The conditions of the house.

These Terms of Use (the “Terms”) constitute a legally binding agreement between you and Jacob Hallmark (“Operator,” “we,” “us,” or “our”) concerning your access to and use of jacobhallmark.com, homelab.jacobhallmark.com, the Vulpenyx installed application, the browser Literary Atelier, the /api/v3 application programming interface, and any related software, documentation, or communications we provide (collectively, the “Services”).

If you do not agree to these Terms, you must not access or use the Services. If you are using the Services on behalf of an organization, you represent that you have authority to bind that organization, and “you” includes that organization.

The Services are a private literary platform. They include a public catalog of novels and related materials; authenticated reading of granted works; authoring, encryption, and publication tools; and optional social features among permitted users.

The Services are not a general-purpose cloud drive, not a law-firm matter-management system, and not a substitute for independent legal, accounting, or security advice. Features may be limited by role, product entitlement, book-level grant, device trust, and environment (production versus private staging).

You must be at least sixteen (16) years of age, or the age of digital consent in your jurisdiction if higher, to create an account or use authenticated portions of the Services. The Services are not directed to children.

You must provide accurate registration information and keep it current. We may refuse, suspend, or terminate access where we reasonably believe these Terms, applicable law, or another user’s rights would otherwise be violated.

Authenticated features require a valid account and, where applicable, product access, a permission or role, and a resource grant. Client-side presentation never replaces those server-enforced rules.

You are responsible for the confidentiality of your credentials, email inbox, and trusted devices. You must notify us promptly at jacob@jacobhallmark.com if you believe an account, device, or recovery path has been compromised.

Certain actions require device verification or trusted-device registration. We may invalidate sessions, devices, or recovery material when we detect abuse, credential stuffing, or other security risk.

Access to a manuscript, chapter, beta copy, or discussion room is controlled by explicit grants and invitation workflows. A friendship, direct message, profile follow, or public catalog listing does not confer a content grant.

Authors and other grantors are responsible for the people they invite. Recipients must not share granted material outside the permission they were given, including by screenshot, recitation, export, or onward distribution, except as the grantor or applicable law expressly allows.

We may revoke staging, homelab, or product entitlements. Homelab is private staging only and is not a public service-level offering.

You retain all intellectual-property rights you already hold in manuscripts, chapters, notes, artwork you upload, and other material you submit (“User Content”). These Terms do not transfer ownership of your writing to the Operator.

You grant the Operator a limited, worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free license to host, store, transmit, encrypt, back up, and display User Content solely as required to operate the Services you use—including making granted works available to recipients you authorize, generating exports you request, and maintaining integrity of the chapter pipeline.

You represent that you have the rights necessary to submit User Content and to grant the license above, and that User Content does not infringe third-party rights or applicable law.

Chapter bodies and certain related payloads are stored as encrypted envelopes. The Operator’s systems are designed so that raw ciphertext is not rendered to users, and so that server paths do not hold your user content key in recoverable plaintext.

You are responsible for maintaining access to your devices, recovery paths, and any material we provide solely to restore a trusted device. If keys, devices, or recovery seals become unavailable, we may be unable to decrypt or restore manuscript plaintext. That limitation is inherent to the encryption model and is not a service credit event.

You must not attempt to bypass encryption, extract keys from another user’s device, or cause ciphertext to be treated as plaintext. Circumvention is a material breach.

The Services, including software, design, trademarks, and the public presentation of Jacob Hallmark’s published novels, remain the property of the Operator or its licensors. Except for the limited license to use the Services in accordance with these Terms, no rights are granted.

Public catalog pages, sample chapters, and other materials we publish on the open website may be read for personal, non-commercial use. You may not scrape, republish, train models on, or commercially exploit those materials without prior written consent, except for brief quotation with attribution as fair use or fair dealing may allow.

You shall not, and shall not permit others to:

• Interfere with, probe, or overload the Services, or circumvent authentication, access control, rate limits, or encryption;
• Upload malware, or use the Services to transmit spam, harassment, or unlawful content;
• Impersonate the Operator, another author, or a grantor;
• Use automated means to extract catalog, account, or social data beyond ordinary browser use;
• Share another person’s granted manuscript, personal data, or private correspondence;
• Use the Services in violation of export-control, sanctions, or other applicable law.

The Services rely on processors and platforms, including hosting, authentication, database, email delivery, and application-store distribution. Those providers’ terms may also apply to the extent they govern your relationship with them. We are not responsible for third-party sites linked from the Services.

Vulpenyx may be distributed through Apple, Google, or sideloaded desktop builds. Additional terms of the applicable storefront apply. To the extent required by Apple, Apple and its subsidiaries are third-party beneficiaries of these Terms as they relate to use of the iOS or macOS application, and may enforce them against you.

Desktop and pre-release builds may lack store review, background update, or the same entitlement set as a later store version. You use such builds at your own risk.

homelab.jacobhallmark.com is private staging. It is intentionally noindexed, may contain unfinished features, and may be reset. Access requires an entitlement. Staging data is not a production backup, and we make no uptime commitment for homelab.

THE SERVICES ARE PROVIDED “AS IS” AND “AS AVAILABLE.” TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW, THE OPERATOR DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES, WHETHER EXPRESS, IMPLIED, STATUTORY, OR OTHERWISE, INCLUDING IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, TITLE, AND NON-INFRINGEMENT.

We do not warrant that the Services will be uninterrupted, error-free, or free of harmful components; that manuscripts will be recoverable if you lose keys or devices; or that public search engines will index or rank any page.

TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW, THE OPERATOR SHALL NOT BE LIABLE FOR ANY INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, CONSEQUENTIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR PUNITIVE DAMAGES, OR FOR ANY LOSS OF PROFITS, REVENUE, DATA, GOODWILL, OR MANUSCRIPT ACCESS, ARISING OUT OF OR RELATED TO THE SERVICES, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES.

EXCEPT FOR LIABILITY THAT CANNOT BE LIMITED UNDER APPLICABLE LAW (INCLUDING LIABILITY FOR DEATH OR PERSONAL INJURY CAUSED BY NEGLIGENCE, OR FOR FRAUD), THE OPERATOR’S AGGREGATE LIABILITY FOR ALL CLAIMS RELATING TO THE SERVICES SHALL NOT EXCEED THE GREATER OF (A) ONE HUNDRED UNITED STATES DOLLARS (US $100) OR (B) THE AMOUNTS YOU PAID TO THE OPERATOR FOR THE SERVICES IN THE TWELVE (12) MONTHS BEFORE THE CLAIM.

You shall indemnify, defend, and hold harmless the Operator from and against any claims, damages, losses, and expenses (including reasonable attorneys’ fees) arising out of your User Content, your grants or invitations, your breach of these Terms, or your violation of law or third-party rights.

You may stop using the Services at any time. We may suspend or terminate access immediately if you materially breach these Terms, if required by law, or if continued access would create a security or integrity risk to manuscripts or other users.

Provisions that by their nature should survive—including intellectual property, encryption limitations, disclaimers, limitation of liability, and indemnity—shall survive termination.

We may revise these Terms by posting an updated version on this page and updating the effective date. Material changes will be signaled by that date and, where we have an email address for you, may also be announced by email. Continued use after the effective date constitutes acceptance. If you do not agree, you must stop using the Services.

These Terms are governed by the laws of the United States and the State of Texas, without regard to conflict-of-law rules. Exclusive venue for disputes that are not subject to a non-waivable consumer protection forum shall lie in the state or federal courts located in Texas, and you consent to personal jurisdiction there.

If a provision is held unenforceable, the remaining provisions remain in effect. These Terms, together with the Privacy Policy and Security statement, are the entire agreement between you and the Operator concerning the Services and supersede prior understandings on the same subject.

Legal notices and questions about these Terms: jacob@jacobhallmark.com. Correspondence concerning rights, adaptations, and press should use the same address and a clear subject line.