Welcome to CruiseDiva.com
General Terms of Service:
Privacy
Policy, Copyright, Bandwidth Theft
This site began as Making
Waves~~~ and has evolved into a
place to share our love of cruise travel with online friends. If you are
reading this, we're glad to call you a friend. We hope you find this web site entertaining and informative.
Your Privacy
We have no record of visitors to this site and,
other than numerical statistics, do not track usage. CruiseDiva.com does not
require registration, nor do we set "cookies" on your computer. Except for
subscribers to the SEA VIEWS Newsletter, we have no way to
collect email addresses. Linda is a travel writer,
not an HTML guru.
Your email and contributions
are welcomed, both
suggestions and questions, as well as cruise reviews. Linda responds to everyone as quickly as
possible and credit is given to our contributors. Be patient
when waiting for an email response or the appearance of your cruise review—we might be on a cruise!
Copyright
All work on this site is
copyrighted. The entire body of the site and original reviews,
articles, and photos belong to CruiseDiva.com and are not to be copied for republication
without first being granted permission. Write
to us for licensing information. Feel free to make one copy the printable versions of the Packing Lists
for personal use. Cruise reviews and other material submitted for inclusion on this
site are the property of their creators. All content submissions are credited to
the originators and copyright retained by them. Certain other information is in the
public domain (for example, how to obtain a passport and CDC vessel sanitation
scores). The page layout and
"style" of these pages are the product of Microsoft Front Page™, of
which we are a registered user. We suggest not ripping off our pal Bill Gates.
For one of the best
explanations about copyrights and the Internet, see 10
Big Myths About Copyright Explained. A good rule of thumb to keep you
out of trouble is, "if you didn't create it, don't copy it!" If you
want to share something on CruiseDiva.com, don't copy it. Instead, share the URL
to the page where it appears. Copyright violators are vigorously pursued.
Bandwidth Theft
Inappropriate bandwidth use has
become an increasing problem on the Internet, particularly regarding the use of
photographs and images. Are you wondering what exactly IS bandwidth? First,
every site on the Internet is "hosted" on a server, either for free
(such as GEO Cities) or for a fee paid to a private service. CruiseDiva.com is
hosted by a private service. We pay for and receive a limited amount of
bandwidth per month—in
other words, the total resources necessary to stay online. Each time a file
and/or photograph appears on your computer, it registers bandwidth usage on the
hosting service's Internet server. When the monthly resource is gone, we pay an
additional fee.
Why
is that important? Because some people inappropriately "direct link"
to our photographs from message boards and personal web sites. A "direct
link" drains the resources of the site where the photo is hosted. For
example, if you find an appealing photo on CruiseDiva.com and want it to appear
in message board posts on another web site, you might copy the URL (the image
source) into your "signature" on that message board. That is
"direct linking"—i.e.
bandwidth theft. Think of
it in terms of extending a garden hose to a neighbors' water spigot and watering
your lawn with resources being paid for by the neighbor.
This
is a warning to anyone who posts a "direct link" to CruiseDiva.com:
Due to the widespread problem and additional cost, we track bandwidth theft and
replace images we find being direct linked with a banner. If you want to share
an image on CruiseDiva.com with your friends, give them the URL to the page on
this site where it is located. DO NOT "DIRECT LINK" TO IMAGES ON THIS
SITE. Again, violators are
vigorously pursued.
General Info
Cruise information tends to be time
sensitive and subject to change. CruiseDiva.com accepts no responsibility for those
changes, although we do our best to keep articles and other facts as up-to-date as possible.
Check Cruise News and news archives for the
latest information.
In order for you to enjoy this site to the
fullest, we ask that you:
- Use MS
Internet Explorer 4.0 or Netscape
4.0 or higher versions.
- Have your browser's Java enabled. Some page
features will not appear properly if your Java setting is disabled.
- Have your browser's resolution set to a
minimum of 800x600 and 16bit High Color. This will prevent excessive
scrolling.
In today's computer world those are normal
settings. However, some online users rightfully choose to disable them or use
other settings. Some even use other browsers. Unfortunately we cannot make this site
work the way it is intended without using at least the minimum settings above.
(Our appreciation to HTML-guru Bob Hoover for
the aforementioned advice.)
Finally, we have no financial ties to the cruise
industry and are not travel agents. The cruise-related merchants listed
on this site in The Cruise Shop, Cruise
Guidebooks, and Magazine Rack are those we trust and personally use.
CruiseDiva.com carries paid advertising. We resisted commercialization as long
as possible, but Linda is a professional travel writer with expenses.
Now... let's MAKE WAVES~~~
About
CruiseDiva.com
PR
& Media Information and Inquiries
