Terms of Service

These Terms of Service (“Terms”) are a legal agreement between you and Scrovel (“Scrovel”, “we”, “us” or “our”) governing your use of the Scrovel website at scrovel.vercel.app, the Scrovel Android app, and any related features (together, the “Service”).

By accessing or using the Service, creating an account, saving a novel, or publishing a book or chapter, you agree to these Terms and to our Privacy Policy. If you do not agree, do not use the Service.

If you use Scrovel on behalf of a company, organization or other entity, you represent that you have authority to bind that entity, and “you” includes that entity.

You must be at least 13 years old, or the minimum age at which you can consent to digital services in your country, to use Scrovel. If you are under 18, you may use Scrovel only with the involvement and consent of a parent or legal guardian.

You must not be barred from using the Service under the laws of your country, and you must not use Scrovel if you have previously been removed for a serious violation of these Terms.

You are responsible for making sure that your use of Scrovel is legal where you live.

You can browse the public feed without an account. To save novels, track your reading or publish, you need an account. You can create one with an email address and password or with Google Sign-In.

• Provide accurate information and keep it up to date. Do not impersonate another person or use a misleading handle or display name.
• Keep your password and Google account secure. Do not share your login credentials. You are responsible for activity carried out through your account, unless it results from our failure to use reasonable security measures.
• Use one account for yourself. Do not create accounts to evade a suspension, manipulate the feed, or abuse promotions or features.
• Tell us promptly at developer.prasant@gmail.com if you believe your account has been compromised.

You can sign out at any time. You can request deletion of your account as described in the account deletion page. We may suspend or close accounts that violate these Terms.

Scrovel is a feed made for readers. It lets visitors discover published novels, lets signed-in readers save books and continue where they stopped, and lets authors write, publish and manage books chapter by chapter. Some features, such as sharing, depend on your device and browser.

We may add, change or remove features, and we may stop offering the Service or any part of it. We do not guarantee that a particular feature, book or chapter will always be available. We may remove content or restrict access when we believe it is necessary to comply with law, protect users, or enforce these Terms.

Scrovel is currently free to use. If we introduce paid features, we will show the price and any additional terms before you buy, and applicable consumer rights will still apply.

You keep ownership of the content you create. This includes your books, chapters, synopses, cover images, profile details and any other material you submit (“Your Content”). Scrovel does not claim ownership of Your Content.

To operate and promote the Service, you grant Scrovel a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free licence to host, store, reproduce, display, distribute, transmit, format and create excerpts or previews of Your Content, and to make it available to readers as you have configured it (public, unlisted, private or draft). This licence includes the right to use service providers such as hosting and database providers, and to show cover images and previews when a link is shared.

This licence is limited to providing, operating, securing and promoting the Service. It does not transfer ownership, and it does not give us the right to sell your books separately or to publish them outside Scrovel except as part of promoting the Service (for example, a social preview of a public book).

The licence ends when you delete Your Content or your account, except for copies that remain in backups for a limited period, pages that have already been cached or indexed by third parties, or content that other users have already shared. You are responsible for keeping your own backup of any draft or manuscript you care about.

You represent that you own or have all necessary rights, licences and permissions to publish Your Content, including any text, cover art, images, characters, translations or other material created by someone else. You must not upload or publish content that infringes another person’s copyright, trademark, privacy or other rights.

You are responsible for Your Content. It must not:

• be illegal, or promote illegal activity, violence, self-harm, terrorism or the exploitation of any person;
• contain child sexual abuse material or any sexual content involving minors, or sexualise a minor in any way;
• contain non-consensual intimate imagery, or reveal another person’s private information without their permission;
• contain hate speech, serious harassment, threats, bullying or content that demeans a person or group based on a protected characteristic;
• impersonate another person, brand or author, or misrepresent the source of a work;
• contain malware, phishing links, spam, deceptive schemes or content designed to disrupt or damage the Service or another person’s device;
• infringe copyright, trademark, publicity, privacy or other rights; or
• violate any applicable law or the rules of an app store through which you installed the app.

We may review, remove or restrict content that we believe violates these standards, and we may suspend or close the accounts of repeat offenders. We are not required to monitor every book or chapter, and removing one item does not waive our right to act on others.

To report content, email developer.prasant@gmail.com with the link, a description of the problem and any supporting information. Do not include anyone’s sensitive personal information unless it is necessary to review the report.

Authors can save a book as a draft, publish it, mark it completed, and choose whether it is public, unlisted or private. Public books can appear in the feed, search and sitemaps, and can be indexed by search engines. Draft, private and unlisted books are not shown in the public feed and are only visible to you.

Publishing does not guarantee that a book will be featured, ranked, recommended or kept online. We may remove or restrict a book if it violates these Terms, if we receive a valid legal or copyright complaint, or if keeping it online would create a risk for Scrovel, readers or the public.

You are responsible for the accuracy of your book details and for keeping a copy of your manuscript. Do not publish personal information about yourself or others that you would not want to become public.

You agree not to:

• access or use the Service in a way that violates these Terms or any law;
• scrape, crawl, bulk-download or harvest content, profiles or other data from the Service without our prior written permission;
• bypass, disable or interfere with authentication, row-level security, rate limits, spam filters or other security or access controls;
• reverse engineer, decompile or attempt to extract source code from the Service, except where the law expressly permits it;
• interfere with the operation of the Service, overload our infrastructure, introduce malware, or attempt to gain unauthorized access to another account or system;
• use the Service to send spam, chain messages or unsolicited commercial communications;
• frame, mirror or resell the Service, or use it to build a competing product, without our written permission; or
• use another person’s account, or share your account in a way that lets others evade these Terms.

We may investigate suspected misuse and cooperate with law enforcement where appropriate. We may suspend or terminate access for conduct that we reasonably believe harms the Service, its users or third parties.

The Service itself, including the Scrovel name, logo, visual design, interface, software, text, graphics and the selection and arrangement of content (but not Your Content), is owned by Scrovel or its licensors and is protected by intellectual property laws.

We grant you a limited, personal, non-exclusive, non-transferable and revocable licence to use the Service for its intended purpose, subject to these Terms. You may not copy, modify, distribute, sell, lease, sublicense or create derivative works from the Service or its branding without our prior written permission.

If you send us feedback, suggestions or ideas, you grant us a perpetual, irrevocable, worldwide, royalty-free licence to use them without restriction or compensation. Do not send us ideas you want to keep confidential.

All rights not expressly granted in these Terms are reserved.

We respect the intellectual property rights of others and expect our users to do the same. If you believe content on Scrovel infringes your copyright, send a written notice to developer.prasant@gmail.com with the subject “Copyright notice”.

Your notice should include:

• your name, address, telephone number and email address, and a physical or electronic signature;
• identification of the copyrighted work you claim has been infringed, or a representative list if multiple works are involved;
• the exact URL or other location of the allegedly infringing material on Scrovel, with enough detail for us to find it;
• a statement that you have a good-faith belief that the use is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent or the law;
• a statement, under penalty of perjury, that the information in your notice is accurate and that you are the copyright owner or are authorized to act on the owner’s behalf; and
• any additional information required by applicable law, including the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) or Indian copyright law.

We may remove or disable access to material in response to a valid notice and may notify the author. If you believe your content was removed by mistake or misidentification, you may send us a counter-notice with the information required by applicable law. We may restore content if the complainant does not pursue legal action.

We may suspend or terminate the accounts of users who repeatedly infringe copyright. Knowingly submitting a false or misleading notice may expose you to liability.

Scrovel uses third-party services for authentication, hosting and infrastructure, including Supabase, Vercel and Google. Your use of those services may be subject to their own terms and privacy policies. The Service may also link to external websites or display cover images hosted elsewhere. We do not control and are not responsible for third-party content, products or practices.

If you download the Scrovel app from Google Play or another app store, these Terms are between you and Scrovel, not the store. The store has no obligation to provide maintenance, support or warranty services for the app. The store’s own terms also apply. Refunds and billing for store purchases, if any, are handled by the store under its policies.

You may stop using Scrovel at any time. You can delete your account as described on the account deletion page.

We may suspend, restrict or terminate your account or access to the Service, with or without notice, if we reasonably believe you have violated these Terms, created risk for other users or Scrovel, or if required by law. We may also remove content that is the subject of a complaint while we investigate.

If we terminate your account for a violation, you may not create a new account to evade the termination. Sections that by their nature should survive termination — including ownership, licence provisions for content already shared, disclaimers, limitation of liability, indemnity and governing law — will continue to apply.

TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY APPLICABLE LAW, THE SERVICE IS PROVIDED “AS IS” AND “AS AVAILABLE”. We do not warrant that the Service will be uninterrupted, error-free, secure or free of harmful components, or that any book, chapter, feature or link will remain available. We do not endorse or verify user content, and we are not responsible for the accuracy, completeness or legality of content published by authors.

You use the Service at your own risk. Some jurisdictions do not allow the exclusion of certain warranties, so some of the exclusions above may not apply to you. Nothing in these Terms limits any warranty or right that cannot be limited by law.

TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY APPLICABLE LAW, SCROVEL AND ITS CONTRIBUTORS, SERVICE PROVIDERS AND LICENSORS WILL NOT BE LIABLE FOR ANY INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, CONSEQUENTIAL, EXEMPLARY OR PUNITIVE DAMAGES, OR FOR ANY LOSS OF PROFITS, REVENUE, DATA, GOODWILL OR OPPORTUNITY, ARISING OUT OF OR RELATED TO YOUR USE OF THE SERVICE, EVEN IF WE HAVE BEEN ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES.

To the maximum extent permitted by law, our total aggregate liability for all claims arising out of or relating to the Service or these Terms will not exceed the greater of (a) INR 1,000 or (b) the amount you paid us for the Service in the 12 months before the claim arose.

Nothing in these Terms excludes or limits liability that cannot be excluded or limited by applicable law, including liability for fraud, wilful misconduct, or death or personal injury caused by our negligence.

To the extent permitted by law, you agree to defend, indemnify and hold harmless Scrovel and its contributors, service providers and licensors from and against claims, liabilities, damages, losses and expenses (including reasonable legal fees) arising out of or related to:

• Your Content;
• your violation of these Terms or applicable law;
• your infringement of another person’s rights; or
• your misuse of the Service, including any claim by a third party arising from content you published or shared.

We may participate in the defence of any claim at our own expense. You may not settle a claim in a way that admits fault or imposes obligations on us without our written consent.

These Terms are governed by the laws of India, without regard to conflict-of-law rules. If you are a consumer, this choice does not deprive you of any mandatory consumer protection rights available in your country of residence.

Before starting formal proceedings, please contact us at developer.prasant@gmail.com and describe the dispute. We will try in good faith to resolve it within 30 days. If we cannot resolve it, you and Scrovel agree to the exclusive jurisdiction of the competent courts in India, subject to any mandatory law that gives you the right to bring a claim elsewhere.

Nothing in this section prevents either party from seeking urgent injunctive or equitable relief to protect its rights.

We may update these Terms from time to time. When we do, we will update the “Last updated” date at the top of this page. If a change is material, we will provide reasonable notice on the website or in the app before it takes effect.

By continuing to use the Service after the updated Terms take effect, you agree to the updated Terms. If you do not agree, stop using the Service and, if you wish, request deletion of your account.

These Terms and the Privacy Policy are the entire agreement between you and Scrovel regarding the Service. If any provision is found unenforceable, the remaining provisions will remain in effect. Our failure to enforce a provision is not a waiver of our right to do so later.

You may not assign or transfer your rights under these Terms without our written consent. We may assign our rights in connection with a merger, acquisition, reorganization or transfer of the Service. We are not responsible for delays or failures caused by events beyond our reasonable control.

Headings are for convenience only and do not affect interpretation. Notices to us should be sent to developer.prasant@gmail.com. We may send notices to the email address associated with your account or post them on the Service.

Questions about these Terms, a report about content, or a legal notice? Email developer.prasant@gmail.com. For privacy requests, see our Privacy Policy. For account deletion, see Delete your account.

We aim to respond within 30 days. Legal notices should use the subject “Legal notice” and include your contact details and the relevant URLs.