Terms of Service

1. The Service

HashtagPLUS is a social link-sharing and discussion platform (in the style of Hacker News or Reddit). Registered and anonymous users may submit URLs with optional captions, comment, vote, follow topics, and bookmark content. When a link is submitted, the Service automatically fetches the linked page and extracts a clean title, excerpt, and basic metadata (using Mozilla Readability), and generates topical hashtags using automated tools. The Service also ingests publicly available RSS/Atom feeds on a schedule and displays items from them.

We may add, change, or remove features at any time.

2. Eligibility (18+ Only)

The Service is intended only for individuals who are at least 18 years old. You must provide your date of birth at registration, and we enforce a server-side age check. By using the Service, you represent and warrant that you are at least 18. We do not knowingly permit anyone under 18 to create an account or use the Service. If we learn that an account belongs to someone under 18, we will terminate it.

3. Accounts, Registration, and Security

• Registration. Account creation requires a username, email address, date of birth, and a password (or use of passwordless magic-link sign-in). Some registration may require an invite.
• Email verification. New accounts are inactive until you verify your email address via the link we send you. You cannot sign in to a registered account until it is verified.
• Credentials. You are responsible for safeguarding your password and any magic-link sign-in emails. Passwords are stored only as salted bcrypt hashes; we never store your plaintext password.
• Responsibility. You are responsible for all activity under your account. Notify us promptly at [email protected] if you suspect unauthorized access.
• Anonymous use. The Service supports anonymous (no-login) posting. Anonymous activity is still subject to these Terms and our Community Guidelines, and is subject to abuse-prevention controls (including IP-based rate limiting).
• Accuracy. You agree to provide accurate information and to keep it current. One person may not maintain accounts to evade suspension or bans.

4. Acceptable Use

Your use of the Service must comply with our Community Guidelines, which are incorporated into these Terms by reference. Prohibited conduct includes (without limitation) posting illegal content, harassment, hate speech, spam or manipulation, doxxing, malware or phishing links, sexually explicit material, child sexual abuse material (zero tolerance), and intellectual-property infringement. We may remove content and suspend or terminate accounts that violate these Terms or the Community Guidelines.

5. User Content and License

“User Content” means anything you submit, including links, captions, comments, votes, and profile information.

• Ownership. You retain ownership of your User Content.
• License to us. You grant HashtagPLUS a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free, sublicensable license to host, store, reproduce, display, distribute, and create technical derivatives of your User Content solely as necessary to operate, provide, promote, and improve the Service (for example, displaying your posts in feeds, generating excerpts, and indexing for search). This license ends when you delete your User Content or your account, except for content already shared with others or where retention is required by law (see the Privacy Policy).
• Your responsibility. You represent that you have the rights necessary to submit your User Content and that it does not violate these Terms or any law or third-party right.

6. Automated and AI-Generated Content Disclaimer

Hashtags, suggested topics, extracted titles, and article excerpts are produced by automated systems, including third-party AI models and a statistical (TF-IDF) fallback. This automatically generated content may be inaccurate, incomplete, mislabeled, or unsuitable. It is provided for convenience only and does not represent our opinion or endorsement. You should not rely on it as authoritative. We are not responsible for errors in automatically generated metadata or hashtags.

7. Third-Party Links and Crawled Content

The Service displays links to third-party websites and stores excerpts and metadata extracted from those pages and from public RSS/Atom feeds. We do not control, endorse, or assume responsibility for any third-party site or its content. Crawled excerpts are shown to help users evaluate a link; the original publisher retains all rights to the underlying content. Your access of any linked site is at your own risk and subject to that site’s own terms.

8. Intellectual Property

The Service, including its software, design, logos, and trademarks (excluding User Content and third-party content), is owned by HashtagPLUS or its licensors and is protected by intellectual-property laws. We grant you a limited, revocable, non-transferable license to use the Service for its intended purpose. You may not copy, modify, reverse-engineer, scrape at scale, or create derivative works of the Service except as permitted by law.

9. Copyright (DMCA)

We respond to notices of alleged copyright infringement in accordance with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. See our DMCA Policy for how to submit a takedown notice or counter-notification, and for our repeat-infringer policy.

10. Suspension and Termination

We may suspend or terminate your access to the Service, remove content, or limit features at any time, with or without notice, if we believe you have violated these Terms or the Community Guidelines, created risk or legal exposure for us, or for any other lawful reason. You may stop using the Service and request account deletion at any time (see the Privacy Policy). Sections that by their nature should survive termination (including Sections 5–8 and 11–14) will survive.

11. Disclaimers of Warranties

THE SERVICE IS PROVIDED “AS IS” AND “AS AVAILABLE,” WITHOUT WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, TITLE, AND NON-INFRINGEMENT. WE DO NOT WARRANT THAT THE SERVICE WILL BE UNINTERRUPTED, SECURE, ERROR-FREE, OR FREE OF HARMFUL COMPONENTS, OR THAT ANY CONTENT (INCLUDING AUTOMATICALLY GENERATED HASHTAGS, EXCERPTS, OR THIRD-PARTY LINKS) IS ACCURATE OR RELIABLE. SOME JURISDICTIONS DO NOT ALLOW CERTAIN DISCLAIMERS, SO SOME OF THE ABOVE MAY NOT APPLY TO YOU.

12. Limitation of Liability

TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW, HASHTAGPLUS AND ITS OPERATORS, OFFICERS, EMPLOYEES, AND AGENTS WILL NOT BE LIABLE FOR ANY INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, CONSEQUENTIAL, OR PUNITIVE DAMAGES, OR ANY LOSS OF PROFITS, DATA, GOODWILL, OR OTHER INTANGIBLE LOSSES, ARISING OUT OF OR RELATED TO YOUR USE OF (OR INABILITY TO USE) THE SERVICE. OUR TOTAL AGGREGATE LIABILITY FOR ALL CLAIMS RELATING TO THE SERVICE WILL NOT EXCEED THE GREATER OF (A) THE AMOUNT YOU PAID US IN THE 12 MONTHS BEFORE THE CLAIM, OR (B) USD 100. SOME JURISDICTIONS DO NOT ALLOW THESE LIMITATIONS, SO THEY MAY NOT FULLY APPLY TO YOU.

13. Indemnification

You agree to indemnify and hold harmless HashtagPLUS and its operators, officers, employees, and agents from any claims, damages, liabilities, and expenses (including reasonable legal fees) arising out of your User Content, your use of the Service, or your violation of these Terms or applicable law.

14. Changes to These Terms

We may update these Terms from time to time. If we make material changes, we will update the effective date above and may provide additional notice (for example, by email or an in-product notice). Your continued use of the Service after changes take effect constitutes acceptance of the updated Terms.

15. Governing Law and Disputes

These Terms are governed by the laws of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, United States, without regard to conflict-of-laws rules. You agree that any dispute will be resolved in the state or federal courts located in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, United States, unless otherwise required by applicable law.

16. Miscellaneous

If any provision of these Terms is held unenforceable, the remaining provisions remain in effect. Our failure to enforce a provision is not a waiver. These Terms are the entire agreement between you and us regarding the Service. You may not assign these Terms without our consent; we may assign them in connection with a merger, acquisition, or sale of assets.

17. Contact

Questions about these Terms: [email protected].