Terms of Service

1. Acceptance of these terms

These Terms of Service govern your access to and use of orinhutchings.com, including its reader accounts, comments, contact form, and newsletter features (the “Service”). By accessing or using the Service, you agree to these terms and the Privacy Policy. If you do not agree, do not use the Service.

2. Eligibility

You must be at least the minimum age required by applicable law to create an account or submit personal information (including at least 13 years old in the United States). If the law where you live requires a higher age to consent to online services, you must meet that age or have permission from a parent or legal guardian. You represent that you have the legal capacity to agree to these terms.

3. Reader accounts

• Provide accurate, current information and maintain no more than one reader account unless we give permission otherwise.
• Keep your password and sign-in links confidential. You are responsible for activity under your account and should notify us promptly of suspected unauthorized access.
• If you use a Google email address, we may require Google Sign-In for authentication.
• Email and password accounts must verify their email address before posting comments. Google and magic link authentication verify the address through their sign-in flows.
• Do not create an account for another person, impersonate anyone, or use false or misleading identity information.

4. Acceptable use

You may not use the Service to:

• break the law, encourage unlawful conduct, or violate another person's rights;
• post spam, advertising, harassment, threats, hate speech, obscenity, or intentionally deceptive or harmful material;
• impersonate another person or misrepresent your affiliation;
• scrape, crawl, harvest, or systematically copy site content or user information without prior written permission, except for ordinary search-engine indexing;
• probe, attack, overload, disrupt, reverse engineer, or bypass the Service's security or access controls;
• upload malicious code or attempt unauthorized access to an account, server, or network;
• interfere with or disrupt another user's enjoyment of the Service; or
• use automated systems to create accounts, post comments, or send messages without permission.

5. Comments and other user content

You retain ownership of comments and other content you submit. By submitting content, you grant Orin Hutchings a non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty-free license to host, store, reproduce, format, display, and distribute that content as needed to operate, promote, and improve the Service. This license ends when the content is deleted from active systems, except for reasonable backups, legal records, and material already shared outside our control.

You represent that you have the rights needed to submit your content and that it complies with these terms. You can delete your own comments through the site while eligible to access that feature. The administrator may review, hide, edit for formatting, or remove content at any time, with or without notice, and has no obligation to publish, retain, monitor, or restore any content.

6. Intellectual property

Unless otherwise stated, the Service and its original content, including Orin Hutchings' blog posts, book and story material, artwork, videos, logos, graphics, and site design, are owned by Orin Hutchings or used with permission and are protected by intellectual-property laws. You may access them for personal, noncommercial reading and viewing only.

You may not reproduce, republish, distribute, use for text or data mining, train machine learning or artificial intelligence models on, or otherwise exploit this material without prior written permission, except as permitted by applicable law. Brief quotations with appropriate attribution are permitted where legally allowed.

7. Newsletter and communications

If you affirmatively subscribe, you consent to receive occasional newsletters and writing updates. You may withdraw that consent at any time through the unsubscribe link in a newsletter or by contacting us. Account-related messages, such as verification, magic link, security, and password reset emails, are transactional and may be sent when needed to provide an action you request.

8. Third-party services and links

The Service uses or links to third parties, including Google, Vercel, Neon, Resend, YouTube, and other websites. Third parties control their own services, availability, content, and privacy practices. Links and integrations do not imply endorsement, and your use of them is governed by their terms. We are not responsible for third-party services or content.

9. Disclaimer of warranties

To the fullest extent permitted by law, the Service is provided “as is” and “as available,” without warranties of any kind, express or implied, including warranties of accuracy, availability, security, non-infringement, merchantability, or fitness for a particular purpose. Blog posts, videos, writing updates, and other materials are provided for general information and entertainment, not professional advice.

10. Limitation of liability

To the fullest extent permitted by law, Orin Hutchings and anyone involved in operating the Service will not be liable for indirect, incidental, special, consequential, exemplary, or punitive damages, or for loss of data, profits, goodwill, or use, arising from or related to the Service. Where liability cannot be excluded, total liability for claims relating to the Service will not exceed the greater of US $100 or the amount you paid to use the Service during the twelve months before the claim. Some jurisdictions do not allow certain limitations, so portions of this section may not apply to you.

11. Indemnification

To the extent permitted by law, you agree to indemnify and hold harmless Orin Hutchings from claims, losses, and reasonable costs arising from your unlawful use of the Service, your content, or your material violation of these terms. This does not require you to indemnify anyone for their own unlawful conduct.

12. Suspension and termination

We may restrict, suspend, or terminate access, remove comments, or close an account when reasonably necessary to enforce these terms, protect users or the Service, respond to legal requirements, or address security risks. You may stop using the Service at any time and may request account deletion by email. Provisions that by their nature should survive termination will remain in effect.

13. Governing law and disputes

These Terms are governed by the laws of the State of Utah, United States, without regard to its conflict of law principles. Unless applicable law provides otherwise, any dispute arising out of or relating to these Terms or the Service will be resolved in the state or federal courts located in Utah, and you consent to the personal jurisdiction of those courts.

14. Changes to these terms

We may update these terms as the Service or applicable requirements change. Updated terms will be posted here with a revised effective date. If a change is material, additional notice may be provided through the Service or by email. Continued use after updated terms take effect constitutes acceptance where permitted by law.

15. General terms

If a provision is found unenforceable, it will be limited to the minimum extent necessary and the remaining provisions will continue. Failure to enforce a provision is not a waiver. These terms and the Privacy Policy are the entire agreement concerning your use of the Service and do not create an agency, partnership, employment, or joint-venture relationship.

16. Contact

Questions about these terms may be sent to support@orinhutchings.com.