International Working Dog Registry Terms of Service December 1, 2017
Definition of Terms and Statement of Agreed Upon Facts:
- The International Working Dog Breeding Association, hereinafter referred to as IWDBA, was incorporated under State of Texas, United States of America, law on May 12, 2004.
- The IWDBA was recognized by the Internal Revenue Service, Department of Treasury, United States Government as a 501(c)(3) non-profit charity on April 19, 2007.
- The International Working Dog Registry, hereinafter referred to as IWDR, is wholly and completely owned by IWDBA.
- For purposes of this agreement, phenotype data are defined as any physical or biological measurement made on an individual dog.
- A cooperative is defined as a group of working dog organizations or a group of private breeders who have agreed to work together. The group’s cooperation usually takes the form of
- A Data Cooperative, where the members pool data on all their dogs into one centralized database for the purpose of improving the accuracy of prediction for genetic merit with respect to a particular trait or phenotype, or
- A Breeding Cooperative, where the members agree to pool their genetic resources by placing them under control of one overall breeding program manager, who then makes all breeder selection decisions and all mating decisions.
- The purpose of IWDR is to gather into one central electronic repository all relevant phenotype data on a large number of dogs. Many dogs may be related by virtue of having ancestors in common. These common ancestors may be identified by traditional pedigrees or by genomic information derived from analysis of DNA. Pedigrees are defined as specific identification in a coded format to identify an exact dog as the sire and an exact bitch as the dam of each individual offspring. When the parents of an individual dog cannot be identified, those parents will be recorded as “unknown” or “missing” in the database, unless the presence of DNA-derived information otherwise provides incontrovertible proof of the identity of an otherwise unknown parent.
- Data stored in the IWDR central electronic repository will be used to calculate an estimated breeding value, hereinafter known as an EBV, which, for a specific phenotype, is a statistical prediction of relative genetic merit for each individual dog as a potential parent.
- Associated with each EBV is a corresponding accuracy level, which reflects the amount of information available from both pedigree and phenotypes to make the stated prediction. Accuracy values associated with each EBV will be published in the database, alongside the phenotype data recorded on each individual dog.
- IWDR, as an organizational entity, will offer no opinion about the suitability of using any particular dog or bitch as a parent for producing a new litter. Interpretation and use of EBVs is solely the responsibility of each organization that controls the welfare of a particular dog.
- IWDR is a “crowd-sourced” database, which means that all data entered into the system are placed there by end-users. This also means that all responsibility for the accuracy of each data item entered into the system rests with the person or organization who made the entry, and NOT with the IWDR dog owner.
- IWDR pledges that, to the best of its ability, the system will be operated using best operational management practices, including, but not limited to, the use of standard backup policies that keep a daily backup copy of the database on-site for at least 30 days. An additional backup copy of the database will be kept in an alternate storage service in the “cloud” that is owned and operated by a vendor who is completely separate and independent from the primary cloud-service provider.
- IWDR pledges that, to the best of their ability, its managers will use internationally recognized best practice procedures and software for completing the statistical calculations required to produce EBVs. Terms included in each statistical model fitted for a particular trait will be clearly defined and published on the IWDR website at: https://www.iwdr.org/.
- IWDR acknowledges that all data entered by a user group entity (referred to as “entity”, whether it be an organization or IWDR dog owner) through any user accounts associated with the “entity”, database administrators or previous owners, is the sole property of that “entity”.
- Persons or organizations choosing to enter data into IWDR do so with the understanding that the entity recorded as the “owner” of a dog has editing rights to enter and modify data stored about the individual dog.
- Unless provided by a duly executed exception managed by the IWDR software system, only the currently recorded first or primary owner of a dog will be enabled by the system to enter new phenotype measurements on an individual dog.
- All IWDR users from working dog organizations can view data available in the All Dogs tab. This includes abnormal and normal phenotypes for common health screening tests for any dog in the IWDR database including other working dog organizations and private breeders.
- Users from non-working dog entities can view data available in their breed’s tab. This includes normal phenotypes for common health screening tests for dogs that are not owned by working dog organizations.
- Owners have the option to share private phenotype data with a selected “entity” using IWDR. This option can be rescinded at the sole discretion of the owner.
- Only an authorized employee of an organization should release information on an individual dog to a larger audience than the employees of the organization. Tools available on the database website will enable IWDR users associated with the “entity” to release the information. An entity-associated user who releases IWDR information to a wider audience accepts full responsibility for any consequences that might develop as a result of his or her action to release that information.
- The display of EBVs on individual dogs will be limited according to the following rules:
- When the primary owner of a dog is a member of a cooperative, EBVs for that dog will be displayed according to terms specified by the cooperative.
- When the primary owner of a dog is not a member of a cooperative, EBVs will be displayed only to the currently recorded owner(s) and the breeder of a dog, unless the primary owner takes additional action to release EBVs to a wider audience of IWDR users.
Agreement and Endorsement
Agreement and Endorsement In light of the Facts stated above, I, the undersigned, operating as an employee or agent for my employer, identified below as ENTITY, agree to the following terms and conditions when accessing the IWDR database:
- By placing data into the central IWDR repository, ENTITY agrees to accept all risk arising from use of the system. These risks may include:
- data becoming corrupted or lost,
- total system failure due to either natural or manmade causes,
- loss of access to the system for an unknown length of time,
- other risks arising from forces outside control of IWDBA, and
- additional risks not explicitly enumerated herein.
- ENTITY, including all of its employees and other principals and IWDR users associated with the ENTITY, will hold blameless IWDBA, its Board of Directors, and all IWDBA employees, contractors, or volunteers involved in supporting or developing IWDR, for any uses made of data added to the repository, outcomes of dogs on which data are stored in the repository, loss of or integrity of data stored in the repository.
- ENTITY, including all of its employees and other principals and IWDR users associated with the ENTITY, accepts and acknowledges that the IWDR is a collaborative data repository wherein data are entered by users from around the world. Because users may come from countries where English is not their primary language, there may occur mistakes in data entry arising from user error, misunderstanding of language or other reasons. IWDR will take reasonable precautions to mitigate the possibility of erroneous data entering the database, but if such data do make it into primary storage, ENTITY agrees that it will hold blameless IWDBA, it Board of Directors, and all employees, contractors, or volunteers who help maintain the system.
- That accuracy of data entered is paramount to overall accuracy of EBVs; hence, ENTITY pledges to ensure that all data entered into the central repository on its behalf is both accurate and timely.
- That users associated with the ENTITY are allowed to add and edit records of the dogs where the ENTITY is the IWDR owner of the dog.
- That duly authenticated IWDR administrators have both the right and obligation to add and edit records as needed to maintain data accuracy, including the removal of duplicate records, the addition of ancestral records required to connect documented pedigree relationships, and other data scrubbing activities required to maintain accuracy and integrity of the data.
- That basic identification information and core phenotype data such as Behavior Checklists, Health Diagnoses, and other physical measurements will permanently remain in the database, as the presence of these records in the central repository materially contributes to the accuracy of EBVs derived from those data.
- That, through a duly authorized representative, an ENTITY is entitled to receive an annual electronic copy of the IWDR data where the ENTITY is the IWDR owner of the dog, transmitted at a mutually agreed upon time and in a mutually agreed upon format.
- That, should ENTITY choose to withdraw from IWDR, its private person and people relationship data can be deleted from IWDR without prejudice, upon receipt by IWDR of a duly authenticated request from an individual designated by ENTITY as authorized to make this request on behalf of the ENTITY.
- While IWDBA, including its Board of Directors, contractors, employees, and volunteers, strives to make the information on the IWDR and IWDBA website as timely and accurate as possible, IWDBA makes no claims, promises, or guarantees about the accuracy, completeness, or adequacy of the contents of this site for any specific purpose and expressly disclaims liability for errors and omissions in the contents on the site.
- ENTITY and each of its employees and other principals and IWDR users associated with the ENTITY agree and acknowledge that use of IWDR is voluntary.
- ENTITY and each of its employees and other principals associated with ENTITY agree and acknowledge that use of IWDR beyond January 1, 2018 will require a subscription and payment of associated fees in order to maintain ENTITY’S ongoing access to the system. If ENTITY employees are part of the Beta Test group using IWDR prior to January 1, 2018 and if an ENTITY fails to accept the Terms of Service, ENTITY will be billed monthly at an annualized rate based on the number of new litters entered in the previous month.