General conditions

General Conditions
for contributions to the 2009 Olympic Congress

1. General

The next Olympic Congress (hereinafter “Congress”) will be held in Copenhagen from 3 to 5 October 2009.

The main goals of the Congress are to analyse certain aspects of the Olympic Movement and to determine the ideal conditions for ensuring its development.

In view of the Congress, the International Olympic Committee (hereinafter “IOC”) wishes to invite members of the Olympic Movement and the general public to share their reflections related to the five Congress themes: the athletes, the Olympic Games, the structure of the Olympic Movement, Olympism and Youth and the Digital Revolution.

To this end, a virtual Congress will be held from 1 October 2007 to 31 December 2008 on the IOC’s Extranet and Internet platforms (hereinafter “virtual Congress”).

Anyone can send the IOC a written electronic contribution (hereinafter “contribution”) in the framework of the virtual Congress.

2. Authors

2.1. Age and capacity to commit

The author certifies that he/she is at least 18 years old and that he/she is fully capable of committing his/her name, or, if the contrary applies, that he/she has the authorisation of his/her legal representative.

2.2. Author category

The following may submit a contribution to the virtual Congress:

Natural persons linked to the Olympic Movement (cf. Chapter I, Rule 1.1 of the Olympic Charter) who have registered with the virtual Congress (hereinafter “OM Authors”) between 1 October 2007 and 31 December 2008; and
the general public, i.e. internet users, between 1 January and 31 December 2008.

3. Contributions

3.1. Formal requirements

Authors will submit their contributions in electronic form, based on the model provided by the Congress secretariat via the extranet created for this purpose for the OM Authors, and based on the model provided by the Congress secretariat via the IOC internet platform created for this purpose for the public.

Contributions must not exceed 1,000 words, including references and footnotes. This is equivalent to approximately two A4 format pages.

To ensure that contributions can be understood by the largest number of people, authors are recommended to write using simple and clear language, with brief, concise sentences and avoiding language which is not easily accessible to a general audience.

Where possible, it is preferable to avoid using acronyms. When an abbreviation or acronym is used, the word(s) must be written out in full the first time, then the abbreviated form given in brackets.

References must be chosen carefully, and the number of them restricted.

3.2. Language of contributions

Contributions must be exclusively in French or English (or both). Any contribution in any other language will not be selected.

4. Personal data

Authors undertake to provide accurate personal data.

The IOC undertakes to use such personal data only for the purpose of sending to the authors information in relation to the virtual Congress or the Olympic Movement in general. There will be no use of personal data for commercial purposes.

If a contribution is published, the author’s family name, given name and country of residence will be mentioned.

Authors may request that the IOC destroys or rectifies any inaccurate data.

5. Assignment of copyright

Each author assigns to the IOC, free of charge and for the whole world, all his/her rights (including copyright) in relation to his/her contribution(s) as of the time and date of submission of the contribution to the virtual Congress.
As a consequence of such assignment, the IOC may:

use the editorial content of the contribution;
apply all or some of the ideas set out in the contribution;
reproduce or have the content of the contribution reproduced in any medium;
for editorial purposes (such as proof-reading) modify the contribution at any time;
make the contribution known to the public.

Each author agrees that he/she will not use, publish or otherwise make his/her contribution public for the whole period of the Congress up to and including the publication of the Final Congress Documents, which is scheduled to occur in the course of 2010. Afterwards, the author is hereby granted by the IOC the non-exclusive right to make use of his/her contribution.

Authors waive their right to any remuneration, given the purpose and context in which their contributions are published.

6. Editorial Committee

The Editorial Committee (hereinafter: the Committee) has the power to select the contributions intended for publication. It may reject any contribution without giving a reason. It may also return to an author for modification any contribution which does not meet the requirements set out under Article 3 above. It may also shorten contributions which exceed the length fixed under Article 3.1, paragraph 3 above.

The Committee will automatically disregard any contribution which:

is not related to the Congress call for contributions;
violates the personality rights of natural and legal persons;
constitutes advertising, publicity or promotion of any product, service, name, trademark or other designation of any person, company or organisation;
plagiarises texts.

7. Congress proceedings

The Congress proceedings will take the form of a document which will include contributions selected by the Committee. This document will be available in hard copy and electronic form.

The Congress proceedings will also include the official minutes of the discussions and the Congress Final Document.

All OM Authors contributions selected by the Committee will be published on the Olympic Movement extranet.

All contributions submitted by the public may be taken into account in the framework of a statistical analysis.

8. Final provisions

The IOC reserves the right to amend the present general conditions at any time. The revised general conditions will be posted on this page.

In sending his or her contribution, each author is deemed to have read, accepted and fully understood the contents of the present general conditions.

The present general conditions are subject to Swiss law. The exclusive seat of jurisdiction is Lausanne.

Lausanne, 16 August 2007

Modified, Lausanne, 1 October 2008

Virtual Olympic Congress