Terms of Service

1. Agreement to Terms

By accessing or using ScholarMind's AI-powered research assistant platform at scholarmind.online ("Service"), you agree to be bound by these Terms of Service ("Terms"). If you do not agree to these Terms, you may not access or use our Service.

These Terms constitute a legally binding agreement between you and ScholarMind regarding your use of our Service.

2. Description of Service

ScholarMind provides an AI-powered research assistant platform that offers:

• Reference checking: extracting the references in a document and looking them up in public bibliographic databases
• Document analysis and summarization
• Concept mapping
• Patent analysis
• Multilingual research support
• Academic workflow automation

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

3. User Accounts

3.1 Account Creation

To use certain features of our Service, you must create an account. You must be at least 18 years old to create an account or use the Service. By creating an account, you agree to:

• Provide accurate and complete registration information
• Keep your account information updated
• Maintain the security of your account credentials
• Accept responsibility for all activities under your account

3.2 Account Termination

We may suspend or terminate your account if you violate these Terms or engage in activities that harm our Service or other users.

4. Acceptable Use Policy

You agree not to use our Service to:

• Upload or process copyrighted content without proper authorization
• Violate any applicable laws or regulations
• Attempt to reverse engineer or compromise our systems
• Upload malicious code, viruses, or harmful content
• Interfere with other users' access to the Service
• Use the Service for any commercial purpose without authorization
• Attempt to extract, copy, or reverse engineer our platform, software, or quality-control algorithms

5. Intellectual Property Rights

5.1 Our Rights

ScholarMind and its licensors own all rights, title, and interest in the Service, including all intellectual property rights. This includes our platform, software, quality-control and orchestration logic, and content. We do not operate any proprietary AI models of our own — document analysis is performed using third-party AI providers as described in our Privacy Policy.

5.2 Your Rights

You retain ownership of the content you upload to our Service. By using our Service, you grant us a limited license to process your content to provide our AI analysis services.

5.3 Generated Content

You own the analysis results, summaries, and reports generated by our AI for your content, subject to these Terms and applicable law.

6. Privacy and Data Handling

Your privacy is important to us. Our collection and use of your information is governed by our Privacy Policy, which is incorporated into these Terms by reference.

You are responsible for ensuring that any content you upload complies with applicable privacy laws and does not infringe upon the rights of others.

7. Payment and Subscription

7.1 Fees

Some features of our Service require payment. All fees are stated in US dollars and are non-refundable unless otherwise specified.

7.2 Billing

For subscription services:

• Billing occurs on a recurring basis
• You may cancel your subscription at any time
• No refunds for partial billing periods
• Price changes will be communicated in advance

8. Disclaimers and Limitations

8.1 AI-Generated Content

Our Service uses third-party artificial intelligence providers (including Anthropic, OpenAI, and Google) to analyze and generate content from documents you submit. While we strive for accuracy and run automated quality checks on generated output, AI-generated results may contain errors, omissions, or inaccuracies. You are solely responsible for independently verifying all results before relying on them for academic, legal, business, or other important decisions.

Reference checks compare each reference against public databases (currently CrossRef and OpenAlex), which are incomplete and sometimes contain errors. A reference marked "not found" or "details differ" is not proof that it is fabricated or wrong, and a reference marked "verified" is not confirmation that it supports the statement it is cited for. Reference checks are an aid to your own review, not a substitute for it.

8.2 Service Availability

We provide our Service on an "as is" basis. We do not guarantee uninterrupted access or error-free operation. Scheduled maintenance and unexpected downtime may occur.

8.3 Limitation of Liability

To the maximum extent permitted by law, ScholarMind shall not be liable for any indirect, incidental, special, or consequential damages arising from your use of our Service.

8.4 Indemnification

You agree to indemnify and hold ScholarMind harmless from any claims, damages, losses, or expenses (including reasonable legal fees) arising from your violation of these Terms, your misuse of the Service, or content you upload that infringes the rights of a third party.

9. Termination

Either party may terminate this agreement at any time. Upon termination:

• Your access to the Service will cease
• We may delete your account and associated data
• You remain responsible for any outstanding fees
• Certain provisions of these Terms will survive termination

10. Governing Law

These Terms are governed by the laws of the State of Illinois, USA, without regard to conflict of law principles. Any disputes shall be resolved in the courts of Illinois.

11. Contact Information

If you have questions about these Terms of Service, please contact us:

12. Changes to Terms

We may modify these Terms at any time. Material changes will be communicated through our Service or by email. Your continued use of the Service after changes constitutes acceptance of the updated Terms.