Terms of Service

These Terms of Service (“Terms”) form a legally binding agreement between you and Matters (“Matters,” “we,” “us” or “our”) and govern your access to and use of getmatters.org, the Matters application at profile.getmatters.org, and any related content, features and services (together, the “Service”).

By creating an account, clicking to accept these Terms, or otherwise accessing or using the Service, you agree to be bound by these Terms and by our Privacy Policy. If you do not agree, do not use the Service.

Please read Sections 4 (Payments, which are non-refundable), 9 (Disclaimers), 10 (Limitation of liability) and 16 (Governing law and disputes) carefully. They limit our liability, rule out refunds and affect how disputes are resolved.

1. The Service

Matters is a digital news product that finds, selects and summarizes publicly available news relevant to education and careers, and presents it in a feed personalized to the interests, goals and countries you choose. Some stories can be read without an account; the personalized feed requires one.

We may change, add or remove features, content or sources at any time, and we may suspend or discontinue all or part of the Service. Where a change materially reduces a paid feature you have already paid for, we will give you reasonable notice. Such changes do not entitle you to a refund (see Section 4).

2. Eligibility

You must be at least 13 years old, or the minimum age required in your country to use online services like ours without parental consent (for example, 16 in some countries of the European Economic Area), to use the Service.

If you are under 18, or under the age of majority where you live, you may use the Service only with the consent of a parent or legal guardian who has read and agreed to these Terms on your behalf. By allowing a minor to use the Service, the parent or guardian accepts these Terms and is responsible for the minor’s use of the Service, including any purchases.

You may not use the Service if we have previously suspended or terminated your account, or if you are barred from using it under the laws of any applicable jurisdiction.

3. Your account

• You agree to provide accurate, current and complete information when you sign up and to keep it up to date.
• You are responsible for keeping your password confidential and for all activity that happens under your account. Tell us immediately at support@getmatters.org if you suspect unauthorized use.
• Your account is personal to you. You may not sell, transfer or share it, or create an account for someone else without their permission.
• You can stop using the Service at any time, and you can ask us to delete your account by writing to support@getmatters.org.

4. Free trials, subscriptions and payments

Parts of the Service may be offered free of charge, and parts may require a paid subscription. The features, price and billing period of each plan are shown to you before you buy.

• Currency and taxes. Prices are stated in United States dollars (USD) unless we show otherwise. Prices may not include taxes such as sales tax, VAT or GST, which will be added where applicable. Your bank or card issuer may charge currency-conversion or foreign-transaction fees, which are your responsibility.
• Free trials. We may offer a free trial of paid features. We will tell you the length of the trial when it starts. When a trial ends, access to the trial features stops unless you subscribe, or, if you provided payment details and agreed to automatic conversion, your subscription begins and you will be charged unless you cancel before the trial ends. That charge is non-refundable. Trials are limited to one per person, and we may withdraw or modify trial offers at any time.
• Automatic renewal. Subscriptions renew automatically at the end of each billing period at the then-current price, and your payment method will be charged, until you cancel. Renewal charges are non-refundable, so cancel before your renewal date if you do not want to be charged again.
• Cancellation. You can cancel at any time through your account or by writing to support@getmatters.org. Cancellation takes effect at the end of the current billing period, and you keep access until then. Cancelling stops future charges only; it does not entitle you to a refund of any amount already paid.
• No refunds. All payments are final and non-refundable. Once a payment has been made, it will not be refunded, in whole or in part, for any reason, including cancellation, non-use or partial use of the Service, unused time in a billing period, dissatisfaction, changes to the Service or its content, or suspension or termination of your account. We do not provide credits in place of refunds. By making a payment, you request that your access to paid features begin immediately and acknowledge that, where the law of your country gives consumers a right to withdraw from a purchase of digital services (for example, in the EEA or UK), you lose that right once access begins. This does not affect any refund right that applicable law gives you and that cannot be waived by agreement.
• Price changes. We may change subscription prices. We will give you at least 30 days’ notice before a price change applies to you, and it will take effect at the start of your next billing period. If you do not agree, you may cancel before the change takes effect.
• Payment processing. Payments are handled by third-party payment processors, whose terms also apply to your payment. We do not store your full card details. You authorize us and our processor to charge your chosen payment method for all fees you incur. If a payment fails, we may suspend paid features until it is resolved.

5. Content on the Service

The Service presents headlines, short summaries, excerpts and links relating to news published by third parties (“Third-Party Content”). Third-Party Content belongs to its respective publishers and owners. We link to the original source, and your use of any third-party website is governed by that website’s own terms and policies.

We do not create, control, verify or endorse Third-Party Content, and we are not responsible for its accuracy, completeness, timeliness, legality or availability. News can be incomplete, change quickly, or later be corrected. Summaries and classifications are produced partly by automated systems and may contain errors or omit important context. Always refer to the original source and to official sources before relying on any information.

If you believe any content on the Service infringes your copyright or other rights, please email support@getmatters.org with the content’s location, a description of the work or right concerned, your contact details, and a statement that you are the owner or authorized to act for the owner. We will review the notice and remove or disable access to content where appropriate.

6. Not professional advice

The Service is provided for general information only. Nothing on the Service is educational, admissions, career, immigration, visa, legal, financial or other professional advice, and no advisory relationship is created by your use of it. Information about scholarships, admissions, jobs, internships, visas and government policies can change or be inaccurate. Before making any decision or taking any action, including applying to an institution, employer or program, or making travel or immigration plans, verify the information with the relevant official source or a qualified professional. You are solely responsible for decisions you make based on information found through the Service.

7. Acceptable use

You agree not to, and not to help anyone else to:

• use the Service in any way that breaks the law or violates others’ rights;
• scrape, crawl, copy, harvest or systematically download content or data from the Service, including by automated means, except as permitted by our robots.txt for search-engine indexing;
• use content or data from the Service to build a competing product, or to train, test or improve any machine-learning or artificial-intelligence model;
• reverse engineer, decompile or attempt to extract the source code, models or ranking methods of the Service, except where the law expressly allows it;
• interfere with, disrupt, overload or attempt to gain unauthorized access to the Service, other accounts, or our systems and networks, or bypass any security, rate-limiting or access controls;
• introduce viruses, malware or other harmful code, or probe or test the vulnerability of the Service without our written permission;
• resell, sublicense, rent or commercially exploit the Service, or share paid features with people who have not paid for them;
• impersonate any person or entity, misrepresent your affiliation, or provide false information; or
• send spam, abusive, harassing, defamatory or unlawful messages through any feature of the Service, including problem reports.

8. Intellectual property

Except for Third-Party Content, the Service and everything in it, including the Matters name and logo, software, design, text, graphics, feed selections, summaries and compilations, are owned by Matters or our licensors and are protected by intellectual-property laws. Subject to these Terms, we grant you a limited, personal, revocable, non-exclusive and non-transferable license to access and use the Service for your own personal, non-commercial purposes. No other rights are granted, and all rights not expressly granted are reserved.

If you send us feedback, ideas or suggestions, you allow us to use them for any purpose without restriction or payment to you.

You can share links to stories using the Service’s share features. Sharing a link does not give you any rights in the linked content.

9. Disclaimers

To the maximum extent permitted by law, the Service and all content are provided “as is” and “as available,” without warranties of any kind, whether express, implied or statutory, including any implied warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, title, non-infringement, accuracy, and quiet enjoyment. We do not warrant that the Service will be uninterrupted, timely, secure or error-free, that content will be accurate, complete or current, that the Service will meet your requirements or show you any particular story, or that defects will be corrected.

Some jurisdictions do not allow the exclusion of certain warranties, so some of the above may not apply to you. Nothing in these Terms excludes or limits any rights you have as a consumer that cannot lawfully be excluded or limited.

10. Limitation of liability

To the maximum extent permitted by law, Matters and its owners, team members, partners, licensors and service providers will not be liable for any indirect, incidental, special, consequential, exemplary or punitive damages, or for any loss of profits, revenue, opportunities, admissions, employment, data, goodwill or other intangible losses, arising out of or relating to the Service, Third-Party Content or these Terms, whether based on contract, tort (including negligence), statute or any other legal theory, even if we have been advised of the possibility of such damages.

To the maximum extent permitted by law, our total liability for all claims arising out of or relating to the Service or these Terms is limited to the greater of (a) the amount you paid us for the Service in the 12 months before the event giving rise to the claim, and (b) fifty US dollars (USD 50).

These limitations apply even if a remedy fails of its essential purpose. They do not limit liability for death or personal injury caused by our negligence, for fraud or fraudulent misrepresentation, or for any other liability that cannot be limited or excluded under applicable law.

11. Indemnity

To the extent permitted by law, you agree to defend, indemnify and hold harmless Matters and its owners, team members, partners and service providers from and against any claims, liabilities, damages, losses and expenses, including reasonable legal fees, arising out of or relating to your breach of these Terms, your misuse of the Service, or your violation of any law or the rights of any third party.

12. Suspension and termination

We may suspend or terminate your access to the Service, with or without notice, if you breach these Terms, if we are required to do so by law, if your use creates risk or possible legal exposure for us or others, or if we discontinue the Service. Where reasonable, we will tell you why. Fees already paid are non-refundable in every case of suspension or termination, as set out in Section 4.

When your account ends, your right to use the Service stops immediately. Sections that by their nature should survive termination, including Sections 5 to 11 and 14 to 18, will survive.

13. Third-party services and links

The Service links to and relies on third-party websites and services that we do not control. We are not responsible for their content, policies, availability or practices, and you use them at your own risk.

14. Privacy

Our Privacy Policy explains how we collect and use your personal information. By using the Service, you acknowledge that we will process your information as described there.

15. Changes to these Terms

We may update these Terms from time to time. We will change the “Last updated” date above and, for material changes, give you reasonable notice (for example, by email or a notice in the Service) before they take effect. Your continued use of the Service after the changes take effect means you accept the updated Terms. If you do not agree, you must stop using the Service and may cancel any subscription.

16. Governing law and disputes

These Terms, and any dispute arising out of or relating to them or the Service, are governed by the laws of India, without regard to its conflict-of-laws rules.

Before starting any formal proceeding, you agree to first contact us at support@getmatters.org with a description of the dispute and try to resolve it informally with us for at least 30 days. Subject to that, the courts of India will have exclusive jurisdiction over any dispute, and you and we submit to their jurisdiction.

If you are a consumer, this Section does not deprive you of the protection of the mandatory laws of the country where you live, or of any right to bring proceedings in the courts of that country, where the law gives you that right. To the extent permitted by law, any claim must be brought within one year after it arises, and claims may be brought only on an individual basis and not as a plaintiff or class member in any class or representative proceeding.

17. General

• Entire agreement. These Terms and the Privacy Policy are the entire agreement between you and us about the Service and replace any prior agreements on that subject.
• Severability. If any provision is found unenforceable, it will be enforced to the maximum extent permissible, and the rest of these Terms will remain in full effect.
• No waiver. Our failure to enforce any right or provision is not a waiver of it.
• Assignment. You may not assign or transfer these Terms without our written consent. We may assign them in connection with a merger, acquisition, reorganization or sale of assets, or to an affiliate.
• Force majeure. We are not liable for any delay or failure to perform caused by events beyond our reasonable control, including outages of third-party providers, internet failures, natural disasters, pandemics, war, government action or labor disputes.
• Notices. We may send notices to the email address associated with your account or display them in the Service. You can send notices to us at support@getmatters.org.
• Export and sanctions. You represent that you are not located in, or a resident of, a country or region subject to comprehensive sanctions, and that you are not on any government list of restricted parties.
• Language. These Terms are written in English. If they are translated, the English version prevails to the extent permitted by law.

18. About us and contact

The Service is operated by Matters, an enterprise registered under the Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME) framework in India, providing the Service to users around the world.

Questions about these Terms, or complaints and grievances about the Service, can be sent to our Grievance Officer at support@getmatters.org. We will acknowledge them promptly and aim to resolve them within 30 days.