Terms of Service

These Terms of Service (the “Terms”) govern access to and use of Still Mill™, including its website, archive, photograph pages, accounts, collections, research tools, messages, and related services (collectively, the “Service”). The Service is operated by The Synergy Experience LLC, an Indiana limited liability company (“The Synergy Experience,” “Still Mill,” “we,” “us,” or “our”). By accessing or using the Service, you agree to these Terms and the policies incorporated into them. If you do not agree, do not use the Service.

You must be at least 18 years old and legally able to enter into a binding agreement to create an account or submit content. The Service is not directed to children under 13. Institutions and organizations must authorize the individual accepting these Terms on their behalf.

You must provide accurate account information, safeguard your credentials, and promptly notify us of suspected unauthorized access. You are responsible for activity conducted through your account unless prohibited by law.

A new account ordinarily receives the Community Member role. Contributor, Identifier, Institution, moderator, and administrator permissions are separate and may require approval, invitation, training, verification, payment, or additional terms. Identifier access requires administrator approval or invitation and an active Identifier subscription when paid Identifier subscriptions become available. Approval alone does not guarantee continued access. We may change, limit, suspend, or revoke permissions to protect people, photographs, research integrity, or the Service.

Community Members may use available public features, including browsing, saving favorites, following activity, commenting where permitted, and suggesting an identity as a lead. A suggested identity is not an official identification. Only authorized users may conduct formal research, add structured evidence, manage identification cases, recommend verification, or advance a case status.

“User Content” includes photographs, scans, captions, dates, locations, names, family relationships, metadata, source citations, proposed identities, evidence, research notes, messages, comments, and collection descriptions. You remain responsible for your User Content. Do not submit content unless you have the rights and permissions necessary to do so and the submission complies with these Terms and the Contributor and Photograph Rights Agreement.

You must distinguish documented facts, reasonable inferences, family recollections, and unverified leads. You may not knowingly submit fabricated, misleading, unlawfully obtained, defamatory, invasive, or infringing material. Still Mill may label, limit, correct, hide, preserve as an audit record, or remove User Content when reasonably necessary for research integrity, safety, legal compliance, or administration.

You grant the licenses described in the Contributor and Photograph Rights Agreement. Those licenses allow Still Mill and its service providers to host, store, reproduce, format, resize, create thumbnails of, display, transmit, and associate submitted photographs and information with research activity as needed to operate, secure, improve, and explain the Service. Still Mill does not acquire ownership of your photographs merely because you submit them.

You may not:

• break the law or violate another person’s copyright, privacy, publicity, contractual, or other rights;
• impersonate another person or misrepresent your authority, affiliation, evidence, sources, identity, or credentials;
• harass, threaten, exploit, discriminate against, dox, or expose sensitive personal information about another person;
• upload malware, scrape the Service without written permission, interfere with security, test vulnerabilities without authorization, or bypass access controls;
• use photographs, metadata, or research from the Service to train or develop facial-recognition, biometric-identification, or artificial-intelligence systems without our prior written permission and all legally required permissions;
• sell, sublicense, republish, or commercially exploit another contributor’s content except as expressly permitted by the rights holder or applicable law; or
• use the Service to make eligibility, employment, housing, credit, insurance, law-enforcement, or other high-impact decisions about a living person.

Historical identification is uncertain. Status labels, confidence indicators, proposed identities, comments, and research histories represent evolving community research, not guaranteed facts. Still Mill does not guarantee that a photograph will be identified, that an identification is correct, that content will remain available permanently, or that the Service will be uninterrupted or error-free. Users should verify important conclusions through original records and qualified professionals.

The Service, including its software, original text, design, organization, trademarks, and non-user-created materials, is owned by or licensed to The Synergy Experience LLC and protected by applicable law. Subject to these Terms, we grant you a limited, revocable, nonexclusive, nontransferable license to use the Service for its intended personal, family-history, educational, archival, or approved institutional purposes. STILL MILL and Still Mill™ are trademarks of The Synergy Experience LLC. No trademark license is granted.

Copyright complaints and counter-notices must follow the Copyright and DMCA Policy. We may remove or disable access to disputed material and may terminate repeat infringers in appropriate circumstances.

Our Privacy Policy explains how we collect, use, disclose, retain, and protect personal information. Public photographs, public case information, public comments, contributor display names, and public research history may be visible to anyone and may be indexed or copied by others. Do not place private or sensitive information in public fields.

The Service may use or link to third-party hosting, authentication, analytics, payment, email, mapping, archival, genealogy, or research services. Those services operate under their own terms and privacy practices. Still Mill is not responsible for third-party services it does not control.

Paid Contributor and Identifier memberships are not currently available, and Still Mill is not currently collecting membership payments. Before billing begins, the checkout page will disclose the price, billing interval, automatic-renewal terms, cancellation method, and material restrictions, and users must affirmatively authorize the charge. The Cancellation and Refund Policy will apply to any paid membership.

You may stop using the Service at any time. Where account controls are available, you may request account closure. We may suspend or terminate an account or permission level for a violation of these Terms, legal risk, security risk, abuse, nonpayment after paid services begin, inactivity, or protection of the archive and community.

Account closure does not automatically erase public photographs, research histories, evidence logs, moderation records, transaction records, or content contributed to collaborative cases. We will evaluate removal, de-identification, retention, and legal-preservation obligations under the Privacy Policy and Contributor and Photograph Rights Agreement.

TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW, THE SERVICE IS PROVIDED “AS IS” AND “AS AVAILABLE.” THE SYNERGY EXPERIENCE LLC DISCLAIMS WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, TITLE, NON-INFRINGEMENT, ACCURACY, AND QUIET ENJOYMENT. Nothing in these Terms excludes a warranty or right that cannot lawfully be excluded.

TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW, THE SYNERGY EXPERIENCE LLC AND ITS MEMBERS, MANAGERS, EMPLOYEES, CONTRACTORS, AND AFFILIATES WILL NOT BE LIABLE FOR INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, CONSEQUENTIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR PUNITIVE DAMAGES; LOSS OF DATA, CONTENT, REPUTATION, PROFITS, OR OPPORTUNITY; OR RELIANCE ON A PROPOSED OR VERIFIED IDENTIFICATION. OUR TOTAL LIABILITY ARISING FROM THE SERVICE WILL NOT EXCEED THE GREATER OF $100 OR THE AMOUNT YOU PAID TO STILL MILL DURING THE 12 MONTHS BEFORE THE EVENT GIVING RISE TO THE CLAIM. These limits do not apply where prohibited by law.

To the extent permitted by law, you will defend, indemnify, and hold harmless The Synergy Experience LLC and its members, managers, employees, contractors, and affiliates from third-party claims, damages, liabilities, and reasonable costs arising from your User Content, your misuse of the Service, or your violation of these Terms or another person’s rights. This section does not require indemnification for our own unlawful conduct.

Indiana law governs these Terms, without regard to conflict-of-law principles, except where federal law applies or applicable consumer law requires otherwise. Any lawsuit that is not eligible for small-claims court must be brought in a state or federal court located in Marion County, Indiana, and the parties consent to that court’s jurisdiction. Before filing, the parties will make a good-faith effort to resolve the dispute by written notice and informal discussion for at least 30 days. This section does not prevent either party from seeking urgent injunctive relief or filing a legally required administrative complaint.

We may update these Terms. Material changes will be posted with a new effective date and, when legally required, additional notice or consent. If any provision is unenforceable, the remaining provisions remain effective. Our failure to enforce a provision is not a waiver. You may not assign your account or these Terms without our written consent; we may assign them in connection with a reorganization, financing, sale, or transfer of the Service. These Terms and incorporated policies are the entire agreement concerning the Service unless separate written terms apply.

Questions about these Terms may be sent to sce@thesynergyexperience.co.