Herald Terms of Service

These Terms of Service ("Terms") govern access to and use of Herald, an email-to-podcast automation service developed and operated by Upstate Data Systems LLC ("Upstate Data Systems," "we," "us," or "our").

By authorizing or using Herald, you agree to these Terms.

1. Service description

Herald is designed to convert content intentionally submitted by an authorized user into a spoken audio episode.

Depending on the requested workflow, Herald may:

• receive or retrieve an intended email submission;
• extract or prepare submitted text;
• use an artificial-intelligence service to transform source material into a narration script;
• synthesize speech;
• assemble an audio file;
• store the completed result in Google Drive; and
• send acknowledgments, status messages, or completed results through Gmail.

Herald is currently offered as a limited-access service and may change as it is developed.

2. Eligibility and authorization

You may use Herald only if you are legally capable of agreeing to these Terms and have permission to use the Google account, email address, content, and connected services involved.

You are responsible for maintaining control of your Google account and for reviewing the permissions you grant to Herald.

3. Google account permissions

Some Herald features require authorization to access Google services through OAuth.

By connecting a Google account, you authorize Herald to use the Google API permissions presented during the authorization process for the Herald functionality described in these Terms and the Herald Privacy Policy.

You may revoke this authorization through your Google Account settings. Revocation may prevent Herald from receiving submissions, sending email, or storing completed files.

Use of Google services is also subject to the terms and policies applicable to those Google services.

4. Your content

You retain ownership of content you submit to Herald.

You grant Upstate Data Systems a limited, non-exclusive right to process, reproduce, transform, transmit, and temporarily store submitted content solely as reasonably necessary to provide, secure, troubleshoot, and support Herald and to comply with applicable law.

You represent that you have the rights or permission necessary to submit the content and to request the processing you direct Herald to perform.

5. Acceptable use

You may not use Herald to:

• violate applicable law or another person's rights;
• submit content you are not authorized to process;
• distribute malware or malicious code;
• attempt to gain unauthorized access to Herald or connected systems;
• interfere with or disrupt the service;
• circumvent security, access controls, quotas, or technical restrictions;
• use Herald to facilitate fraud, abuse, or unlawful activity.

We may suspend or terminate access when reasonably necessary to protect the service, other users, third parties, or Upstate Data Systems.

6. Generated output

Herald uses automated processing, including artificial-intelligence-assisted script generation and automated speech synthesis.

Generated scripts and audio may contain errors, omissions, pronunciation issues, formatting artifacts, or other inaccuracies. You are responsible for reviewing output before relying on it for decisions or redistributing it.

Herald is intended to transform submitted source material for listening convenience. It is not a substitute for professional legal, medical, financial, safety, or other expert advice.

7. Third-party services

Herald depends on third-party services and infrastructure, including Google services and cloud infrastructure providers.

Those services may be governed by separate terms and privacy policies. We are not responsible for outages, changes, suspensions, data-loss events, or other failures caused by third-party services outside our reasonable control.

8. Availability and changes

We may modify, suspend, limit, or discontinue Herald or any feature at any time.

Because Herald is currently a limited-access service under active development, we do not guarantee uninterrupted operation, specific processing times, permanent availability of any feature, or a service-level commitment unless separately agreed in writing.

9. Intellectual property

Except for content submitted by users and third-party materials, Herald and its software, branding, documentation, designs, and related intellectual property are owned by Upstate Data Systems LLC or its licensors.

These Terms do not grant rights to use Upstate Data Systems or Herald trademarks, logos, or branding except as necessary to identify the service.

10. Privacy

Our handling of information in connection with Herald is described in the Herald Privacy Policy:

https://upstatedatasystems.com/Herald/privacy

The Privacy Policy is incorporated into these Terms by reference.

11. Disclaimer of warranties

To the maximum extent permitted by law, Herald is provided on an "as is" and "as available" basis.

Upstate Data Systems disclaims warranties not expressly stated in these Terms, including implied warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, non-infringement, and any warranty that Herald will be uninterrupted, error-free, or produce perfectly accurate output.

Some jurisdictions do not allow certain warranty exclusions, so some of the above may not apply to you.

12. Limitation of liability

To the maximum extent permitted by law, Upstate Data Systems LLC and its members, employees, contractors, and agents will not be liable for indirect, incidental, special, consequential, exemplary, or punitive damages arising from or related to Herald.

To the extent liability cannot be excluded, the aggregate liability of Upstate Data Systems arising from or relating to Herald will be limited to the amount, if any, paid by the user specifically for Herald during the twelve months preceding the event giving rise to the claim.

Some jurisdictions do not allow certain limitations of liability, so some of these limitations may not apply to you.

13. Suspension and termination

You may stop using Herald at any time and may revoke Google access through your Google Account.

We may suspend or terminate access if:

• these Terms are violated;
• continued access creates a security, legal, or operational risk;
• a required third-party service becomes unavailable;
• Herald is discontinued.

Provisions that by their nature should survive termination will remain in effect, including provisions concerning ownership, disclaimers, liability, and governing law.

14. Governing law

These Terms are governed by the laws of the State of New York, without regard to conflict-of-law principles, except where applicable law requires otherwise.

15. Changes to these Terms

We may update these Terms as Herald changes. The "Last updated" date at the top of this page will show the most recent revision.

Continued use after updated Terms become effective constitutes acceptance of the revised Terms to the extent permitted by law.

16. Contact

Questions about these Terms may be sent to:

Upstate Data Systems LLC
Email: upstatedatasystems@gmail.com

Herald homepage: https://upstatedatasystems.com/Herald
Terms of Service: https://upstatedatasystems.com/Herald/terms