Regulation (EU) 2022/2065 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 19 October 2022 on a Single Market for Digital Services and amending Directive 2000/31/EC (Digital Services Act) (the “DSA”) applies to intermediary services, which includes a wide range of online services, including online platforms like Meetup. This page outlines certain information that we are required to provide under the DSA, including:
- A single point of contact for Meetup;
- Meetup’s legal representative in the EU;
- Information about the average monthly active recipients of our services within the EU;
- Information about how we recommend content;
- Information about how we moderate content;
- Information about how you can report content on Meetup and your rights to appeal any decisions made by us; and
- Misuse of our platform.
Single point of contact
The DSA requires Meetup to designate a single point of contact to enable direct communication with users in the EU and the European Commission, EU Member States’ authorities and the European Board for Digital Services regarding the application of the DSA. These parties can contact legal@meetup.com. Communications with this email address should be in English.
Legal representative
The DSA requires Meetup to designate a legal representative in one of the EU Member States in which we provide services. The following are the details of our legal representative:
Name: Bending Spoons Operations S.p.A.
Postal address: Via Nino Bonnet 10, 20154, Milan, Italy
Email address: dsa-representative@bendingspoons.com
Telephone number: +1 681 381 3307
Average monthly active recipients
717,000
How does Meetup recommend content?
We recommend content to you so that you can see groups and events that would be of most interest and relevance to you. The main parameters for recommending content to you are:
- Your location;
- Topics of interest that you have selected;
- Topics associated with groups you have joined or events you have attended;
- Your age, if you have provided it, and your gender;
- Popularity of groups and events with other users on Meetup;
- Your RSVP history on Meetup;
- Your search history; and
- Whether or not you have a photo on your account.
While we do not provide specific functionality to users for changing or influencing these parameters, users can change or influence their parameters through their activity on the platform, such as by changing their interests and by joining or leaving groups.
Content Moderation
We prohibit certain content, including illegal content. See in particular our Terms of Service, Organizer and Leadership Standards, Usage and Content Policies and Groups and Events Policies.
Meetup moderates content by:
- Reviewing reports from others; and
- Voluntary own-initiative monitoring.
Own-initiative moderation on Meetup is carried out by our bespoke account review software and third-party software for the purposes of spam and fraud detection and for identifying content that violates our Terms of Service. Accounts and content which are flagged by our tools may be automatically blocked and content that is reported or flagged through Meetup’s monitoring may be queued for review by our Trust & Safety team.
Statement of reasons
Where we have your electronic contact information, we will provide you with a statement of reasons if we impose any of the following restrictions on you because any content you have provided is illegal or violates our Terms of Service:
- any restrictions of the visibility of specific items of information provided by you, including removal of your content, disabling access to content, or demoting content;
- suspension, termination or other restriction of monetary payments;
- suspension or termination of the provision of the service to you in whole or in part; or
- suspension or termination of your account.
Appealing a decision
Where you submit a report and disagree with Meetup’s action(s) in response, or you received a statement of reasons, you can submit an appeal within 6 months of receiving the decision or statement of reasons. If you wish to appeal, you can do so at the following link: https://www.meetup.com/appeal. Please provide any details that are relevant to your appeal and that, in your view, warrant a different response from Meetup. If you are appealing our decision regarding a report that you submitted, please also include the Case ID for your report (referenced in the email notifying you of our decision on the report). We will consider your appeal in a timely, diligent manner and, where your appeal contains sufficient grounds, we will reverse our decision. We will notify you of the outcome of the appeal with our reasoned decision.
Note that after we have informed you of our decision on your appeal, you have the possibility of out-of-court dispute settlement with a body that has been certified in accordance with Article 21 of the DSA.
Misuse
If you frequently submit clearly baseless reports or appeals, Meetup may, following a prior warning if we have your electronic contact information, suspend your ability to submit notices and appeal decisions for a reasonable period of time (a first suspension will be for a period of 30 days, a second suspension will be for a period of 60 days and a third or subsequent suspension will be for a period of 1 year). If you have a Meetup account, a third or subsequent suspension will also include a full suspension of your account for a period of 1 year. An example of misuse would be submitting 3 or more clearly baseless reports or appeals in one month. A clearly baseless report or appeal is a report or appeal that is obviously unfounded, without any substantive analysis needed to reach this conclusion.