The content and opinions expressed on Rice University’s blogs.rice.edu web pages do not necessarily reflect the views of, nor are they endorsed by, the university.

Terms of Service for Rice University’s blogs.rice.edu

The purpose of Rice University’s blogs.rice.edu is to provide a supported academic blogging and web publishing service for creation and transfer of knowledge and advancing the university’s mission of academic inquiry, learning, and service. Faculty, staff, and students with active Rice NetIDs may log in to blogs.rice.edu to create blogs and websites. The service is based on WordPress, a popular and well-supported platform for blogging and web content management and powered by campuspress.com.

Blogs.rice.edu is a free service sponsored by the university and managed through the Office of Information Technology (OIT).

User login support is provided by the IT Help Desk, and assistance for pedagogical integration is offered by the staff of Academic Technology Services (ATS) in collaboration with the Center for Teaching Excellence.  The best resource for managing sites and content in blogs.rice.edu is the EduBlogs User Guide:  http://help.edublogs.org/user-guide/.

GENERAL CONDITIONS

Use of blogs.rice.edu constitutes agreement to adhere to the Appropriate Use of Computing Resources Policy (832-99) and the university’s Protection of Personal Information Policy (808). 

DATA ALLOCATION AND BLOG LIFE-EXPECTANCY

Each site has a size limit of 10 GB with a 50 MB single file upload limit.  The service automatically rejects uploads with file extensions that typically carry malware, such as .zip and .exe.

INACTIVE BLOGS

Blogs and web sites that are inactive for more than two years will be removed from the system. When students graduate, all their NetID accounts and sites are deactivated shortly after their May graduation date.  The deactivation includes content on blogs.rice.edu.  Department blogs can be administered by students but must have a faculty or staff administrator to prevent deactivation after the student workers graduate.

MAINTENANCE WINDOW

Rice University’s blogs.rice.edu is currently hosted under a contract with campuspress.com. As a hosted service, Rice University does not control the service provider’s maintenance windows, upgrades and other software services. In the event that we are notified of any changes to the system by the vendor, IT will provide updates to the university community through IT-Alerts mailing list (subscribe) and on our web site: it.rice.edu.

All blog users are responsible for reading and adhering to Rice University’s Appropriate Use and Protection of Personal Information policies.

Violations of these policies will be referred to the appropriate authorities.