Terms of Use

2. Acceptance of Terms

These Terms of Use (the "Terms") are a binding agreement between you and Atticus Interactive Inc. ("Atticus," "we," "us," or "our").

By accessing or using Atticus's websites, mobile apps, or other products and services that link to these Terms (collectively, the "Services"), you:

• Acknowledge that you have read, understood, and agree to be bound by these Terms; and
• Agree to our Privacy Policy, which is incorporated into these Terms by reference.

If you do not agree to these Terms, you may not use the Services.

If you use the Services on behalf of a company or other legal entity, you represent that you have authority to bind that entity, and "you" will refer to that entity.

3. Eligibility; Private Beta Participation

3.1 Minimum Age

You must be at least 13 years old (or the minimum age of digital consent in your jurisdiction, if higher) to use the Services. If you are under the age of majority where you live, you may only use the Services with the consent and supervision of a parent or legal guardian who agrees to these Terms on your behalf. The Services are not intended for children under 13 (or under 16 in the EEA/UK).

3.2 Private Beta Status

The current version of Atticus is a private beta:

• Features are experimental and may be incomplete or unstable.
• We may monitor usage more closely than in a public release.
• We may modify, suspend, or terminate access (for all users or for you individually) at any time, with or without notice.

As a beta participant, we encourage (but do not require) you to:

• Report bugs, errors, or unexpected behavior to hello@readatticus.com;
• Provide feedback on your experience through any surveys or feedback tools we provide; and
• Let us know about any accuracy, safety, or content concerns you notice.

3.3 Institutional Access

If your access to the Services is provided through an educational institution or enterprise organization (an "Institution"):

• Your Institution may act as the data controller for your use of the Service, with Atticus acting as a data processor;
• Your Institution's policies (acceptable use, data retention, privacy, etc.) may supplement or modify these Terms;
• If there is a conflict between these Terms and your Institution's written agreement with Atticus, that institutional agreement will govern to the extent of the conflict; and
• Your Institution may have access to aggregated usage patterns and analytics in accordance with its agreement with Atticus.

4. Description of the Services

Atticus provides an AI-powered interactive reading platform that allows you to:

• Access and interact with audiobooks, eBooks, and digital textbooks;
• Ask questions and have AI-generated conversations about those books ("Book AI");
• Interact with AI representations of authors where available ("Author AI"); and
• Receive recommendations, summaries, explanations, and other AI-generated content.

We may offer different experiences for readers, authors, publishers, institutions, and other partners, which may be subject to additional or separate terms.

We reserve the right to modify, suspend, or discontinue any part of the Services at any time.

4.1 Voice Input Features

When you use voice input features within the Services:

• Recording Consent: By enabling voice input, you consent to the recording and processing of your voice solely for the purpose of generating text queries and interacting with Book Content and the Service.
• Processing: Voice recordings are transmitted to third-party speech recognition services for transcription. We do not create or store voiceprints, voice models, or biometric identifiers derived from your voice.
• Retention: Voice recordings are processed in real time and automatically deleted after transcription (typically within 24 hours). Only the resulting text query is retained as part of your conversation history, as described in our Privacy Policy.
• Third-Party Recording: You agree not to record, capture, or redistribute any audio generated by the Service, including AI-generated voice responses, without explicit written permission from Atticus and any applicable rights holders.
• Accuracy: Voice recognition accuracy may vary. You are responsible for reviewing transcribed queries before submission and for any actions you take based on AI responses.

5. Important AI & Safety Disclaimers

5.1 AI Limitations

The Services use artificial intelligence and other automated systems to generate responses. By using the Services, you understand and agree that AI-generated content may be incorrect, incomplete, misleading, offensive, or out of date and may "hallucinate" facts or citations.

5.2 No Professional Advice or Emergency Use

The Services and any AI-generated content are for informational and educational purposes only. They do not constitute medical, mental health, legal, tax, financial, or other professional advice, and you should not rely on them for decisions that could affect your health, finances, safety, legal rights, or similar important matters. The Services must not be used for emergencies of any kind. If you are experiencing an emergency, call your local emergency number immediately.

5.3 Author & Publisher Disclaimers and Configuration

Where the Services include "Author AI" or experiences branded with a particular author or publisher:

• Responses are generated by AI systems, not by the author in real time;
• Authors and publishers do not individually review or approve each response; and
• Nothing in the Services should be taken as a legally binding statement or promise by any author or publisher.

Authors and publishers who license content to Atticus may configure parameters for their AI representations, including topics or questions the AI will decline to address, tone and style, content exclusions or sensitive subject handling, and whether to enable cross-book synthesis with other titles. These configurations are set by rights holders and may change without notice.

6. Accounts, Registration & Security

To use certain features, you may need to create an account. You agree to provide accurate, current, and complete information; keep your login credentials confidential; and update your information as needed.

You are responsible for all activities that occur under your account. If you suspect unauthorized access, notify us promptly at hello@readatticus.com.

If you register or log in through a third-party service (such as Apple or Google), you authorize Atticus to access and use information that service provides (such as your name and email address) consistent with our Privacy Policy.

7. Subscriptions, Trials & Payments

During the private beta, access may be free, paid, or limited to certain features or invitees. If we charge for any portion of the Services, the applicable fees, billing schedules, trial periods, and cancellation terms will be described in the app or on our site or the applicable app store listing.

If you sign up through a third-party app store (such as Apple or Google), that provider's terms will govern billing, renewals, and cancellations. Except where required by law or explicitly stated otherwise, fees are non-refundable. We may change pricing or features from time to time; if a change materially affects an ongoing paid subscription, we will provide notice and an opportunity to cancel before the change applies to you.

8. Content & Intellectual Property

8.1 Definitions

• "Atticus Content" means all content we provide (other than Book Content), including software, designs, text, graphics, images, audio, video, and compilations.
• "Book Content" means books, audiobooks, ebooks, digital textbooks, articles, and other works provided by or on behalf of authors, publishers, or other rights holders through the Services.
• "User Content" means content you submit, upload, or create while using the Services, including questions, messages, notes, highlights, reviews, and uploaded materials.
• "AI Outputs" or "Generated Content" means content generated by the Services in response to your prompts, questions, or other inputs.

8.2 Ownership

As between you and Atticus:

• Atticus and its licensors own all rights, title, and interest in the Services and Atticus Content;
• Authors, publishers, and other licensors own all rights in Book Content and associated artwork, trademarks, and branding; and
• Subject to these Terms and applicable law, you own your User Content and, to the extent permitted by law and third-party rights, your AI Outputs—provided, however, that any Book Content quoted, excerpted, or referenced within AI Outputs remains the intellectual property of the applicable rights holders.

Your ownership of AI Outputs does not grant you any rights to the underlying Book Content beyond personal, non-commercial use within the Service. You may not republish, redistribute, or commercially exploit quoted Book Content extracted from AI Outputs without obtaining appropriate permissions from the rights holders.

8.3 Your License to Use the Services

Subject to your compliance with these Terms, Atticus grants you a personal, limited, non-exclusive, revocable, non-transferable, non-sublicensable license to access and use the Services and Atticus Content for your own personal, non-commercial use. You may access your Atticus library and conversation history from multiple personal devices registered to your account. Your license is personal to you and may not be shared with or transferred to others.

This license does not permit you to copy, reproduce, distribute, publicly perform, or publicly display Book Content or Atticus Content except as expressly allowed by the normal functionality of the Services; use automated systems to extract or download content at scale; or reverse engineer or attempt to derive the source code except where such restrictions are not permitted by law.

8.4 License You Grant to Atticus (User Content & AI Outputs)

By submitting User Content or using the Services to generate AI Outputs, you grant Atticus a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free, sublicensable, transferable license to host, store, process, reproduce, modify, translate, create derivative works from, display, and perform such content, and to use it to operate, maintain, secure, and improve the Services and develop new features, as described in the Privacy Policy.

We do not use your User Content, AI Outputs, or licensed Book Content to train general-purpose AI foundation models. Our agreements with AI infrastructure providers explicitly prohibit them from using data transmitted through Atticus for their own model training, and we select providers that offer zero-data-retention API configurations where available.

8.5 Respecting Book & Third-Party Rights

Book Content and other third-party content are licensed, not sold, to you. You agree to use Book Content only within the Services and only as permitted by these Terms and any applicable publisher or platform terms; not to remove or circumvent digital rights management or technical protections; and not to upload or use content that infringes, misappropriates, or violates any person's or entity's rights.

8.6 Content Availability

The availability of Book Content in the Services depends on our licensing agreements with publishers and authors, which may be modified or terminated at any time. Rights holders may withdraw their content from the Services at any time, and we may also remove content for legal, quality, or business reasons. We do not guarantee the continued availability of any specific title, author, or category of content.

If Book Content you have accessed is removed, your conversation history related to that content may be retained, but you may no longer be able to initiate new AI conversations using that content. Removal of individual titles does not entitle you to refunds of subscription fees; subscriptions provide access to the Service's catalog as it exists at any given time, not to specific titles.

8.7 Feedback

If you provide us with feedback, suggestions, bug reports, or ideas regarding the Services ("Feedback"), you grant Atticus a perpetual, irrevocable, worldwide, royalty-free license to use, modify, and incorporate such Feedback into the Services or other Atticus products without any obligation to you. Feedback does not include your Personal Information or User Content, which remain subject to our Privacy Policy.

9. Acceptable Use & User Conduct

You agree not to, and not to allow any third party to, misuse the Services. For example, you will not:

• Use the Services for any unlawful, harmful, fraudulent, or malicious purpose;
• Harass, threaten, or defame others, or promote violence, hatred, or discrimination;
• Attempt to gain unauthorized access to the Services or related systems;
• Interfere with or disrupt the operation of the Services (for example by overloading or spamming);
• Upload or share content that is illegal, obscene, hateful, or infringes others' rights;
• Use the Services to generate or distribute content that exploits or harms minors, facilitates human trafficking, encourages self-harm, or promotes terrorism or violent extremism;
• Use bots, scrapers, or similar tools to collect data beyond normal consumer use or to reconstruct a substantial portion of any book or content through repeated queries; or
• Impersonate any person or entity, or falsely claim or imply that AI-generated content was personally written, spoken, or endorsed by a specific author or publisher when that is not the case.

10. Third-Party Content & Links

The Services may display or link to third-party content, services, websites, or resources. Atticus does not control or endorse third-party content and is not responsible for it. Your use of third-party content and services is at your own risk and may be subject to additional terms and privacy policies.

11. Term, Suspension & Termination

These Terms remain in effect for as long as you use the Services or until terminated. We may, at our sole discretion and without liability, suspend or terminate your access to the Services if we reasonably believe that you have violated these Terms or applicable law; your use may cause harm or risk to Atticus, other users, or third parties; or continued availability of the Services is not commercially or technically feasible, including in the private beta.

For non-egregious violations, we may (but are not obligated to) provide you with written notice and a seven (7) day opportunity to cure before termination. You may stop using the Services at any time and may request account deletion as described in our Privacy Policy. Upon termination, your right to access the Services will cease, and certain sections of these Terms (including Sections 5 and 8–18) will survive.

12. Changes to the Services & to These Terms

We may update and improve the Services on an ongoing basis. We may also modify these Terms. If we make material changes, we will provide notice (for example via email, in-app notice, or by posting an updated version with a revised Effective Date). If you continue to use the Services after updated Terms become effective, you agree to the updated Terms. If you do not agree, you must stop using the Services.

13. Disclaimers

To the maximum extent permitted by law, the Services (including all content and AI-generated outputs) are provided on an "AS IS" and "AS AVAILABLE" basis, with all faults and without warranties of any kind. Atticus and its licensors expressly disclaim all warranties, whether express, implied, statutory, or otherwise, including implied warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, title, and non-infringement, and any warranties arising out of course of dealing or usage of trade. We do not guarantee the accuracy, completeness, reliability, availability, or security of the Services or any content, or that the Services will be uninterrupted or error-free.

Nothing in these Terms excludes or limits liability in ways that are not permitted under applicable law. If you are a consumer in the European Economic Area, United Kingdom, or other jurisdiction with mandatory consumer protection laws, your statutory rights are not affected by these disclaimers, and they apply only to the maximum extent permitted by applicable law.

14. Limitation of Liability

To the maximum extent permitted by law, Atticus and its affiliates, officers, directors, employees, agents, and licensors will not be liable for any indirect, incidental, consequential, special, exemplary, or punitive damages, or for any loss of profits, revenues, data, goodwill, or other intangible losses, arising out of or related to your use of (or inability to use) the Services, even if we have been advised of the possibility of such damages.

In no event will Atticus's total liability arising out of or relating to the Services exceed the greater of: (a) the amount you paid to Atticus (if any) for access to the Services in the twelve (12) months immediately preceding the event giving rise to the claim; or (b) one hundred U.S. dollars (US $100).

Nothing in these Terms excludes or limits liability that cannot be excluded or limited under applicable law (for example, liability for death or personal injury caused by negligence, or for intentional misconduct). If you are a consumer in the EEA, UK, or similar jurisdictions, these limitations apply only to the extent permitted by law.

15. Indemnification

You agree to indemnify, defend, and hold harmless Atticus and its affiliates, officers, directors, employees, and agents from and against any and all claims, liabilities, damages, losses, and expenses (including reasonable attorneys' fees) arising out of or related to your use of the Services, your User Content or AI Outputs, your violation of these Terms, or your violation of any rights of another person or entity. Atticus may, at your expense, assume the exclusive defense and control of any matter subject to indemnification, and you agree to cooperate with such defense.

16. Copyright Complaints (DMCA)

If you believe that any content in the Services infringes your copyright, you may submit a notice under the U.S. Digital Millennium Copyright Act ("DMCA") or similar laws. Your notice should include:

• Your physical or electronic signature;
• Identification of the copyrighted work claimed to have been infringed;
• Identification of the allegedly infringing material and reasonably sufficient information to locate it;
• Your contact information;
• A statement of good-faith belief that use of the material is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law; and
• A statement that the information is accurate and, under penalty of perjury, that you are authorized to act on behalf of the copyright owner.

DMCA Agent:
Atticus Interactive Inc.
Attn: DMCA Agent
Email: hello@readatticus.com

17. Governing Law & Dispute Resolution

17.1 Governing Law

These Terms and any dispute arising out of or relating to them or the Services will be governed by and construed in accordance with the laws of the State of Delaware, USA, without regard to its conflict-of-laws rules, except where mandatory local law requires otherwise.

17.2 Courts and Venue

Subject to applicable law, you and Atticus agree that any legal action or proceeding arising out of or relating to these Terms or the Services will be brought exclusively in the state or federal courts located in Los Angeles County, California, USA, and you and Atticus consent to the personal jurisdiction of those courts.

18. Miscellaneous

These Terms, together with the Privacy Policy and any additional terms presented within the Services, are the entire agreement between you and Atticus regarding the Services and supersede any prior agreements or understandings on that subject. Our failure to enforce any provision will not constitute a waiver of that provision. If any provision is held invalid or unenforceable, it will be enforced to the maximum extent permissible and the remaining provisions will remain in full force and effect.

You may not assign these Terms or your rights or obligations under them without our prior written consent. We may assign these Terms without restriction. We will not be liable for any delay or failure to perform resulting from causes beyond our reasonable control (including acts of God, war, terrorism, natural disasters, labor conditions, governmental actions, internet failures, or power outages). If these Terms are translated into other languages, the English version will control to the extent permitted by law.

19. Contact Us

If you have questions about these Terms or the Services, you can contact us at:

Email: hello@readatticus.com