Terms & Conditions

1. Agreeing to these terms

These terms are an agreement between you and the developer of EchoMap. By creating an account, entering as a guest, or otherwise using the app, you accept them. If you do not accept them, do not use EchoMap.

Your privacy is covered separately by the Privacy Policy, which forms part of these terms.

2. You must be 18 or over

EchoMap is for adults. You confirm you are at least 18. The app refuses an age below 18, and an account found to belong to a minor will be removed.

You must also not be barred from using the service under the laws that apply to you, and must not have been previously removed from EchoMap for breaking these terms.

3. What EchoMap is

EchoMap lets you attach memories to physical places, see blurred pins from other people at the same place, and talk to them. Features will change as the product develops. Material changes are shown in the app.

EchoMap is provided free of charge. There is no subscription, no in-app purchase, and no advertising.

4. Your account

You are responsible for your credentials and for everything done under your account.

A username account cannot be recovered. It has no email attached, so its password cannot be reset. If you lose it, the account and its contents are gone and nobody can restore them. Use Continue with Google if you want an account you can always get back into.

Guest mode stores nothing. Nothing you do as a guest is kept once the session ends.

One person, one account. Do not impersonate anyone, do not claim a username in order to sell or withhold it, and do not share your account with someone else.

5. Acceptable use

Do not use EchoMap to:

· harass, threaten, stalk, or intimidate anyone
· impersonate another person or misrepresent who you are
· post unlawful, hateful, or sexually explicit content, or anything sexualising a minor
· post another person's private information, or try to work out someone's true location from their pins
· upload a profile photo that is not of you — the camera-only rule exists for exactly this reason
· advertise, spam, or run bulk or automated activity
· scrape the service, or access it other than through the official app
· probe, disrupt, or attempt to bypass the app's security rules or rate limits
· do anything unlawful, or anything that puts another person at risk of harm

Accounts that break these rules may be suspended or removed without notice.

6. Your content stays yours

Your memories, notes, and photos remain your property. You keep every right you had in them.

You grant EchoMap a licence to store your content and show it back to you, to people standing at a place you chose to publish to, and to the people you connect with. This licence exists only so the app can function, is limited to that purpose, is worldwide and royalty-free because storage and delivery are, and ends when you delete the content. Deleting your account removes your messages from other people's rooms and conversations as well as your own; the narrow exceptions — anonymised star ratings and moderation records — are listed in the Privacy Policy.

EchoMap will not publish your content anywhere else, will not use it for advertising, and will not sell it.

You confirm that you have the right to post what you post, and that it does not infringe anyone else's rights.

7. Other people's content

What other users write is theirs, not EchoMap's, and it is not checked before it appears. You may find something you dislike or disagree with. EchoMap does not endorse it.

If you believe content infringes your copyright or another right, email support@echomap.space with enough detail to identify it and it will be reviewed.

8. Location and personal safety

Positions shown to other people are deliberately blurred, and the blurring is described in full in the Privacy Policy. No system makes sharing your general area risk-free.

Use the privacy levels. Keep sensitive places — home, work, a child's school — out of the app or inside a no-show zone. Leave FIND ME ON THE MAP off unless you want to be found.

Meeting people. EchoMap does not verify anyone's identity. If you choose to meet someone, meet in public, tell someone where you are going, and use your judgement. You do so at your own risk.

9. Moderation, reporting and blocking

You can report any user from their card, and you can block them. Blocking removes their pins from your map and stops their notifications reaching you.

Reports are reviewed and may result in a warning, suspension, or permanent removal. A record of the report is kept as described in the Privacy Policy.

What reviewing a report involves. EchoMap is run by one developer, and one administrator account — the developer's — can open the reported direct conversation or place room, read it, delete content, and remove an account. That access exists so a report of harassment can be acted on rather than filed away. It is not used for anything else, and there is no automated scanning of messages.

Do not file reports in bad faith.

10. Availability

EchoMap is offered as it is, when it is available. There is no guaranteed uptime. Features may be changed, suspended, or withdrawn, and the service may be discontinued. Where a change is material and it is reasonable to do so, notice will be given in the app.

The app depends on third-party services — Google Firebase, Google Maps, OpenStreetMap, and Cloudflare Images where it is enabled — and on your device's own permissions. When those are unavailable, parts of EchoMap will not work.

11. Ending it

You may stop using EchoMap at any time. DELETE ACCOUNT on the Profile tab removes your account and its data; see the deletion page for exactly what goes and what stays. Signing out leaves the account intact.

EchoMap may suspend or terminate an account that breaks these terms, that puts other users at risk, or where required by law.

Sections that by their nature should survive termination — your content licence for copies already delivered, disclaimers, limitation of liability, indemnity, and governing law — continue to apply.

12. No warranties

EchoMap is provided "as is" and "as available", without warranties of any kind, express or implied, including any implied warranty of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, or non-infringement.

No promise is made that the app will be uninterrupted, error-free, or secure against every attack, that blurred locations are un-analysable by every possible technique, or that other users are who they say they are.

13. Limitation of liability

To the fullest extent the law allows, EchoMap and its developer are not liable for indirect, incidental, special, consequential, or punitive damages, nor for lost data, lost profits, or loss of goodwill, arising from your use of the app.

Where liability cannot be excluded, it is limited to the greater of the amount you paid for EchoMap in the twelve months before the claim — which for a free app is nothing — or the minimum the law requires.

Nothing here excludes liability for death or personal injury caused by negligence, for fraud, or for anything else that cannot lawfully be excluded. If you are a consumer, you keep every statutory right you have, and nothing in these terms reduces them.

14. Indemnity

If someone brings a claim against EchoMap because of content you posted, your use of the app, or your breach of these terms, you agree to cover the reasonable costs of dealing with it — except where the claim arises from EchoMap's own fault.

15. Governing law

These terms are governed by the laws of the country in which the developer of EchoMap is established, and disputes are subject to the courts of that country.

If you are a consumer, this does not deprive you of the protection of the mandatory laws of the country in which you live, and you may bring proceedings in your local courts.

Note for the publisher: replace this section with your actual country and courts before public release.

16. The rest

If any part of these terms is found unenforceable, the rest continues to apply. Not enforcing a term on one occasion does not waive it. These terms, with the Privacy Policy, are the entire agreement between you and EchoMap about the app. You may not transfer your rights under them; EchoMap may transfer its rights if the app changes hands, without reducing your rights.

17. Changes to these terms

These terms may change as the product grows. The updated version appears here with a new date, and material changes are shown in the app before they take effect. Continuing to use EchoMap after that means you accept them.

18. Contact

support@echomap.space