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General Terms and Conditions for the specialized information service "meRfi - Gut Microbiota (MGM)
meRfi - Medical Research Finder GmbH, represented by its managing director Prof. Dr. Hans Lentzen, Amselweg 7, 51503 Rösrath, Germany (hereinafter referred to as "meRfi GmbH") operates a database asin which part of its specialist information service "meRfi- Gut Microbiota (MGM)", specialist information on the subject of gut microbiota is published with comprehensive source references. The sources are in alphabetical order linked to the source published in scientific portals or internet services, thus enabling quick access to the relevant source. As an additional information option, the user is provided with an AI in which the user can enter questions on the topic. The AI searches the specialist information available in the database as well as in the sources' scientific articles, and thus the user gets a quick and scientifically provided sound answer to their question.
These General Terms and Conditions regulate the framework conditions for the use of the database. Deviating, conflicting or supplementary general terms and conditions of the user shall become even if is aware of them, not part of the contract unless their validity is expressly agreed to in writing.
1. Definition of "user" and "test customer"
(1) Users of the database are natural or legal persons who use the database of meRfi GmbH.
(2) User status presupposes that the natural or legal person has registered to use the database and has taken out a subscription to use the database.
(3) A test customer is a natural or legal person who the database during wishes to use and try out the test phase free (see section 2).
2. Free test phase
(1) The use of the database of meRfi GmbH is generally subject to a charge. However, meRfi GmbH grants the test customer (see section 1, paragraph 3) a free trial period.
(2) To use the free test phase, the test customer must click on the website www.merfi-online.com the "Register now and test free of charge" button, and register by providing their e-mail address and a password of their choice. Section 3, paragraphs 4 and 5 apply accordingly.
(3) Unless otherwise agreed, the duration of the test phase is 24 hours.
(4) The test phase ends automatically after 24 hours. Access to the database will then be blocked.
(5) If the test customer wishes to continue using the database after the 24 hours have expired, he must register with Stripe and take out a paid subscription (see section 3, paragraphs 2 - 5)
(6) The free trial period is only granted once. Multiple use is not permitted. If there is reasonable suspicion that a customer is attempting to contrary to the take out further test subscriptions above, meRfi is entitled to terminate all existing test subscriptions of the test customers concerned with immediate effect and to block all access.
(7) Sections 5, 6, 7, 8, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, and 15 shall apply accordingly to test customers.
(8) Section 16 applies with the proviso that meRfi GmbH reserves the right to amend these GTC at any time without informing the test client individually. However, any changes to the GTC will be generally on the website www.merfi-online.com, stating the reason, indicated for one month.
3. Registration and conclusion of contract
(1) In order to use the services offered by the database, the user must be registered (see section 2, paragraph 2).
(2) To a paid subscription with meRfi GmbH take out, the customer must log into their customer account by entering their email address and chosen password, click on the "Profile" button and then click on under the "Buy now" button "Subscription". The user can now select the desired subscription by clicking on the "Buy now" button and must enter their payment information. By clicking on the "Subscribe with obligation to pay" button, the user submits a binding subscription offer to take out which subscription they have selected
(3) Acceptance of the offer is made by meRfi GmbH in the form of an order confirmation, which the customer immediately after submission of the order is sent to the e-mail address provided by the customer
(4) Registration under a pseudonym or another name is not permitted
(5) The user undertakes to provide truthful information to meRfi GmbH
4. Remuneration, payment conditions, adjustment of remuneration
(1) The basis for the paid use of the database are the prices stated at the time of the order on the website www.merfi-online.com.
(2) All prices are - unless expressly stated as net prices - inclusive of the sales tax applicable at the time of the order.
(3) The remuneration for the selected subscription must be paid in advance for the subscription period and subsequent extension periods.
(4) The only payment method accepted at present is payment by credit card. If necessary, other payment methods can be selected in the future.
(5) The prices for a subscription shown on the website www.merfi-online.com can be adjusted at the reasonable discretion during the term or when the subscription is extended if the total costs for the respective subscription change after the subscription is concluded and the change was not foreseeable when the contract was concluded. The total costs include, in particular, the following costs:
● Costs of maintaining and further developing the technical infrastructure of the database
● Costs for the general administration of the database, in particular personnel deployment
● Costs arising from changes in the technical and legal framework (e.g., the need to update software and/or hardware components)
Increased costs for one cost type may only be used to adjust the price of existing, ongoing subscriptions if and to the extent that the total costs are not offset by lower costs in other cost types. If the total costs decrease, the price of the subscription must be reduced.
meRfi GmbH will inform of the price adjustment at least four weeks before the price adjustment comes into effect. The information will be sent by e-mail. The user affected by the price adjustment can object to the price adjustment in text form, i.e., by e-mail or letter, until the end of the day on which the price adjustment is to come into force. In its notification of the price adjustment, about meRfi GmbH will inform the objection period and the consequences of failing to object within the deadline. If the price adjustment is objected to in due time, the subscription will be continued at the originally agreed price. In this case, however, reserves the right to terminate the subscription at the end of the term (see section 9). If the price adjustment is not objected to or not objected to in due time, the subscription will be continued at the adjusted price.
5. Mandatory information for consumers: Right of withdrawal, online dispute resolution platform (OS platform) of the European Commission
(1) meRfi GmbH grants users who are consumers a right of withdrawal by the following cancellation policy.
According to Section 13 of the German Civil Code (BGB), a consumer is any natural person who concludes a legal transaction for a purpose that cannot be attributed to either their commercial or their independent professional activity.
Cancellation policy
Right of cancellation
You have the right to cancel this contract within fourteen days without giving any reason.
The cancellation period is fourteen days from the day on which you take out the subscription. To exercise your right of cancellation, you must inform us (meRfi - Medical Research Finder GmbH, Amselweg 7, D- 51503 Rösrath, telephone: +49 (0) 2205 73 84 01 0, email: support@merfi-online.com) of your decision to cancel this contract using a clear declaration (e.g., a letter sent by post, or email).
To meet the cancellation deadline, it is sufficient for you to send your notification of exercising your right of cancellation before the cancellation period has expired.
Consequences of revocation
If you revoke this contract, we will refund all payments that we have received from you promptly and at the latest within fourteen days from the day on which we received notification of your revocation of this contract. For this refund, we will use the same means of payment that you used for the original transaction unless something else was expressly agreed with you; under no circumstances will you be charged any fees for this refund.
Sample cancellation form
(If you want to cancel the contract, please fill out this form and send it back to us.)
- Ordered on: _______________
- Name of the consumer(s)
- Signature of the consumer(s)
- Date
(2) As an online company, we are obliged to refer you as a consumer to the online dispute resolution platform (ODR platform) of the European Commission. You can access this platform via the following link: https://webgate.ec.europa.eu/odr. Please note that we do not participate in dispute resolution proceedings before a consumer arbitration board.
6. Access to the database
(1) The user's access to the database is password-protected using the access data selected by the user during the registration process (email and self-selected password). The user is obliged to keep these access data secret and prevent unauthorized use by third parties. Passing on access data to third parties is not permitted.
(2) To ensure the user's authorization, a technical verification of authorization by meRfi GmbH is permitted upon each registration (login, password).
(3) meRfi GmbH reserves the right to deny the user access to the database if there are indications that a user is enabling unauthorized third parties to obtain services by fraud, the options of meRfi GmbH to verify the user's access authorization are restricted or the functionality or security of the database is impaired by the technologies used by the user. meRfi GmbH will contact the user before blocking access, inform him of the facts and the intended blocking, and allow him to remedy the situation within a reasonable period; this does not apply in the event of imminent danger.
(4) The user will immediately inform meRfi GmbH if he suspects or becomes aware of any misuse of access data, in particular the password. In the event of misuse, meRfi GmbH is entitled to block access to the database until the misuse has been clarified and stopped. The user is liable for any misuse for which he is responsible.
7. User's duty to cooperate
(1) The prerequisite for the proper use of the database is that the user has access to electronic media that meets the technical standards for using the database. The user is responsible for ensuring that the technical requirements for access to the database are created and maintained within his area of responsibility, for example, through a stable and powerful internet connection.
(2) The user undertakes to take suitable measures to secure his systems, in particular by using current protection mechanisms to ward off malware.
8. Scope and limitation of services within the database, updates, authority to make changes
(1) The user has access to all services presented on the meRfi GmbH website in relation to the database.
(2) The links to scientific literature included in the source information are third-party content. meRfi GmbH does not guarantee that the linked literature is always available on the scientific portals or Internet services during the booked usage period of the database. If a scientific portal or Internet service removes the specialist literature from its portal or Internet access or only makes the content available behind a paywall, the user cannot view this content via the link.
(3) The specialist content and the associated source information, together with links to the associated specialist literature, are constantly revised by meRfi GmbH to ensure they are up to date. However, meRfi GmbH does not guarantee that all content always corresponds to the current scientific status. The user is required to subject the content, including source information and links, to a plausibility check appropriate to its intended use.
(4) meRfi GmbH endeavours to continually adapt the database to current requirements. To ensure this, meRfi GmbH reserves the right to change the contents of the database at any time and without prior notification or consent from users. meRfi GmbH can therefore adapt, delete, or temporarily or permanently stop publishing parts of the website or the entire offer at its own discretion. Should such a change lead to a significant deterioration in the services to which the user is entitled, the user has the right to either demand a corresponding reduction in the fee that takes the degree of deterioration into account or to terminate the subscription without notice. This right of termination can be exercised within 2 months from the time of the change. meRfi GmbH is not liable if certain specialist literature is temporarily or permanently removed from the database.
9. Contract term and termination
(1) Subscriptions are concluded upon completion of the registration process on the website www.merfi-online.com and have a term of one month for a monthly subscription and one year for an annual subscription (so-called minimum term). If the subscription is not terminated by the end of the minimum term at the latest, the subscription will be extended by a further month for a one-month subscription and by a further year for an annual subscription.
(2) The booked subscription can be terminated by the user at any time, no later than the last day of the respective subscription period. The termination then takes place at the end of the subscription period selected by the user or, if the subscription has already been extended, at the end of the extension period.
(3) The termination must be made in text form (email) or by telephone directly to meRfi GmbH. Alternatively, the user has the option of terminating the contract on the website www.merfi-online.com. To do this, the user must go to their profile and click on the "Settings" button. Under Subscription, they can remove the tick from the "Automatically renew" box. Removing the tick and saving this setting counts as regular cancellation.
(4) The right to extraordinary termination for good cause remains unaffected.
(5) Upon termination of the contract concluded between meRfi GmbH and the user, meRfi GmbH is entitled to immediately block the user's access to the database.
(6) The right of withdrawal for consumers, according to section 5, remains unaffected.
10. Protection rights
(1) The user acknowledges that the database is a database work produced by the publisher or a database within the meaning of Sections 4 Paragraph 2 and 87 a Paragraph 1 of the Copyright Act. Associated computer programs are protected by Sections 69 a ff of the Copyright Act. The specialist information presented in alphabetical form in the database is copyrighted work within the meaning of Section 2 of the Copyright Act of meRfi GmbH.
(2) The linked specialist literature (external content) is copyrighted work within the meaning of Section 2 of the Copyright Act, which is freely accessible. As soon as the author no longer makes his works freely accessible via scientific portals and Internet services, the rights of the author are protected by the fact that the content can no longer be accessed via links integrated into the database. Third-party rights to the copyrighted works remain reserved.
(3) Within the framework of the AI integrated into the database, meRfi GmbH reserves the right to make copies of the specialist information contained in the database as well as the linked third-party content (scientific literature) for text and data mining. However, this only applies to the linked third-party content to the extent that the authors of these works have not declared a reservation within the meaning of Section 44 b Paragraph 3 of the Copyright Act.
11. User rights of use
(1) By the following provisions, natural persons and companies are granted the simple, non-exclusive, non-sublicensable, non-transferable right, limited to the duration of the selected subscription or its extension, to use the specialist information, the freely accessible scientific literature of third parties that can be found via links and the texts generated by the AI (hereinafter also "content") for both their own and commercial use. Use may include the following purposes:
a) natural persons
aa) Own use: The right of use entitles the user to research in the database, to retrieve the own and third-party content available in the database, and to read access. The user is also entitled to save the own and third-party content available in the database as well as the content generated by the AI once or to print it out once. In deviation from paragraph 1, the saved and printed content may also be kept on the user's server/computer after the extension and used as described under a) and b).
bb) Own publications: Content may generally be used in one's publications; this includes both scientific and commercial publications. However, about the specialist information available in the database and the specialist literature of third parties that can be accessed via links this only applies to the extent that the user correctly applies the rules of quotation law (Section 51 of the German Copyright Act).
b) for companies
aa) Own use: Reference is made to the provisions in Section 12 Paragraph 1 (a) (aa) with the exception that printing is permitted as often as the number of authorized users within the meaning of Section 1 Paragraph 3 of these General Terms and Conditions.
bb) Own publications: Content may be published on the company's website and in print media associated with the company (e.g., flyers, brochures, etc.). However, this only applies to the specialist information available in the database and the specialist literature of third parties that can be accessed via links to the extent that the user correctly applies the rules of quotation law (Section 51 of the German Copyright Act).
cc) Commercial purposes: The commercial use of the content includes the possibility of creating advertising texts and background information on a product from the content available in the database (specialist information and specialist literature as well as texts created by AI) and publishing them on the website, etc. for advertising purposes. However, this only applies to the specialist information available in the database and to the specialist literature of third parties that can be accessed via links to the extent that the user correctly applies the rules of quotation law (Section 51 of the German Copyright Act). AI-generated content may be published without a citation.
(2) Any use that goes beyond that described in paragraph 1 is prohibited and requires the prior separate written consent of meRfi GmbH unless it is permitted by mandatory legal regulations. The user is particularly prohibited from creating systematic collections from the research results or the content available in the database, making the full texts of the content available in the database accessible - except the texts generated by the AI in the database. In addition, it is not permitted to reproduce, distribute, or make publicly accessible essential parts of the database within the meaning of Section 87a of the German Copyright Act (UrhG) or to carry out such uses through automated IT applications; this also applies to reproductions for text and data mining. The reproduction of insignificant parts of the database is also prohibited, as the use of automated evaluations runs counter to the purpose of the database and unreasonably impairs the legitimate interests of meRfi GmbH. Any existing rights of the user to reproduction following Section 60 d of the German Copyright Act remain unaffected. It is also not permitted to use the contents of the database - except the AI contained in the database itself - in combination with an artificial intelligence tool. In particular, the user may not use robots, spiders, or devices or similar or equivalent manual processes to, for example, continuously and automatically search, scrape, extract, link, or index content.
(3) Rights of use for linked third-party content that is or will not be freely accessible according to the author's decision will not be granted due to meRfi GmbH not being the legal owner. This third-party content is generally not displayed in the database. Reference is made to Section 11, Paragraph 2 of these Terms and Conditions. If, however, content that is not freely accessible is linked via the database, and the user thereby gains access to third-party specialist literature that is no longer freely accessible, the third party's rights to their copyrighted works remain unaffected. The same applies if the user uses technical devices to circumvent access blocks on the scientific portals and Internet services without permission, e.g., by overcoming a payment barrier without authorization. In the latter case, the user releases meRfi GmbH from all claims that may be made against meRfi GmbH by third parties and bears the reasonable legal defense costs incurred by meRfi GmbH to defend against these claims.
(4) In the event of improper use, meRfi GmbH is entitled to block access to the database immediately. Further rights of meRfi GmbH, in particular the enforcement of claims for damages and the right to extraordinary termination for good cause, remain expressly reserved.
12. Data protection
(1) meRfi GmbH processes personal usage data (in particular, the registration data entered by the user) within the scope of the use of the database agreed with the user and as described in more detail in the data protection declaration of meRfi GmbH.
13. Claims in the event of defects
(1) merFi GmbH will remedy technical defects in the database within a reasonable period. Its responsibility only extends to the systems it operates and their connection to the Internet. There is no responsibility for the user's systems, hardware and software, or their Internet connections.
(2) meRfi GmbH constantly endeavors to keep the database up to date with the latest scientific findings. However, the completeness, accuracy, and timeliness of the content cannot be guaranteed.
(3) It is the customer's responsibility to report any defects, malfunctions, or damage immediately.
14. Liability
(1) meRfi GmbH endeavors to make the offer available continuously and without time restrictions. Nevertheless, temporary restrictions or failures may occur, e.g., due to maintenance work, technical faults, or force majeure. meRfi GmbH assumes no liability for damages caused by a limited availability of the database or if the database does not work correctly for other reasons unless these are due to gross negligence or intent on the part of meRfi GmbH.
(2) The use of the database is at the user's own risk. meRfii GmbH assumes no liability for any damage that may occur to the user's technical system, including its software and hardware, through the use of the database unless this damage is due to gross negligence or intent on the part of meRfi GmbH.
(3) As part of the database, scientific works by third parties are made available to the user via links. The author cited on the content is solely responsible for all content of the linked specialist literature. meRfi GmbH is not liable for this third-party content. This applies in particular to any incorrect information and incorrect data published as part of this third-party content.
(4) meRfi GmbH assumes no liability for the accuracy of the content generated by the AI. The user is responsible for checking this content for plausibility. When publishing content generated by the AI, the user is responsible for the content he publishes.
(5) meRfi GmbH hereby expressly declares that at the time a link ("hyperlink") to scientific literature was created on scientific portals and Internet services, no illegal content or legal violations were obviously recognizable on the linked pages. meRfi GmbH has no influence on the current and future design of the linked pages and their content and is not liable for them. Something different only applies if meRfi GmbH becomes aware of illegal content or legal violations on a linked website or is made aware of legal violations by third parties and does not delete the link.
(6) In all other respects, meRfi GmbH shall only be liable, regardless of the legal basis, within the framework of the statutory provisions following the following sections 14.1-12.3:
14.1. meRfi GmbH shall be liable without limitation for damages resulting from injury to life, body, or health, as well as for damages resulting from intent or gross negligence on the part of meRfi GmbH or a legal representative or vicarious agent.
14.2. meRfi GmbH shall be liable, limited to compensation for such damages that are typically foreseeable under the contract, for damages resulting from a slightly negligent breach of essential contractual obligations by it or one of its legal representatives or vicarious agents. Essential contractual obligations are obligations whose fulfillment makes the proper execution of the contract possible in the first place and whose compliance the user can rely on. The typical contractual damage in the event of data loss is limited to the typical recovery costs.
14.3. For other cases of slightly negligent conduct, meRfi GmbH’s liability is limited to EUR 5,000.00 per claim.
15. Validity, choice of law, and place of jurisdiction
(1) The validity of these general terms and conditions is not affected by any invalid individual provisions or parts thereof. If a provision of these general terms and conditions is invalid in whole or in part, it is to be replaced by a provision that corresponds as closely as possible to the invalid provision in economic and legal terms.
(2) All disputes in connection with the use of the database, regardless of the legal basis, are subject exclusively to the law of the Federal Republic of Germany, excluding all provisions of the conflict of laws that refer to another legal system. The application of the UN Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods is excluded.
(3) The exclusive place of jurisdiction for disputes with merchants or legal entities under public law is Cologne.
16 Right to change
(1) The General Terms and Conditions are available on the meRfi GmbH website at www.merfi-online.com and can be printed out.
(2) meRfi GmbH reserves the right to change these General Terms and Conditions. Users will be informed individually of any change to the General Terms and Conditions and will be allowed to object to the change within 6 weeks. The message will indicate that silence will be considered as consent to the change. If no objection is made within the 6 weeks, the amended General Terms and Conditions are deemed to have been accepted and become part of the contract between meRfi GmbH and the user. The 6-week period begins when the user receives the notification. It is the user's responsibility to ensure that the message can be delivered to the address provided.
Rösrath, March 7, 2025