any content posted on the website for any reason without notice. IDUG may terminate this agreement and your rights to access, use and download content from the website at any time, with or without cause, immediately and without notice.

Any attempt to deliberately damage any web site or to undermine the legitimate operation of this promotion is a violation of criminal and civil laws, and should such an attempt be made, IDUG reserves the right to seek remedies and damages to the fullest extent permitted by law.

In addition to these terms and conditions, the contest parties may impose other conditions specific to the program from time to time. Participants are requested to refer to such terms and conditions, which may be displayed or intimated from time to time.

Licensing:

By submitting entries, entrants grant the contest parties the right to publish, use, adapt, sell, edit and/or modify such entry (and electronic communications related to such entry) in any way, in commerce, and in any and all media worldwide, including but not limited to the internet, without limitation and without compensation to the entrants. Entrants also grant the contest parties a worldwide irrevocable, nonexclusive and royalty free right and license to use, have used, copy, reproduce, transfer, modify and/or display any information contained in their entry in whole or part and in any form without compensation.

Entries must be entrant's own original creations, must not infringe on third party rights, must not have won previous awards, must not have been posted on another web site prior to submission and must be suitable for publication. Winners may be required to sign an additional affidavit/license (except where prohibited) to this effect.

Further, the entrant may be required to post his or her code on www.sourceforge.org or some other web site and provide the contest parties a link to the posted code during or after the contest. Entrants may be required to complete and submit a Certificate of Originality, which must be reviewed and approved, prior to the entry being considered. Winners may be required to sign an additional affidavit/license (except where prohibited) to this effect.

Submissions:

The contest will be conducted mainly in English although some web pages may be translated into local languages. Submissions should be accompanied by documentation specifying the development environment details (hardware platform, operating system and version, programming language, version, IDE, etc). Accompanying documentation accompanying code submissions may in local languages, if the entrants prefer. Specific points will be awarded for clear, accurate and well-written documentation. Please see rules for specific contests for further details.

In addition, any shared libraries which are required should be specified explicitly. Any required platform libraries should be freely available. Contest judges will not purchase any development environments or libraries for the purpose of evaluating entries.

Submission of an entry constitutes your acceptance of the official rules of the contest. Entries are subject to verification and will be declared invalid if they are illegible, mechanically reproduced, mutilated, forged, falsified, altered or tampered with in any way. Entrants agree to abide by the contest rules and the decisions of the independent judging panel, which are final.

Prizes:

Odds of winning depend on the number and quality of entries received. All individual prizes will be awarded, provided at least 100 qualifying entries are received. Duplicate prizes will not be awarded. Judges' decisions are final in all matters relating to the contest. Recipients of prizes will be notified via email and will be required to provide shipping address and verification of eligibility. Incomplete registration information will void eligibility for the contest. Taxes on all prizes, if any, are the sole responsibility of the prizewinners.

By accepting prizes, winners agree to release the contest parties from any and all liability, loss or damage of any kind arising out of or in connection with winners' participation in this contest, or with respect to awarding, receipt, possession, use and/or misuse of any prize, or to participation in the contest or in prize-related activities.

By accepting prizes, winners acknowledge that the contest parties have neither made, nor are in any manner responsible or liable for, any warranty, representation or guarantee, expressed or implied in fact or in law, relative to prize or to any portion thereof, including but not limited to its quality, merchantability, mechanical condition, or fitness for a particular purpose.

No cash value or substitutions of prizes except by sponsor who may change prizes or models of equipment as availability changes or make such substitutions as necessary to meet export requirements. Prizes will be delivered to confirmed winners. Winners of trips may be reimbursed for travel expenses but not all incidental expenses associated with travel or any expenses not specified. Furthermore, winners are responsible for proper travel documentation and any expenses incurred in receiving such documentation.

The contest parties reserve the right to cancel or suspend this program should virus, bugs or other causes beyond its control corrupt the administration, security, or proper judging of the contest. Submission of an entry constitutes your acceptance of the conditions of the program.

Elimination: Any false information provided within the context of the Contest by any participant concerning identity, postal address, telephone number, ownership of right or non-compliance with these rules or the like may result in the immediate elimination of the participant from the Contest. Contest parties further reserves the right to disqualify any entry that it believes in its sole and unfettered discretion infringes upon or violates the rights of any third part or otherwise does not comply with these official rules.