Terms, Conditions, and Privacy Practices

1. Acceptance of the Textile.org charter

Textile.org (“Textile Academy”, “we”, “us”, or “our”) maintains this platform expressly for professional experimentation, research, and collaboration in textile hardware and engineering. By accessing any portion of the Textile.org domain, requesting access to documentation, joining a cohort, downloading content, or participating in community exchanges, you explicitly affirm that you have read, understand, and agree to be bound by these Terms & Conditions (“Terms”), our privacy commitments, and any supplemental program-specific policies. Your continued access constitutes a legally binding contract wherein Textile.org may enforce every clause to the fullest extent permitted by applicable law. If you disagree with any section, you must discontinue use immediately.

2. Eligibility and accounts

Access is granted at the sole discretion of Textile.org. We reserve absolute authority to approve, deny, suspend, or terminate access for any reason or no reason. You warrant that all data supplied during registration is accurate, complete, and current, and you agree to immediately update such data to preserve accuracy. You may not impersonate another person, misrepresent affiliation, or create accounts through automated means. Textile.org may audit or require re-verification at any time.

• You agree to maintain the confidentiality of your credentials and accept responsibility for all activity that occurs under your account, whether authorized or unauthorized.
• You consent to receive transactional, operational, and legal notices electronically, and you acknowledge that such communications satisfy any statutory notice requirements.
• You acknowledge that Textile.org may archive, monitor, or disclose your data to protect platform integrity, comply with legal processes, or enforce these Terms.

3. License to use Textile.org resources

We grant you a limited, non-transferable, revocable license to access Textile.org content solely for personal learning or internal business use. You may not sublicense, resell, publicly perform, broadcast, or commercially exploit any portion of the site without written consent. You may not reverse engineer, scrape, or attempt to derive source code or datasets except where expressly permitted under an open-source license explicitly attached to specific files.

Textile.org owns, or has secured rights to, all text, graphics, data, curriculum, designs, and trade dress. All trademarks, logos, and service marks belong to their respective owners and may not be used without written permission.

Honesty statement: Textile.org’s intent is to maintain no-cost access for full-time students and individuals who are presently unemployed. Participants operating a startup or small business (fewer than 50 employees) must contribute a light regionalized license fee, and professionals affiliated with enterprises of 50 or more employees must license the platform at full enterprise rates. Pricing varies by country, but truthful self-reporting is mandatory.

• You certify that the affiliation and headcount information you provide is accurate and up to date; Textile.org may audit enrollment and demand documentary proof.
• If we determine that a user intentionally misclassified themselves (for example, a large-company employee registering as unemployed to avoid fees), you agree that Textile.org may immediately invoice for the proper license retroactive to first access and seek reimbursement for investigative costs.
• Failure to cure misclassification or remit the proper amount may result in account termination, publication of the breach to partner institutions, and pursuit of additional remedies available at law.

4. Contributions, submissions, and community conduct

When you upload, publish, or otherwise share materials (“User Content”), you grant Textile.org a worldwide, irrevocable, perpetual, royalty-free license to host, display, modify, translate, analyze, and distribute that content for the purposes of operating, improving, and promoting Textile Academy initiatives. You represent that you have all rights necessary to grant this license and that your content does not infringe the rights of any third party.

• You must not post proprietary data you are not authorized to release, including industrial trade secrets, client Confidential Information, or export-controlled materials.
• You may not upload malicious code, attempt to breach security controls, or disrupt the learning environment.
• You agree that Textile.org may remove, edit, or refuse to display any content for any reason.

5. Program modifications, availability, and warranty disclaimer

Textile.org may modify, suspend, or discontinue any feature, cohort, dataset, or tooling without notice. We make no warranty that access will be uninterrupted, error-free, secure, or compatible with every device. The platform and all content are provided “AS IS” and “AS AVAILABLE”. Textile.org disclaims any implied warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, non-infringement, or course of dealing. You assume all risk arising out of use, including reliance on technical advice, prototypes, or experimental data.

6. Limitation of liability and indemnification

To the maximum extent permitted by law, Textile.org, its directors, officers, advisors, affiliates, and contributors will not be liable for any indirect, incidental, consequential, punitive, special, or exemplary damages arising from your use of the site, even if advised of the possibility of such damages. Our aggregate liability for any claim shall not exceed the greater of (a) amounts paid by you to Textile.org in the preceding six months or (b) USD $25.

You agree to indemnify, defend, and hold harmless Textile.org and its partners from any claim, loss, liability, demand, including reasonable attorneys’ fees, arising from your use of the platform, violation of these Terms, or infringement of any intellectual property or other rights.

7. Privacy, data handling, and telemetry

Textile.org collects and processes personal data—including but not limited to contact details, telemetry, engagement metrics, uploaded assets, device identifiers, and location approximations—to operate the learning environment, enforce security, deliver personalized curriculum, and conduct research that strengthens the ecosystem. We may share data with vetted vendors, instructors, partner labs, or legal authorities when necessary to fulfill program objectives or comply with the law.

Data may be stored in the United States or other jurisdictions with differing privacy safeguards. By using the site, you consent to cross-border data transfers and acknowledge that your information may be subject to foreign government access.

• We employ layered security controls, but no system is infallible. You accept the risk of unauthorized access despite reasonable safeguards.
• You may request access, correction, or deletion of certain personal data, subject to Textile.org’s overriding need to maintain audit trails or comply with legal duties.
• Anonymized or aggregated analytics may be retained indefinitely for benchmarking, curriculum design, or investor reporting.

8. Governing law, venue, and dispute resolution

These Terms are governed exclusively by the laws of the State of Washington, excluding conflict-of-law principles that would apply any other jurisdiction’s laws. Any dispute, claim, or controversy arising out of or relating to Textile.org must be brought solely in the state or federal courts located in Seattle, King County, Washington, and you irrevocably consent to personal jurisdiction and venue in those courts. You waive any objection based on inconvenient forum or lack of personal jurisdiction.

You agree that any claim must be filed within one year after the cause of action accrues, or it is permanently barred.

9. Privacy commitments in depth

In addition to the summary above, Textile.org may conduct behavioral analytics, sentiment scoring, and automated decision-making to flag suspicious activity, prioritize cohort placement, or customize outreach. We may combine on-platform data with third-party datasets, including professional directories or social media, to verify identity and tailor programming.

We may retain onboarding forms, communications, recordings of live sessions, and support tickets to improve quality and maintain compliance. By participating, you consent to being recorded in live workshops; where prohibited by law we will provide opt-out procedures.

• Sensitive projects: If you submit prototypes or lab data labeled confidential, you grant Textile.org a non-exclusive license to review and triage but agree that accidental exposure shall not constitute damages absent gross negligence.
• Cookies & telemetry: We deploy necessary and optional cookies, beacons, and device fingerprinting to maintain sessions, detect fraud, and understand usage.
• Marketing: You authorize Textile.org to reference your name, likeness, institution, or testimonials as part of case studies unless you revoke consent in writing.
• Data retention: We reserve the right to retain backups indefinitely, even after account deletion, for legal, archival, or research purposes.

10. Amendments, severability, and entire agreement

Textile.org may revise these Terms or policies at any time by posting updates. Continued use constitutes acceptance of the modified terms. If any provision is deemed unenforceable, the remaining clauses remain in full force. These Terms, together with any cohort-specific addenda, constitute the entire agreement between you and Textile.org.

Any failure to enforce a right shall not be deemed a waiver of that right. The headings are provided for convenience only and do not affect interpretation.

11. Courses, rentals, hardware, and commerce

From time to time Textile.org may offer paid or unpaid coursework, workshops, downloadable patterns, kits, circuit boards, rental equipment, or other tangible and digital goods (“Offerings”). All Offerings are provided on an “AS IS” and “AS AVAILABLE” basis, may change without notice, and may be subject to additional contracts or supplemental terms. Descriptions, specifications, and pricing are provided for convenience only and do not constitute a warranty or guarantee of fitness.

To the fullest extent permitted by law, Textile.org disclaims responsibility for damages arising from the use, misuse, assembly, installation, transportation, or storage of any equipment, electronics, consumables, or instructional materials supplied through the platform. If you rent or borrow equipment, you accept full responsibility for losses, theft, or injuries associated with that equipment regardless of cause, and you agree to indemnify Textile.org for any third-party claims.

• Any fabrication, soldering, or deployment of circuits, boards, or machines occurs at your own risk; you must comply with all applicable safety regulations, building codes, and export controls.
• Rental or loaned equipment must be returned in the same condition (ordinary wear excepted); you authorize Textile.org to charge replacement costs for damaged or unreturned equipment.
• We do not warrant availability of spare parts, compatibility with your systems, or continuous support for any product or kit purchased through the Textile.org shop.
• Your exclusive remedy for any Offering is limited, at Textile.org’s option, to replacement of the product or refund of the amount paid; under no circumstance will Textile.org’s liability exceed the amounts paid for the specific item at issue.