Terms of Service

§1. Parties and Acceptance

1.1 Parties. These Terms of Service are a binding agreement between you (the user, either an individual or the legal entity you represent) and SynthVerse (Pty) Ltd, a private company duly incorporated under the laws of the Republic of South Africa with registration number 2024/001234/07 ("SynthVerse", "we", "us" or "our").

1.2 Acceptance. By creating an account, clicking "I agree" during registration, accessing, browsing or using any part of the SynthVerse platform (including the main site, subdomains, mobile applications, API integrations, SynthVerse Studio and SynthVerse Forge tools), you confirm that you (a) have read and understood these Terms; (b) agree to be bound by them; and (c) have the legal capacity to enter into a binding contract. If you are under 18 years old, you may use SynthVerse only with the involvement and consent of a parent or legal guardian who has read and agreed to these Terms on your behalf.

1.3 Changes. SynthVerse may update these Terms from time to time. Material changes will be notified by email to your primary registered address (for active accounts) and by an in-app banner for no fewer than 30 days before the effective date. Your continued use of SynthVerse after the effective date constitutes acceptance of the revised Terms.

§2. Accounts and Responsibilities

2.1 Account creation. To access paid services, creator features, account settings and personalised recommendations you must create a SynthVerse account. You agree to provide accurate, current and complete information during registration and to update it promptly to keep it accurate, current and complete.

2.2 Credentials. You are solely responsible for safeguarding your account credentials (username, password, MFA recovery codes, third-party social login tokens). SynthVerse will not be liable for any loss or damage arising from your failure to maintain the confidentiality of your credentials. You must notify us immediately of any unauthorised access or suspected compromise of your account.

2.3 One individual per account. Each SynthVerse account is for one individual user. Shared or "family" accounts are not permitted on Creator plans. SynthVerse reserves the right to enforce device-count and concurrent-session limits to detect and suspend credential sharing.

2.4 Artist and legal-entity accounts. Creator, label and enterprise accounts represent the warrant that the account holder has the legal right to upload, license and collect royalties for every work submitted under that account. Where multiple persons or a legal entity share an artist profile, one individual remains the designated account owner and is responsible for all activity and communications.

2.5 Account termination. You may close your SynthVerse account at any time from Account > Security > Close account. Closure schedules a 30-day soft-delete window during which you can request cancellation. After the soft-delete window your account data is either (a) irreversibly anonymised and retained indefinitely for copyright and royalty-audit purposes, or (b) irrevocably deleted if you have previously submitted a valid POPIA Erasure request.

§3. Description of Service

3.1 The SynthVerse platform. SynthVerse provides an online music-discovery, streaming, distribution and artist-services platform including (a) a public-facing website at synthverse.co.za and associated subdomains; (b) SynthVerse Radio, a linear audio stream; (c) artist, label and admin portals; (d) Documentation Vault provenance certificates; (e) SynthVerse Studio and Forge AI-assisted creation tools; (f) a public application-programming interface (API); and (g) mobile and desktop applications, when available.

3.2 Modification of service. SynthVerse evolves continuously. We may modify, suspend or discontinue any feature (temporarily or permanently) at any time, with or without notice, so long as we do not withdraw access to already-purchased content or substantially reduce the feature set of an active paid subscription without a pro-rata refund or credit.

3.3 Third-party services. SynthVerse integrates with payment processors (Stripe, PayPal), identity providers (Google, Apple, Spotify Sign In), DSP distribution partners and analytics vendors. Your use of those integrations is additionally governed by their respective terms.

§4. Creator Licenses and Royalties

4.1 Creator ownership. Subject only to the limited licenses granted below, you retain full ownership of all copyright, moral rights, database rights, trademark rights and other intellectual property in the music, artwork, metadata, biography, photographs, liner notes and other materials you submit, upload or publish to SynthVerse ("Your Content").

4.2 Operating license. By publishing Your Content on SynthVerse, you grant SynthVerse a non-exclusive, worldwide, transferable (only to assignees of our business), royalty-bearing license to reproduce, distribute, publicly perform, publicly display, communicate to the public, make available, stream, transcode into any format, adapt metadata for categorisation, promote through playlists and recommendation algorithms, and sublicense to SynthVerse\'s licensed third-party DSP partners any Content you publish. This license lasts for the term of your account plus the minimum period required to complete already-contracted distribution or sublicensing commitments.

4.3 Royalty share. Net streaming and download revenue is shared with creators according to the published rate card applicable to your plan tier at the time of the transaction. "Net revenue" means gross revenue actually received by SynthVerse, excluding value-added tax, sales tax, payment processor fees, chargebacks, refunds, and DSP distribution fees. Royalties are accumulated monthly and paid out on the schedule applicable to your plan. Unclaimed royalties below your plan\'s minimum payout threshold are carried to the next statement period indefinitely, or until account closure (at which point a final payout is made if the threshold is met).

4.4 Withholding and tax. It is your responsibility to declare and pay all taxes applicable to your royalty income in your jurisdiction of residence. SynthVerse may deduct statutory withholding tax where required by applicable law, and will provide you with an official withholding statement upon request.

4.5 Distribution sublicenses. Professional and Enterprise tiers may elect to enable optional distribution to third-party DSPs. By enabling distribution, you appoint SynthVerse as your non-exclusive licensee for the purpose of delivering your releases to those DSPs and collecting, reporting and remitting the attributable revenue, all in exchange for the distribution fee disclosed at time of enablement.

§5. Listener Rights and Restrictions

5.1 Personal, non-commercial use. Subject to your plan entitlements and these Terms, SynthVerse grants you a limited, personal, non-exclusive, non-transferable, revocable license to access, stream and (on Premium) temporarily download audio content cached by the SynthVerse client for the sole purpose of your private, non-commercial, entertainment use. This license does not include public performance, broadcasting, commercial venue playback, re-streaming, DJ set transmission, redistribution or resale of any content or account access.

5.2 Download cache. Downloaded content on Premium plans is encrypted and bound to your signed-in SynthVerse account. Downloaded files are not DRM-stripped consumer copies; they are temporary licensed reproductions that cease to function if (a) your subscription lapses for more than 30 days, (b) the rights holder removes the work from SynthVerse, or (c) your account is suspended for breach of these Terms.

5.3 Scraping and crawling. You may not use robots, spiders, scrapers, metadata dumpers, bulk-export clients or any automated process (other than the documented public API with a valid API key and within published rate limits) to download content, crawl platform metadata or extract user-facing data in bulk. Violations will be referred to the security team and may result in immediate account suspension and legal action.

§6. Fees, Payment and Taxes

6.1 Subscription fees. Paid subscriptions are billed monthly or yearly in advance at the rate published on the Pricing page at time of purchase. All prices are inclusive of VAT (South Africa) unless stated otherwise.

6.2 Renewal and cancellation. Subscriptions automatically renew unless cancelled at least 24 hours before the renewal date. Cancellations take effect at the end of the current billing period. No partial-month refunds are issued for cancellations mid-cycle.

6.3 Refunds. Subject to the Consumer Protection Act (Act 68 of 2008) for consumers in South Africa: (a) cooling-off refunds are available within 7 business days of first signup on paid plans if you have not consumed more than 2 hours of streaming or published any paid-scope feature; (b) refunds for technical faults preventing substantially all service use for 72+ consecutive hours will be credited on a case-by-case basis; (c) no refunds are offered for non-use or dissatisfaction with content.

6.4 Chargebacks. Reversing a legitimate subscription charge via your card issuer outside of the SynthVerse refund process may result in immediate suspension of service, a 20% chargeback administration fee, and reporting of the unpaid balance to collections or credit bureaus where permitted by law.

6.5 Pricing changes. SynthVerse may adjust subscription prices with 30 days\' prior email notice. The new pricing applies on the next renewal date after the notice period; if you do not agree with the new pricing you may cancel before the renewal date.

§7. Acceptable Use and Content Policy

7.1 You may not use SynthVerse to: (a) upload, publish or transmit unlawful, defamatory, harassing, hateful, discriminatory, violent, fraudulent, deceptive, non-consensual-explicit, or otherwise illegal content; (b) impersonate any person or entity, falsely claim affiliation, or forge metadata or provenance headers; (c) submit works you do not own or have full authority to license; (d) deliberately manipulate play counts, followers, chart position or engagement metrics through botting, streaming farms, click-through schemes, purchased engagement or any other inorganic method; (e) distribute malware, phishing links, crypto-mining payloads or any other harmful code; (f) interfere with or disrupt the security, integrity or availability of SynthVerse infrastructure; (g) reverse-engineer the SynthVerse client, decrypt cached content or circumvent DRM or offline-download controls.

7.2 Content ratings. All creator-submitted content must carry an accurate rating: General (no explicit content), Advisory (mild explicit language/themes), or Explicit (strong language, adult themes, graphic violence references). Mis-rating content to avoid filters is a breach of these Terms.

7.3 User-generated content. Comments, forum posts, reviews, playlist descriptions, biographies and other user-generated text ("UGC") are the sole responsibility of the posting user. SynthVerse does not pre-moderate every piece of UGC but reserves the right to remove UGC that violates these Terms or law at any time, with or without notice.

§8. Enforcement, Suspension and Termination

8.1 Progressive enforcement. For first, low-severity infractions SynthVerse typically issues a written warning with a reasonable cure period. Subsequent infractions, or severe single infractions, may result in temporary suspension (24 hours to 30 days), removal of individual content, loss of verified or featured status, loss of chart eligibility, downgrade of plan tier, or permanent account termination.

8.2 No refund upon termination for cause. Where we suspend or terminate because you have materially breached these Terms, no pro-rata refund or credit of unused subscription time will be issued. Accrued royalties (if any) above the minimum payout threshold will be remitted per the normal schedule, minus any damages, chargeback fees, legal costs or unpaid charges reasonably incurred by SynthVerse arising from the breach.

8.3 Appeal. Any enforcement action may be appealed by writing to support@synthverse.co.za within 14 calendar days of the action with a full explanation and supporting evidence. Appeals are reviewed by a team independent of the moderation staff. Decisions on appeals are final.

§9. Disclaimers

9.1 "AS IS" and "AS AVAILABLE". SynthVerse provides the service on an "as is" and "as available" basis, without any warranty of any kind — express, implied, statutory or otherwise — including but not limited to warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, non-infringement, title, accuracy, completeness, error-free operation, uninterrupted availability, or that the service will meet your requirements.

9.2 No advisory role. Nothing on SynthVerse constitutes legal, tax, accounting, medical, investment or professional advice. Consult appropriately-qualified independent professionals for such guidance.

9.3 Third-party content. SynthVerse is a distributor and host of user-uploaded content and does not undertake a general obligation to monitor uploaded works for rights clearance. Specific takedown requests should follow the Copyright & DMCA process.

§10. Limitation of Liability

10.1 Exclusion. To the maximum extent permitted by applicable law, SynthVerse, its affiliates, directors, officers, employees, contractors, licensors, suppliers and agents shall not be liable for any indirect, incidental, special, consequential, exemplary or punitive damages, or any loss of profits, revenue, data, goodwill, content or business opportunity, arising out of or related to your use of SynthVerse, whether or not we have been advised of the possibility of such damages and regardless of the theory of liability.

10.2 Total aggregate cap. Except as required by non-excludable provisions of the Consumer Protection Act or the POPIA for consumers, SynthVerse\'s total aggregate liability arising under or in connection with these Terms for any and all claims, whether in contract, delict (tort) or otherwise, will not exceed the greater of (a) the total subscription fees actually paid by you to SynthVerse in the 12 months preceding the first date of the event giving rise to the claim, or (b) R1,000 (one thousand Rand).

10.3 Consumer law. Nothing in this section limits rights that cannot be excluded or limited under South African consumer legislation or any other applicable law that cannot be contracted out of.

§11. Dispute Resolution and Governing Law

11.1 Informal resolution first. Before commencing formal proceedings, you agree to first attempt good-faith resolution by writing to disputes@synthverse.co.za with a detailed description of the dispute and your requested remedy. A SynthVerse dispute-resolution officer will respond within 14 business days and negotiate in good faith for a further 30 calendar days.

11.2 Mediation. If informal resolution fails, either party may submit the dispute to binding private mediation administered by the Arbitration Foundation of Southern Africa (AFSA) before a single mediator jointly selected within 10 business days, with each party bearing its own costs of preparation and splitting the mediator\'s fee equally.

11.3 Litigation. Only after unsuccessful mediation may a party institute proceedings. These Terms are governed by and construed in accordance with the laws of the Republic of South Africa without reference to conflict-of-laws rules. The parties submit to the exclusive jurisdiction of the Magistrate\'s Court, Johannesburg, for disputes within its monetary jurisdiction, or the High Court of South Africa, Gauteng Local Division, Johannesburg, for disputes outside it.

11.4 No class actions. You agree to resolve disputes on an individual basis only, and not as a plaintiff or class member in any purported class, representative, collective or consolidated action or proceeding.

§12. Miscellaneous

12.1 Entire agreement. These Terms, together with the Privacy Policy, Copyright & DMCA Policy and AI Ownership Policy, form the entire agreement between the parties and supersede all prior oral or written agreements regarding the same subject matter.

12.2 Severability. If any provision of these Terms is held unenforceable or invalid, that provision will be limited or eliminated to the minimum extent necessary so that these Terms otherwise remain in full force and effect and enforceable.

12.3 No waiver. No failure or delay by SynthVerse in exercising any right, power or privilege operates as a waiver, nor does any single or partial exercise preclude any other or further exercise.

12.4 Assignment. SynthVerse may assign these Terms and its rights and obligations hereunder (in whole or in part) in connection with a merger, acquisition, corporate reorganisation or sale of all or substantially all assets, without prior notice, provided the assignee agrees to be bound by obligations no less protective of your interests than these Terms. You may not assign these Terms without SynthVerse\'s prior written consent.

12.5 Notices. SynthVerse may provide legal and operational notices by email to your registered primary email address, by in-app banner, or by certified mail to your physical address if one is registered. It is your responsibility to keep your contact information current.

12.6 Survival. Sections 4 (Creator Licenses), 6.4 (Chargebacks), 9 (Disclaimers), 10 (Liability), 11 (Disputes) and 12 (Miscellaneous) survive any termination or expiration of these Terms.