This is an agreement between you (the customer) and Debiki AB. Debiki AB develops Talkyard, a discussion platform (see www.talkyard.io), and provides Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) hosting for Talkyard.
This agreement is for Debiki AB to host a Talkyard forum or Talkyard blog comments site for you — we call this your "Talkyard site", or just your "site", for short.
If you don't agree to these Terms, then don't use Debiki AB's services. If you want to, you could contact us (the people at Debiki AB) and tell us how we could change and improve these Terms:
support+legal@talkyard.io.
Shortcuts to some sections below:
(These Terms are based on Automattic's Terms of Service licensed under CC-By-SA 4.0, which you can find here at GitHub.)
These Terms govern your access to and use of the products and services we provide through or for your Talkyard site (collectively, "Services"). These Terms also govern visitors' access to and use of your Talkyard site. Please read these Terms carefully before accessing or using our Services. By creating a Talkyard site, or accessing or using any part of our Services, you agree to be bound by all of the Terms and all other operating rules, policies, and procedures that we may publish via the Services from time to time (collectively, the "Agreement"). You also agree that we may automatically change, update, or add on to our Services, and this Agreement will apply to any changes.
"We" and "Debiki" refer to Debiki AB, a company based in Sweden.
"You" means any individual or entity using our Services. If you use our (Debiki's) Services on behalf of another person or entity, you represent and warrant that you're authorized to accept the Agreement on that person's or entity's behalf, that by using using our Services you're accepting the Agreement on behalf of that person or entity, and that if you, or that person or entity, violates the Agreement, you and that person or entity agree to be responsible to us.
When using our Services requires an account, you agree to provide us with complete and accurate information and to keep the information current so that we can communicate with you about your account. We may need to send you emails about notable updates (like changes to these Terms or Privacy Policy), or to let you know about legal inquiries or complaints we receive about the ways you use our Services so you can make informed choices in response. We may limit your access to our Services until we're able to verify your account information, like your email address.
When you create a Talkyard site, we consider that to be an inquiry about our products and services, which means that we may also contact you to share more details about what we have to offer (i.e., marketing). If you aren't interested, you can opt out of marketing communications.
You're responsible and liable for all activity under your account and at your Talkyard site. You're also fully responsible for maintaining the security of your account (which includes keeping your password secure) and your Talkyard site (which includes not giving admin or moderator access to people you don't trust). We're not liable for any acts or omissions by you, including any damages of any kind incurred as a result of your acts or omissions. If you get fired because of something you write about your boss (if any), that's on you. Don't share or misuse your access credentials or grant admin or moderator rights to people you do not trust. And notify us immediately of any unauthorized uses of your account, or Talkyard site, or of any other breach of security. If we believe your account or site has been compromised, we may suspend or disable it. If you'd like to learn about how we handle the data you provide us, please see our Privacy Policy.
Our Services are not directed to children. You're not allowed to access or use our Services if you're under the age of 18. If you register as a user or otherwise use our Services, you represent that you're at least 18. You may use our Services only if you can legally form a binding contract with us. In other words, if you're under 18 years of age (or the legal age of majority where you live), you can only use our Services under the supervision of a parent or legal guardian who agrees to the Agreement.
We haven't reviewed, and can't review, all of the content (like text, photo, video, audio, code, computer software, items for sale, and other materials) posted to or made available through our Services by users or anyone else ("Content") or on websites that link to, or are linked from, our Services. We're not responsible for any use or effects of Content or third-party websites. So, for example:
Please note that additional third-party terms and conditions may apply to Content you download, copy, purchase, or use.
Our Talkyard site hosting and some of our other or related Services, are offered for a fee — we call these the "Paid Services". By using a Paid Service, you agree to pay the specified fees.
We (Debiki) don't handle payments directly ourselves — instead: Our order process is conducted by our online reseller Paddle.com. Paddle.com is the Merchant of Record for all our orders. Paddle provides all payments related customer service inquiries and handles returns. — Here you can read about Paddle.Your agreement with Paddle: https://paddle.com/legal-buyers/ (as of 2021-05-14).
You can contact us if you want a refund: support+payments@talkyard.io. We generally do not refund payments you did more than 30 days ago. It's our reseller, Paddle.com, who makes the actual refunds. We (Debiki) can click buttons in our Paddle dashboard, to make Paddle issue refunds.
You can also try contacting Paddle.com directly (i.e. our reseller) to maybe get a refund directly from them. As of April 2021, go to https://paddle.net and click the "Talk to us here" link. Then, a chat bot appears, it's named Kino and looks like a cat. Type "I want a refund" in the chat, then, you'll get to type the email address you used, when you started paying, and how much money you paid.
You agree to pay the fees for the price plan you use for your Talkyard site, see the pricing page. There may be one-time fees, recurring fees, or revenue-based fees. For recurring fees, Paddle will bill or charge you in an automatically-renewing interval (such as monthly, every third or sixth month, or annually), on a pre-pay basis until you cancel, which you can do at any time by contacting us, see the How to Terminate section.
If your payment fails, or you don't pay on time (for example, if you contact your bank or credit card company to decline or reverse the charge of fees for Paid Services), or we suspect a payment is fraudulent, we may immediately cancel or revoke your access to Paid Services without notice to you. (Probably we'd first try to contact you and let you know that the payments are failing though, so you'd get a chance to fix that.)
Automatic Renewal. To ensure uninterrupted service, recurring Paid Services are automatically renewed. This means that unless you cancel a Paid Service before the end of the applicable subscription period, it will automatically renew.
Cancelling Automatic Renewal. You can manage and cancel your Paid Services by contacting us — see How to Terminate.
Changing the price.We may change our fees at any time in accordance with these Terms and requirements under applicable law. This means that we may change our fees going forward, start charging fees for Services that were previously free, or remove or update features or functionality that were previously included in the fees. If you don't agree with the changes, you must cancel your Paid Service.
We love hearing from you and are always looking to improve our Services. When you share comments, ideas, or feedback with us, you agree that we're free to use them without any restriction or compensation to you (for example, we are not required to pay anything or mention you or notify you).
You represent and warrant that your use of our Services:
We don't own your content, and you retain all ownership rights you have in the content you post to your Talkyard site.
Be responsible in what Content you post and allow on your Talkyard site.
Your Content and conduct must not violate the Prohibited Uses — for example, no spam or ads, or harmful health advice, or hate speech.
We might place your site in read-and-clean mode (explanation follows), if you aren't moderating the contents at your site, for example, you disappear for vacation for some weeks, and don't tend to your site.
Your site being in read-and-clean mode means that people cannot post more to your site; instead, they can only delete things they've already posted. When you start moderating your site again, it'll leave read-and-clean mode and start working as normal again.
If you find a Talkyard site that you believe violates these Terms, please tell us about it: support+legal@talkyard.io.
If you create a Talkyard site via our hosting, you get free use of a Debiki-owned subdomain, like yourgroovysite.talkyard.site or mollys.talkyard.net. You must not engage in "domain squatting," claim an unreasonable number of subdomains (as determined by us), or sell access to any subdomains.
By uploading or sharing Content, or letting others do that, you grant us a worldwide, royalty-free, transferable, sub-licensable, and non-exclusive license to use, reproduce, modify, distribute, adapt, publicly display, and publish the Content solely for the purpose of providing and improving our products and Services and promoting your Talkyard site. (But we would not promote your site, unless you told us it's ok that we do that.)
If you delete Content, we'll use reasonable efforts to remove it from public view (or in the case of a private site, from view by the authorized visitors) on your site hosted by us, but you acknowledge that cached versions of the Content or references to the Content may not be immediately unavailable.
We may use a third-party service to measure your Talkyard site's audience and usage. By having your Talkyard site hosted by us, you agree to assign the traffic for your site to Debiki, and you authorize us to sign a Traffic Assignment Letter on your behalf. This means that your site's traffic may be included under Debiki, your site may not receive credit for traffic in the respective reports, and you must not assign your site's traffic to any other party. If we require additional documentation to verify ownership of your site or domain name, you agree to make reasonable efforts to provide it.
We offer free HTTPS on all Talkyard site hosted by us, including those using custom domains, currently (May 2021) via LetsEncrypt. By signing up and using a custom domain, you authorize us to act on the domain name registrant's behalf (by requesting the necessary certificates, for example) for the sole purpose of providing HTTPS on your Talkyard site.
We may display attribution text or links in your Talkyard site footer or toolbar or emails, noting that your site is powered by Talkyard and hosted by us, or attributing the creator of your theme (if any), for example.
If you believe any Content violates your copyright, please contact us: support+legal@talkyard.io. Note that Talkyard is open source — we are unable to process DCMA requests that refer to self hosted Talkyard sites.
The Agreement doesn't transfer any Debiki or third-party intellectual property to you, and all right, title, and interest in and to such property remains (as between Debiki and you) solely with Debiki. Talkyard, and any/all other trademarks, service marks, graphics, and logos used in connection with our websites or Services are trademarks or registered trademarks of Debiki (or Debiki's licensors). Other trademarks, service marks, graphics, and logos used in connection with our Services may be the trademarks of other third parties. Using our Services doesn't grant you any right or license to reproduce or otherwise use any Debiki or third-party trademarks.
We may update, change, or discontinue any aspect of our Services at any time, for example, add new features to Talkyard. Therefore, we sometimes have to change the terms under which the Services are offered. The Agreement may only be modified by a written amendment signed by an authorized executive of Debiki, or if Debiki posts a revised version.
If we make any significant changes to the Agreement, we'll contact you via email or via a banner visible to admins in your Talkyard site, at least 30 days before the changes become effective. We might also post in the Announcements: Legal category in the support forum. — If you don't read your emails or lose access to your email account, or don't visit your Talkyard site and don't see the banner, then the changes take effect nevertheless.
If we make other changes to the Agreement, we'll just post them here and update the "Last Updated" date. We might also post in the Announcements: Uninteresting category in the support forum — you can subscribe to new topics in that category, if you want to get notified about minor changes.
Your continued use of our Services after the new terms take effect will be subject to the new terms, so if you disagree with the changes in the new terms, you should stop using our Services. To the extent you have an existing subscription, you may be eligible for a refund.
You can stop using our Services at any time, or, if you use a Paid Service, you can cancel at any time, subject to the Fees, Payment, and Renewal section of these Terms.
Email us at support@talkyard.io, from your Talkyard site owner email address (the one you used when you created the site, unless you have changed it), to terminate the Agreement.
To avoid misunderstandings, it's better if you terminate by emailing us (see above). Anyway, you can alternatively contact our reseller, Paddle.com, and cancel your subscription with them. Then, we (Debiki) will get notified about that, and we won't get any more payments from you. Then we will eventually terminate the Agreement from our side (rather than keeping your Talkyard site up and running for free). Probably we'd first try to contact you, and ask what's going on — maybe you just forgot to update an old expired credit card number.
We wrote a short guide about how to end your subscription via Paddle's chat bot: Cancel subscription via reseller, Paddle. And, probably you'll never need to do this, but anyway, here are some ways to contact our reseller: (i.e. Paddle) How do I get in touch with Paddle support?.
We may terminate your access to all or any part of our Services at any time, with or without cause, with or without notice, effective immediately. We have the right (though not the obligation) to, in our sole discretion, (i) reclaim your username or Talkyard site's URL due to prolonged inactivity, (ii) refuse or remove any content that, in our reasonable opinion, violates the Agreement or any Debiki policy, or is in any way harmful or objectionable, (iii) ask you to make adjustments, restrict the resources your site uses, or terminate your access to the Services, if we believe your site's storage or bandwidth usage burdens our systems (which is rare and typically only occurs when a site is used for file sharing or storage), or (iv) terminate or deny access to and use of any of our Services to any individual or entity for any reason.
We will have no obligation to provide a refund of any fees previously paid. But if you ask us, we might refund you anyway, for the last 30 days, to stay on good terms with our reseller, Paddle.com, and to make a better impression on you and others. Contact us at support+payments@talkyard.io if you want a refund. Also see the Refunds section above.
After termination of the Agreement, we'll still try to keep your Talkyard site available in admin-only mode for about a month maybe two, so that you can export (parts of) it, and continue self-hosted, should you want to. — If, however, your site contains illegal things, we might need to delete it directly after termination.
Admin-only mode means that people cannot access the site (they just see a login dialog), except for the site admins, who can login and download a JSON dump of the site contents (Currently (May 2021) such dumps don't include all contents — for example, images and uploaded files are not included, but categories, posts, user accounts are included.)
Our Services are provided "as is." Debiki and its suppliers and licensors hereby disclaim all warranties of any kind, express or implied, including, without limitation, the warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose and non-infringement. Neither Debiki, nor its suppliers and licensors, makes any warranty that our Services will be error free or that access thereto will be continuous or uninterrupted. You understand that you download from, or otherwise obtain content or services through, our Services at your own discretion and risk.
Except to the extent any applicable law provides otherwise, the Agreement and any access to or use of our Services will be governed by the laws of Sweden. The proper venue for any disputes arising out of or relating to the Agreement and any access to or use of our Services will be the courts located in Stockholm, Sweden. The language to be used shall be Swedish, or English as applicable.
In no event will Debiki, or its suppliers, partners, or licensors, be liable with respect to any subject matter of the Agreement under any contract, negligence, strict liability or other legal or equitable theory for: (i) any special, incidental or consequential damages; (ii) the cost of procurement for substitute products or services; (iii) for interruption of use or loss or corruption of data; or (iv) for any amounts that exceed €50 or the fees paid by you to any of our resellers (currently Paddle.com) or to us directly, under the Agreement during the seven months period prior to the cause of action, whichever is greater. Debiki shall have no liability for any failure or delay due to matters beyond its reasonable control. The foregoing shall not apply to the extent prohibited by applicable law.
You agree to indemnify and hold harmless Debiki, its contractors, and its licensors, and their respective directors, officers, employees, and agents from and against any and all losses, liabilities, demands, damages, costs, claims, and expenses, including attorneys' fees, arising out of or related to your use of our Services, including but not limited to your violation of the Agreement or any agreement with a provider of third-party services used in connection with the Services, Content that you post, or that you let others post on your Talkyard site, and any e-commerce activities conducted through your or another user's site.
For example, if your Talkyard site members post illegal things, or forbidden copyrighted material — then you are liable for that, not Debiki. You, not we, are responsible for moderating your community.
You may not use the Services if such use is inconsistent with U.S. sanctions law or if you are on any list maintained by a U.S. government authority relating to designated, restricted or prohibited persons.
If you need a data processing agreement (DPA) with us for the GDPR requirements that apply to us as a data processor for your Talkyard site, please email us: support+legal@talkyard.io.
These Terms were originally written in English (US). We may translate these terms into other languages, and in the event of a conflict between a translated version of these Terms and the English version, the English version will control.
The Agreement (together with any other terms we provide that apply to any specific Service, e.g. the Pricing page and any price plans you're using) constitutes the entire agreement between Debiki and you concerning our Services.
If any part of the Agreement is unlawful, void, or unenforceable, that part is severable from the Agreement, and does not affect the validity or enforceability of the rest of the Agreement.
A waiver by either party of any term or condition of the Agreement or any breach thereof, in any one instance, will not waive such term or condition or any subsequent breach thereof.
Debiki may assign its rights under the Agreement without condition. You may only assign your rights under the Agreement with our prior written consent.