Effective 1 September 2026. By using Give Up Internet! (the "site") you agree to these terms. If you do not agree, please do not use the site. The terms are short because the site is simple; please read them anyway.
1. What the site is
Give Up Internet! is a dictionary of internet language and a blog about online culture. The dictionary is a community record: its headnotes are written by the editors, and the entries beneath them are contributed by readers and reflect those readers' views, memories and opinions. Nothing on the site is professional, legal, medical or financial advice.
2. Accuracy
We try hard to get origins and dates right, and we correct them when shown to be wrong. Even so, the site documents jokes, slang and memes whose histories are often disputed or unrecorded, and reader entries are published without prior fact-checking. The site is provided "as is", and we make no guarantee that any record, entry or blog post is complete, accurate or current.
3. Contributing entries
When you file an entry, vote, or send us material you:
- confirm that you wrote it or have the right to submit it, and that it does not infringe anyone's copyright, privacy or other rights;
- agree that it may be published on the site with the handle and date you gave, edited for length or clarity, moved under a different record, or removed at the editors' discretion;
- grant us a non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty-free licence to publish, reproduce and adapt it as part of the site and its archives, in any medium, for as long as the site exists;
- keep the copyright in what you wrote and may reuse it elsewhere.
You must not file entries that are defamatory, that harass or threaten anyone, that contain personal information about a private individual (including addresses, phone numbers, real names of pseudonymous people, or private images), that are spam or advertising, or that are illegal where you or we are located. Entries that break these rules will be removed and repeat offenders may be blocked from contributing.
Entries are opinions of their authors. The editors do not endorse them by publishing them.
4. Voting
Votes are counted once per visitor per item using a session identifier. Manipulating votes with scripts, multiple sessions or other means is not allowed; we may discard votes that look manipulated.
5. Using our content
Headnotes, blog posts, the site's design and its database are © 2008–2026 Give Up Internet! and its contributors. You may:
- quote short passages with a link back to the page you quoted;
- share links to any page freely;
- use the site's material for personal, educational and journalistic purposes with attribution.
You may not republish substantial parts of the dictionary or the blog, scrape the site to build a competing database, or use its content to train commercial machine-learning models without written permission. Requests for reuse beyond the above go through the contact page.
Images, GIFs and archived pages shown on record pages are embedded from third-party services (Giphy, the Internet Archive) and remain the property of their respective owners. Older blog posts may contain images belonging to third parties, reproduced for commentary and review; if you own one of them and object, contact us and we will remove it.
6. Trademarks and other people's memes
Names of products, platforms, games and people appear on the site because they are part of the record. Their use does not imply endorsement by or of their owners. Memes are, by nature, made of other people's work; where we know the original creator, we say so, and we correct attributions when told.
7. Removal requests
If a record or entry concerns you and is defamatory, exposes private information or infringes your rights, use the contact page with the address of the page and an explanation. We review such requests promptly. We do not remove records merely because a word is unflattering or its origin is unpleasant; documenting it is the point of the site.
8. Availability and changes
We may change, suspend or discontinue any part of the site at any time, including the dictionary's entry form and voting. We may change these terms; the effective date at the top will be updated and material changes will be noted on the blog. Continued use after a change means you accept it.
9. Liability
To the fullest extent permitted by law, Give Up Internet! and its editors are not liable for any loss or damage arising from your use of the site or reliance on its content, including content contributed by readers. Nothing in these terms limits liability that cannot be limited by law.
10. Governing law
These terms are governed by the laws of the country in which the site's publisher is established, and disputes will be handled by the courts there, without prejudice to any mandatory consumer protection you enjoy where you live.
11. Contact
Questions about these terms: contact page. See also the privacy policy and the about page.