I Proclaim This a Disclaimer:
I am not a lawyer. I don’t want to be a lawyer and I don’t want to employ the services of a lawyer for the purposes of this entirely unofficial disclaimer. I don’t think I even have to bother with this, but some readers disagree, so here goes.
This entire website is written by one person. That person is me, Steve Wood.
At the bottom of every page on CTMQ you’ll note it says, “Copyright © 2006-Present Year Connecticut Museum Quest. All rights reserved.” My brother added that and I’m sure it’s very important. It also says, “ctmq.org is not affiliated with any museums anywhere and never will be.” I wrote that part and it’s important to me. I don’t work for a museum, I don’t even volunteer at any museums at present. I don’t work for the Connecticut Forest Parks & Forest Association or any of the stores, restaurants, farms, breweries, wineries, towns or anything I write about or visit for the purposes of this site. I pay for everything you read about on here. Everything. (Although, it must be noted, there are lots and lots of things anyone can get for free. I don’t pay for them. That would be stupid.)
Although I refer to CTMQ as a website rather than a blog, simply because of its structure, please keep in mind that everything I write is “point in time.” If I visited a museum in 2007 and wrote about it in 2007, I do not feel obligated to revisit said museum 6 years later solely to do an update or a rewrite. I just can’t do that. This site is a hobby, not a job – and therein lies the reason.
I make mistakes. I hardly take any notes anymore during my visits. I am a unpaid writer, not a paid reporter. I accept your corrections and will make the changes as necessary. I am opinionated, yes, but you wouldn’t read the blog if I was a robot. I hold some very strong beliefs, but usually try to avoid discussing them here. Except for my utter disdain for supernatural nonsense which seems to creep into the museum world now and again. I can’t help myself.
I lift pictures from other websites from time to time, to supplement my posts (and because my photos generally stink.) I give credit when I do that, but sometimes I give credit a paragraph or two before the picture appears. I don’t know if that’s proper, but it works for me. If I’ve stolen your picture and you have a problem with that, I’m sorry. Let me know and I’ll go steal someone else’s picture (with credit).
If you run a museum and disallow pictures, I will probably feign ignorance and snap off as many as I can until I get yelled at. And then I’ll take pictures from your website. If you alert me that this is a problem, I’ll stop.
More often, I lift text from other sources. I have no idea what the rules are about such things, but when I just take a boring factual sentence from a museum’s site or Wikipedia or something, I don’t credit it. I source newspaper and magazine articles though. And if I take more than a sentence or two from a site, I do try to source it. I’ve posted these snippets differently over the years – I usually blockquote them, but have come to realize this is difficult to even notice on some browsers/screen sizes due to the stylesheet CTMQ uses. Maybe I’ll italicize them from this point forward (Jan 2010). Again, if you feel I’ve used your words inappropriately, shoot me an email and I’ll rectify the situation.
Above all, I write this site for fun. Please take it in that spirit and enjoy it along with me and my family.
Steve (January 2010)
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