Acceptable Use
Policy.

What Dropstone Is For

Dropstone is built for writing software and for research and development that moves people and society forward: products and open-source tools, science and medicine, education, public services, and the everyday work of the people building them.

Almost everything people do with it is exactly that. This policy marks the small set of uses that work against it, and explains what happens when someone tries.

Scope

This policy applies to everyone who uses Dropstone, on every surface: the command-line tool, the desktop and web apps, the editor extensions and the API. It covers what you ask Dropstone to do, what you do with what it produces, and how you use your account.

It is part of our Terms of Service, and by using Dropstone you agree to it. If you use Dropstone on behalf of an organization, the organization is responsible for its members following it, and if you build Dropstone into your own product, your users have to follow it too.

Illegal Activity

Don't use Dropstone for anything that is illegal, either where you are or where the people and systems affected are. That includes planning, carrying out or helping with a crime, and producing anything that is illegal to create or share. For example:

• Making, selling or trafficking illegal drugs
• Human trafficking or exploitation
• Infringing other people's copyrights, trademarks or other intellectual property
• Breaking sanctions or export control laws

Weapons

Don't use Dropstone to design, build, obtain or use weapons. This includes:

• Biological, chemical, nuclear or radiological weapons, and the agents, precursors and delivery methods behind them
• Explosives and incendiary devices
• Firearms, ammunition and untraceable weapons, including instructions for making them or illegally modifying them
• Turning drones, vehicles or other machines into weapons

Critical Infrastructure

Don't use Dropstone to disrupt, damage or gain unauthorized control of the systems people depend on: power grids, water supplies, hospitals and medical devices, telecommunications, transport, financial systems and emergency services.

Hacking & Malicious Software

Don't use Dropstone to get into systems, accounts or data you aren't authorized to access, or to damage them. This includes:

• Breaking into computers, networks or accounts without the owner's permission
• Gaining access or privileges you weren't given
• Writing or deploying malware, ransomware, spyware or botnets
• Stealing passwords, access tokens or personal data
• Denial-of-service attacks
• Exploiting vulnerabilities in systems you don't own and haven't been given permission to test

Violence, Hate & Harassment

• Planning, promoting or glorifying terrorism or violent extremism
• Threatening anyone, or encouraging violence against them
• Attacking or demeaning people for their race, ethnicity, religion, nationality, gender, sexual orientation, disability or other protected trait
• Harassing, bullying or intimidating anyone
• Encouraging suicide, self-harm or eating disorders
• Creating or sharing intimate images of anyone without their consent

Children

Never use Dropstone to sexualize, groom, exploit or endanger anyone under 18. Any material that sexualizes a minor is forbidden without exception, and we report it to the authorities.

Sexual Content

Don't use Dropstone to create sexually explicit content, including written fiction, role-play and images, even when every person involved is a consenting adult. Dropstone is built for software and research, not for erotic or pornographic material.

Factual material about sex and sexual health, such as medical information or sex education, is fine.

Privacy & Surveillance

• Collecting or using people's personal data without the permission or legal basis you need
• Tracking, monitoring or recording people without their consent
• Identifying people from their face, voice or other biometrics without their consent
• Building profiles of individuals, or publishing someone's private information to target them

Fraud, Deception & Elections

• Scams, phishing, identity theft, and forged or fake documents
• Spam, and messages sent in bulk to people who didn't ask for them
• Impersonating real people or organizations, including deepfakes
• Fake accounts, fake reviews and coordinated campaigns that hide who is behind them
• Misleading people about how, when or whether to vote, or interfering with an election

High-Stakes Decisions

If you build something with Dropstone that makes or recommends decisions about people in health care, law, finance, insurance, employment, housing, education, public benefits or immigration:

• A qualified person has to review the result before it affects anyone, and be able to change it
• The people affected should be told AI was involved

If it controls equipment that acts in the physical world, a person must be able to watch it and stop it.

Agents & Automation

Dropstone can run commands, edit files and operate your computer for you. You are responsible for what it does at your direction, the same as if you had done it yourself. Keep it to systems and accounts you are allowed to use, and read what it asks to run before you approve it.

Abusing Dropstone

• Trying to get around the safety checks built into Dropstone, or using other tricks to produce what this policy forbids
• Creating accounts in bulk, or opening new accounts to get around usage limits, a suspension or a ban
• Attacking or overloading the Service, or trying to reach other users' accounts or data

How Dropstone Checks Its Own Work

Dropstone reviews its own work as it goes, not only what it is asked to do.

• Before it runs a command that could do damage, such as deleting files, rewriting git history or sending files off your machine, it stops and asks you to approve it, unless your request asked for exactly that.
• When a request crosses this policy, it says so plainly, declines that part, and may ask what you are trying to do. Explaining legitimate context, such as your authorization for a security test, is often enough to carry on.
• Our team reviews reports of misuse and acts on them as described under Enforcement.

Enforcement

Breaking this policy can lead to your account being suspended or permanently banned. Depending on how serious it is, we may:

• Warn you
• Limit what your account can do
• Suspend your account while we look into it
• Permanently ban your account, and any other account used to get around the ban
• Report the activity to law enforcement where the law requires it or someone is at risk of harm

Serious violations, including anything involving weapons, attacks on other people's systems or harm to children, can lead to an immediate ban without a warning. What happens to a suspended or banned account is covered in Section 14 of the Terms of Service.

Reporting

If you see Dropstone being used in a way this policy forbids, email [email protected] with what you saw and any links or details that help us find it.

Changes

We may update this policy. When we do, we'll change the effective date at the top of this page, and for significant changes we'll let you know by email. Using Dropstone after a change means you accept the updated policy.