Terms of service

These terms are an agreement between you and Whatcha, Inc., a Delaware corporation ("Whatcha", "we", "us"), and they govern your use of Sidelong, the writing tool at sidelong.app, including the browser extension, publishing, and newsletter delivery (together, the "service"). By creating an account you agree to them and to the privacy policy. Readers count too: by subscribing to a publication or browsing public pages, you agree to the parts of these terms that apply to readers and to the privacy policy. They're written to be read; if anything is unclear, ask us.

The short version

• Your work is yours: what you save, write, and publish.
• Quoting with credit is normal writing; copying wholesale isn't.
• Newsletters go only to people who actually asked for them.
• You can export everything and leave at any time.

Your account

You sign in with a code sent to your email address, so keeping that inbox secure is what keeps your account secure. One account per person, your details must be accurate and kept current, and you must be at least 13 years old (or the higher minimum age where you live). If you use Sidelong for a company, you confirm you have authority to bind it to these terms. You're responsible for everything that happens under your account, and you'll tell us promptly if you believe it's been compromised.

Your content

Everything you bring to Sidelong or make with it stays yours: your library, your notes, your drafts, your published work, your subscriber list. We claim no ownership of any of it.

To run the product we need your permission to host, store, reproduce, process, and display your content, and to pass it to the service providers who help us do that (they're listed in the privacy policy). Concretely, that permission covers: storing your library and its backups, generating summaries, transcripts, and search indexes, showing your content back to you, and, when you publish, showing the published piece to the world and delivering it to your subscribers. It exists solely to operate and improve the service for you, and it ends for content you delete, except for the short life of routine encrypted backups.

If you send us ideas or feedback about Sidelong, we can use them without obligation to you; that's the one thing in this section we get to keep.

Our stuff

The service itself (the software, design, and the Sidelong name and marks) belongs to Whatcha and its licensors. We give you a personal, non-exclusive, non-transferable right to use it under these terms. You may not copy, resell, or reverse-engineer the service except where the law says we can't stop you.

Saving content to your library

Your library is a private research tool, like a notebook of clippings. Saving an article, video, or book for your own reference is what it's for. The material you save remains the property of whoever made it, and saving it gives you no rights you didn't already have.

Publishing is where judgment comes in, and quoting is part of writing. Copyright law recognizes that: using short excerpts with credit to discuss, build on, or respond to a source (a line from a podcast, a passage from a book) is the traditional territory of fair use and fair dealing, and Sidelong's citations are built for exactly that, naming the source and linking to it. What that territory doesn't cover is substituting for the original: republishing entire articles, full transcripts, or so much of a work that readers no longer need it. You're responsible for staying on the right side of that line, and the copyright complaints process below applies when a rights holder believes you haven't.

Writing with Sidelong

Sidelong gives you drafting help that works from your own library. You direct it, you review what it produces, and you decide what goes out under your name. Summaries, transcripts, and drafting help can contain mistakes, so don't treat them as authoritative without checking, and don't rely on them as professional advice of any kind.

Publishing

When you publish with Sidelong, you are the publisher. You're responsible for what your pages and emails say, including accuracy, attribution, and legality, and you represent that you have the rights you need to publish it. If someone reports content that breaks the law or these terms, we may unpublish or remove it, and we'll tell you when we do. Content involving serious illegality may also be preserved and reported to the relevant authorities where the law requires or permits it.

Newsletters and subscriber lists

Email deliverability is shared infrastructure: every writer sends from Sidelong domains, so one bad list hurts everyone's ability to reach inboxes. The rules that protect it:

• Send only to people who gave you their address for this purpose. Purchased, rented, or scraped lists are prohibited; imports from new accounts are limited in size for their first week, and large imports are verified by a human before they can be sent to.
• Unsubscribes are honored automatically and permanently. Every email carries an unsubscribe link, and addresses that bounce or report spam stop receiving mail.
• If a publication's bounce or spam-report rates climb high enough to threaten other writers' delivery, Sidelong pauses its sending automatically. Contact support to review and restore it.
• You'll comply with the email laws that apply to your sending, such as CAN-SPAM and, where relevant, GDPR and CASL.

Your list remains yours throughout: you can export it as a CSV at any time, and we never use it for our own purposes.

Acceptable use

You may not use Sidelong to:

• send spam or any email the recipient didn't ask for;
• publish or distribute content that's illegal, that infringes others' intellectual property or privacy, or that harasses, defames, deceives, or impersonates;
• distribute malware, phishing, or other harmful code;
• probe, scan, overload, or interfere with the service, evade its limits or abuse protections, or access other people's accounts or private content;
• scrape or harvest the service or other users' content, including for training AI models;
• violate the terms of platforms you connect, such as X or LinkedIn, or use the service in violation of any applicable law, including export and sanctions laws.

Copyright complaints

We respect copyright and expect the same from writers on Sidelong. If you believe content published through the service infringes your copyright, send a notice to support@sidelong.app identifying the work, the infringing URL, your contact information, a statement of good-faith belief, and a statement under penalty of perjury that you're authorized to act, with your physical or electronic signature (the elements of a DMCA notice). We'll remove or disable access to infringing material, notify the writer, accept counter-notices as the DMCA provides, and terminate repeat infringers.

Notices can also reach our designated agent by mail or phone: Copyright Agent, Whatcha, Inc., 1521 Blake St STE 58575, Denver, CO 80202, (720) 893-0476. The same agent is registered in the U.S. Copyright Office's DMCA Designated Agent Directory.

Plans and billing

Sidelong has a free trial and paid monthly plans, billed in advance through Stripe at the prices and limits on the pricing page. Limits work like this: your plan includes allowances (such as a subscriber cap), and if your subscriber count grows past your plan's allowance, the difference is billed at your next renewal as posted. Subscriptions renew automatically each month until you cancel.

You can switch plans in the app and cancel any time; cancellation takes effect at the end of the paid period, and except where the law requires otherwise, payments aren't refunded for partial months. Prices can change; we'll give you notice before any increase affects you, and continuing past the effective date means you accept the new price. You're responsible for applicable taxes, and for keeping a valid payment method on file; we may suspend paid features if payment fails after we've notified you.

Connected services

Connecting X, LinkedIn, or other services is optional and governed by their own terms. You can revoke a connection whenever you like; we're not responsible for what those platforms do on their side, including changing or shutting off the access Sidelong depends on.

Leaving Sidelong

You can export your writing as Markdown or HTML and your subscriber list as CSV, then delete your account in Settings. Deletion removes your content from Sidelong, including published pages, as described in the privacy policy. No lock-in is the deal.

Changes to the service, suspension, and termination

Sidelong will evolve, and we may change, add, or discontinue features. We may suspend or terminate accounts that violate these terms or put other users or the service at risk, with notice unless the violation makes that unreasonable (active spam or abuse). Where it's fair to do so, we'll warn you and give you a chance to fix the problem first. On termination, your right to use the service ends and public pages come down; the sections of these terms that by their nature should survive (ownership, disclaimers, liability limits, disputes) survive. If we ever discontinue Sidelong itself, we'll give you reasonable time and tools to take your work with you.

Disclaimers

To the fullest extent the law allows, the service is provided "as is" and "as available", without warranties of any kind, express or implied, including merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, and non-infringement. We work hard to keep Sidelong fast, correct, and available, but we don't warrant that it will be uninterrupted, error-free, or secure, or that drafting help, summaries, or transcripts are accurate or complete. Back up what you can't afford to lose. Some jurisdictions don't allow certain warranty disclaimers, so parts of this section may not apply to you.

Limits on liability

To the fullest extent the law allows: neither Whatcha nor its officers, employees, or suppliers are liable for indirect, incidental, special, consequential, or punitive damages, or for lost profits, revenues, data, or goodwill, however arising, even if we've been advised such damages are possible; and our total liability for all claims relating to the service is capped at the amount you paid us in the twelve months before the claim arose, or 100 US dollars if you haven't paid us anything. Some jurisdictions don't allow certain liability limits, so parts of this section may not apply to you.

Indemnification

If a third party brings a claim against Whatcha arising from your content, your sending, or your breach of these terms, you'll defend and indemnify us against it, including reasonable attorneys' fees. We'll notify you promptly of any such claim and reasonably cooperate with you.

Governing law and disputes

These terms are governed by the laws of the State of Delaware, without regard to conflict-of-law rules. Before either of us files anything, we agree to try to resolve any dispute informally: raise it by email and give the other side 30 days to respond. If that fails, disputes will be resolved exclusively in the state or federal courts located in Delaware, and both sides consent to their jurisdiction.

General terms

These terms and the privacy policy are the entire agreement between us about the service. If part of them is found unenforceable, the rest stands. Not enforcing a provision isn't a waiver of it. You may not assign these terms without our consent; we may assign them in connection with a merger, acquisition, or sale of assets. Neither side is liable for delays caused by events beyond its reasonable control. We may give you notices by email to your account address or in the app, and you agree to receive them electronically.

Changes to these terms

If these terms change in a way that matters, we'll say so on this page and, for significant changes, by email before they take effect. Using Sidelong after a change takes effect means you accept it.

Contact

Whatcha, Inc. operates Sidelong. Questions about these terms: support@sidelong.app.