Terms of Use

Plain English: By using the site, you agree to these rules and the related policy pages.

1. Acceptance of these terms

By accessing or using The Great Debate Today, you agree to these Terms of Use, our Privacy Notice, and any additional terms or policies that apply to a feature, promotion, classroom deployment, or paid plan. If you use the service on behalf of a school, newsroom, company, or other organization, you represent that you have authority to bind that organization.

Plain English: This is a current-events analysis product, not a substitute for primary reporting or professional advice.

2. What the service is

The Great Debate Today combines source ranking, outlet comparison, ANN briefings, News Desk guidance, membership features, and classroom-friendly review tools. The service is designed to support review, discussion, and comparison of viewpoints. It is not a substitute for primary reporting, official records, emergency services, legal advice, medical advice, financial advice, or professional educational judgment.

News Desk can explain stories, compare coverage, and help route you through approved settings, but it cannot change the platform rules or bypass moderation and access controls.

Plain English: Keep your account accurate and secure, and make sure a responsible adult oversees minors.

3. Eligibility and accounts

You must provide accurate information, keep your credentials secure, and use the service only in compliance with applicable law. If a school, parent, or educator allows a minor to use the service, that adult or institution is responsible for supervision, permissions, and policy compliance. You are responsible for activity that occurs through your account unless you promptly notify us of unauthorized use.

Plain English: Teachers can use the platform, but they still have to supervise, preview, and decide what fits.

4. Classroom, educator, and school use

The service may be used in classroom or educational settings when the activity is reviewed and supervised by a teacher, librarian, administrator, parent, or other responsible adult. Educators are responsible for determining whether a topic is age-appropriate, whether district or family notice is required, and whether a particular classroom activity is consistent with local policy.

• Do not treat the service as an official school record, grading system, counseling service, or disciplinary tool.
• Do not require students to disclose sensitive personal information in order to participate.
• Where a district or school requires notice, consent, accessibility review, or technology approval, that requirement must be satisfied before use.
• Educator controls are intended for local classroom pacing and review, not for platform-wide administrative control.

Plain English: Use the site respectfully and do not try to break, scrape, or misuse it.

5. Acceptable use

You may use the service only for lawful, respectful, and appropriate purposes. You may not use the service in a way that harms others, compromises platform integrity, or interferes with our moderation, billing, or security systems.

• No harassment, threats, hate speech, unlawful discrimination, or abusive conduct.
• No impersonation, fraud, deception, plagiarism, or attempts to mislead others about source, identity, or authorship.
• No malware, denial-of-service activity, scraping in violation of our rules, reverse engineering, or attempts to bypass security, rate limits, or access controls.
• No unlawful collection, posting, or disclosure of personal information, especially information relating to children, students, or third parties.
• No use of the service for high-stakes decisions without independent verification and appropriate human review.

Plain English: Generated summaries and comparisons can be wrong, incomplete, or out of date, so verify important claims.

6. Generated content and compare reports

The service may include generated summaries, comparisons, guidance, report excerpts, and other outputs. Those outputs may be incomplete, inaccurate, biased, offensive, or out of date. You are responsible for verifying important claims before relying on them for publication, teaching, grading, legal matters, medical matters, business decisions, or public safety.

Generated outputs are not necessarily the views of The Great Debate Today, Aeliana AI, LLC, any partner, or any named source discussed on the site.

Plain English: The checkout price shown at purchase is the one that controls your order.

7. Paid services, billing, and renewals

If you buy a paid membership or other paid feature, you agree to the pricing, billing cycle, renewal terms, taxes, and plan details shown at checkout. Unless the checkout says otherwise, subscriptions renew automatically until cancelled. Cancelling stops future renewals but usually does not retroactively cancel the current paid period.

Sync membership status helps the current device catch up with your active plan. It does not create a new purchase and does not guarantee access if the payment processor or account system shows no active entitlement. Additional managed or pilot tiers may be described elsewhere on the site, but only the live checkout price controls the purchase you make.

Plain English: Refunds follow the policy on the site and the law that applies to your purchase.

8. Refunds

Refunds are governed by the refund policy presented on the site and by any non-waivable rights you have under applicable law. Unless the law or a verified billing problem requires a different result, paid digital access is generally non-refundable once the billing period begins.

Plain English: Your submissions stay yours, but we can store and process them to run the service.

9. User content and feedback

You retain ownership of the content you submit, except to the extent a separate agreement says otherwise. By submitting content, you grant us a non-exclusive, worldwide license to host, store, reproduce, adapt, display, and process that content as reasonably necessary to operate, secure, improve, and support the service. If you send us suggestions or feedback, we may use them without restriction or compensation unless the law requires otherwise.

Plain English: We own the product design and branding unless we say otherwise in writing.

10. Our intellectual property

The service, including its design, software, branding, page layouts, text selection, and other protected content, belongs to us or our licensors and is protected by applicable intellectual property law. These terms do not transfer ownership of our intellectual property to you. You may not copy, repackage, resell, or create derivative commercial products from the service except as allowed by law or by our written permission.

Plain English: We can suspend or end access when the rules are broken or a safety issue appears.

11. Suspension and termination

We may limit, suspend, or terminate access if we believe you have violated these terms, created a safety risk, interfered with the service, failed to pay required fees, or exposed us or other users to legal or operational harm. You may stop using the service at any time. Certain provisions, including billing obligations, intellectual property terms, disclaimers, and dispute-related provisions, survive termination where legally applicable.

Plain English: The site is provided as-is and may not always be perfect or uninterrupted.

12. Disclaimers

The service is provided on an as-is and as-available basis. To the fullest extent permitted by law, we disclaim warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, title, and non-infringement. We do not warrant that the service will be uninterrupted, error-free, or perfectly secure, or that all generated outputs will be accurate, complete, or suitable for your intended use.

Plain English: Our liability is limited to the extent the law allows.

13. Limitation of liability

To the fullest extent permitted by law, The Great Debate Today, Aeliana AI, LLC, and their officers, employees, contractors, and affiliates will not be liable for indirect, incidental, special, consequential, exemplary, or punitive damages, or for lost profits, revenues, goodwill, data, or opportunity arising from or related to your use of the service. Where the law does not allow certain limits, those limits apply only to the extent permitted.

Plain English: If your misuse causes a problem, you may have to cover the resulting claims and costs.

14. Indemnity

To the extent permitted by law, you agree to defend, indemnify, and hold harmless The Great Debate Today, Aeliana AI, LLC, and their affiliates, personnel, and service providers from claims, losses, liabilities, and expenses arising from your misuse of the service, your content, or your violation of these terms or applicable law.

Plain English: Disputes are handled under Washington law and, unless the law requires otherwise, in the courts serving Cowlitz County, Washington.

15. Governing law and disputes

Unless a separate written agreement says otherwise, these terms are governed by the laws of Washington, USA, without regard to conflicts-of-law rules, except to the extent non-waivable law requires a different result. Any dispute arising from these terms or the service must be brought in the state or federal courts located in or serving Cowlitz County, Washington, unless applicable law or a separate written agreement requires another forum.

Plain English: We may update these terms when the service or the law changes.

16. Changes to these terms

We may update these terms from time to time to reflect changes in the service, our business practices, or legal requirements. If we make a material change, we will take reasonable steps to provide notice. Continued use of the service after the updated terms become effective means you accept the revised terms.

Plain English: Legal questions and privacy-type requests should go to legal; support handles account help.

17. Contact

If you have questions about these terms, classroom use, billing, or legal requests, contact [email protected] or [email protected].