Terms of use

These terms govern the use of tellmelo and the rights and duties of both sides.

Basics

§ 1 Scope and contracting party

These terms apply to the use of tellmelo at this address and in its apps. The contracting party is Blackline Development Inh. Sebastian Ostermeier (see imprint).

§ 2 The service and its limits

Basic use is free of charge. There is no right to availability; tellmelo runs on a single server that is maintained and can fail. The operator may change or discontinue the service; a discontinuation is announced at least 30 days in advance so that you can download your data (Settings → App & data).

Sorting of the feed. “For you” ranks posts by these main parameters: whether you follow the author, how well the #tags match your topics (learned or entered), how much the post is being talked about, how new it is, whether it comes from your area, whether the team has highlighted it and whether the author is a partner. You set the weighting yourself under Settings → Your feed; under every post it says what tipped the balance. “Following” and “Latest” sort by time only. “For you” also suggests groups with matching #tags.

Partners are accounts chosen by the operator, with a mark on their profile. Their posts are only ranked higher where their #tags match your topics, and only as far as your “Close to my topics ↔ Far beyond the edge” slider allows. Nobody pays for partnerships or highlights. Should that change, it will be marked on the post and changed here.

Plans. The operator offers paid plans with extra tools. “Supporter” gives, for example, a longer window for editing, more drafts and images, longer posts, profile and app colour, your own emojis, a link page, pinned posts, reminders, messages sent later and early access to new features. “Organization” adds team access and a team inbox, events with sign-ups, locations, questions and answers, the profile in further languages, recurring posts, a website widget, webhooks and more requests to the API. Price, term and cancellation are shown before you sign up; the conditions named there apply in addition. A plan brings no reach. Its badge shows the start of the plan when tapped and can be hidden. With a plan, the username can be changed again after 30 instead of 90 days. When a plan ends, its tools stop; what was set up with them stays stored for six months and comes back with a new plan, after that it is deleted, with an e-mail two weeks before. Posts, messages and the account stay.

Rewards for inviting. Whoever brings others to tellmelo through their invitation link can receive rewards. An invitation counts when the new account is created through the link, confirms its email address and is used on seven days within its first 30 days; at most 30 invitations count within 30 days. The steps and what they give are listed under Settings → Profile → Invite friends. Plan time from rewards gives the tools of a plan for the stated period, without a badge; if a plan of your own is running, it starts when that plan ends. Permanent rewards apply as long as the account exists and tellmelo offers the feature. Rewards have no cash value, cannot be transferred or paid out and bring no reach. There is no claim to future steps; the operator may change or end the programme for the future, and what has been reached stays. Whoever fakes invitations, for example with their own or bought accounts, loses the rewards, and the account can be suspended (§ 6).

Responsibility for team, widget, webhooks and link page. An account that others act for is responsible for everything they do in its name, as for its own actions; whoever acts for an account follows these terms. Whoever embeds a widget or enters webhooks is responsible for the website and the server where they arrive. Whoever creates a link page is responsible for the pages its links lead to.

Account

§ 3 Account

1. An account is personal and may not be passed on or sold. You are responsible for your password; if you suspect misuse, change it and inform the operator.
2. Anyone who runs an account fully automated, for example as a bot, has to mark it as “Automated” under Settings → Organization.
3. The minimum age is 16 years. The date of birth is evaluated at sign-up and not stored. Between 13 and 15 an account is only created with a parent’s consent (Art. 8 GDPR); under 13 there is no account.
4. You can delete your account at any time. It is blocked at once and finally deleted after 30 days; until then you undo the deletion by signing in.
5. Verification. You apply for the “Verified” badge under Settings → Account & security → Verification and account standing; a person decides on every application, and there is no right to it. People and automated accounts need the minimums shown there, businesses and associations an officially recognised document, which is only stored until the decision (privacy). Redactions are only allowed with a valid reason. Anyone who submits a forged, altered or third-party document or gives false information is rejected; a verification already granted is withdrawn, and the account can be blocked (§ 6). If the requirements no longer apply later, the verification can be withdrawn as well.

Content

§ 4 What you write

Rights to content. The rights to your content stay with you. You grant the operator only what is needed to show it: store it, scale images down and show it to the other members. With “Findable by search engines” also to show your profile and your public posts publicly on the web; the same applies to a public group page. The right ends when you delete the content.

No further licence. Your posts are not exploited, not sublicensed, not used to train models and not sold. You confirm that you hold the necessary rights to everything you post, including images, music and quotes.

§ 5 What is not allowed

Prohibited in particular:

• criminal content, incitement to hatred, depictions of violence, symbols of unconstitutional organisations;
• harassment, threats, calls against individuals or groups;
• other people’s content without the right to use it and other people’s personal data without their consent;
• advertising, chain letters, automated mass mailing;
• links to sites the team has blocked, also in another spelling, through short links or redirects;
• invented or AI-generated content without a label where it could otherwise be taken as real;
• attempts to disrupt or overload the service or to get into other people’s accounts.

Moderation

§ 6 Moderation

1. Depending on their severity, violations lead to a notice, a warning, removal of the content or a block of the account; for serious or repeated violations also without warning.
2. Every decision comes with reasons and appears under “Account standing”, with the day it lapses. You can appeal against every decision; a person reviews the appeal.
3. Sites rated as harmful after a review are blocked by the team: links to them do not open and cannot be published. Whoever circumvents such a block risks the permanent block of the account. You can have every rating reviewed again.

§ 7 Reporting infringements

If content infringes your rights, report it through the report form or the contact form. Known infringements are removed without delay (Sections 8–10 DDG).

Legal

§ 8 Liability

The operator is liable without limitation for intent and gross negligence and for injury to life, body or health. In the case of simple negligence he is only liable for the breach of essential contractual obligations (obligations whose fulfilment makes the performance of the contract possible in the first place and on which you may rely), limited to the foreseeable damage typical for the contract. Liability under the Product Liability Act remains unaffected.

The operator is not liable for members’ content and does not have to monitor it (Section 7(2) DDG). External links first lead to a notice that the site does not belong to tellmelo; the operator does not adopt its content. If the notice mentions a review, it reflects its state on the day named.

§ 9 Termination

You terminate at any time by deleting your account. The operator can terminate with 14 days’ notice, for serious violations without notice. Before that you can download your data; after an immediate block you receive it on request through the contact form.

§ 10 Changes to these terms

Changes are announced by e-mail to the address of your account and apply from the day named for further use. No consent is inferred from this; silence does not count as agreement. If you do not agree, stop using the service and download your data beforehand. Purely editorial changes without effect on the content are not announced separately. The date at the top names the version in force.

§ 11 Final provisions

German law applies. If a provision is invalid, the others remain valid. For consumers the statutory places of jurisdiction apply; towards businesses the place of jurisdiction is the operator’s seat. The operator does not take part in proceedings before a consumer arbitration board and is not obliged to do so.