WBS

World Brain Scholar (WBS) – Terms of Service

World Brain Scholar BV, a limited liability company, having its registered office in Amsterdam, the Netherlands (“WBS”, “we” or “us”) is pleased to provide you with access to the “WBS services”, which allow a scientist who has prepared a manuscript (the ‘Author’) to improve the quality of the manuscript, those who review the manuscripts (the “Reviewer”) to professionalise their reports and make editorial decisions (the “Editors”) to facilitate their editorial tasks. The different users together are called the “Users” or “User” or “you” in this agreement. WBS and the User may be referred to as the “Parties” (collectively) or a “Party” (individually).

Acceptance of the Terms of Use. By acknowledging agreement to these Terms of Use, or by installing, downloading, accessing, or otherwise copying or using all or any portion of the WBS Services and more generally of the WBS Platform, for any purpose whatsoever, the User accepts these Terms of Use and acknowledge that you are legally bound by these Terms of Use.

In the event of any reservation or dispute concerning all or part of the provisions of these Terms of Use, you acknowledge that you shall no longer have the right to use the WBS Services and access the WBS Platforms. The Terms of Use may be modified from time to time at our sole discretion. Your continued use of the WBS Services constitutes your consent to such changes.

Our Privacy Policy explains how we use personal data and is part of these Terms of Use.

1. Definitions

Manuscript quality improvement: shall mean all activities of Authors in connection with increasing the quality of their manuscript.

Peer-Reviewing: shall mean all activities of the Reviewers and Editors solely in connection with the peer review of the Manuscripts.

Manuscript: shall mean each academic paper that a given User uploads on the WBS Platform.

User Content: shall mean any and all content provided by a given User on the WBS Platform in connection with the use of the WBS services, including a Manuscript, the reviews created by the Editors and/or the Reviewers, the comments sent by the Reviewers to the Editors, the decision letter created by the Editors, the prompts entered by the User, as well as any personal data, content and materials provided by/created by a User while using the WBS Services. This extends to the output that a User receives when using the WBS Services, based on the input information and material provided beforehand by the User.

User: shall mean, as detailed above, an Author, Reviewer or an Editor using the WBS Services as a User using the WBS Services on his/her own behalf.

WBS Platform: shall mean the web-based platform available at our website or any other website provided by WBS from time to time.

WBS Services: shall mean the applications, tools, software, features and websites provided by WBS via the WBS Platform, to provide assistance to Authors, Editors and Reviewers. The WBS Services shall include all derivative works, modifications, improvements, upgrades and/or updates thereto, as well as all images, texts, data, graphics, ideas, methods, know-how and processes concerning the same, including all associated intellectual property rights and other material included on or otherwise made available by WBS.

2. Purpose

The purpose of these Terms of Use is to describe the rights and responsibilities of the Parties in connection with Your use of the WBS Services.

3. Your right of use

Right to use the WBS Services. WBS grants you a limited, non-exclusive, non-transferable, non-sub-licensable, fully revocable right to internally access the WBS Platform and use the WBS Services, during the Term, subject to these Terms of Use.

Prohibited Uses. Except as specifically permitted above, you agree not to:

copy, modify, merge or sub-license any portion of the WBS Services;
sell, license (or sub-license), lease, assign, transfer, pledge, or share your rights under these Terms of Use with/to anyone else;
modify, disassemble, decompile, reverse engineer, revise or enhance any portion of the WBS Services or attempt to discover the corresponding source code, or aid, assist or otherwise permit any third party to do so;
develop any other products containing any of the concepts or ideas that are contained in the WBS Services, except as expressly permitted hereunder;
develop methods to enable unauthorized parties to use, recreate or infringe the WBS Services; and
represent that you possess any proprietary interest in the WBS Services.

Termination of your right to use. We may, in our sole discretion, refuse to offer the WBS Services to any person or entity. We may, in accordance herewith, terminate your right to use the WBS Services, or any portion of thereof, and block or prevent your future access to and use of the WBS Services or any portion thereof.

4. Ownership of the WBS Services

WBS Services are owned by WBS or its licensors. All right, title and interest in and to the WBS Services, including (including, without limitation, patents, copyrights, trade secrets, trademarks, etc.), and other proprietary rights in and to the WBS Services, are and shall at all times vest exclusively with WBS or its licensors. WBS does not sell or transfer title in the WBS Services or any part thereof to the User.

For clarity, these Terms of Use do not convey to the User an interest in or to the WBS Services, but only a limited right of use revocable in accordance with the terms herein. We reserve all rights not expressly granted to you in these Terms of Use. Nothing herein constitutes a waiver of WBS' intellectual property rights under any law.

5. User Content

Ownership. You retain at all times all the rights, including but not limited to the intellectual property rights, to your User Content. Except as otherwise set forth herein, WE DO NOT CLAIM OWNERSHIP OVER ANY USER CONTENT and in particular over the Manuscript. This shall extend to the output received by the User when processing the input provided by the same User to the WBS Services.

Grant of license for use of the WBS Services. By using the WBS Services, you grant WBS, its service providers and licensors a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free, perpetual, irrevocable, sub-licensable right and license to use, reproduce, publicly display, distribute and adapt the User Content for the sole purposes of providing the WBS Services to the User for the Manuscript at hand. You further agree that any information and personal data included in your User Content may be used in accordance with our Privacy Policy.

Grant of license for improving the WBS Services. By using the WBS Services, you grant WBS a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free, perpetual, irrevocable, sub-licensable right and license to use, reproduce, publicly display, distribute and adapt the User Content (including the Manuscript) for the sole purposes of improving the WBS Services, including by training the WBS language model on which the WBS Services are built (after de-identification, as the case may be, in accordance with our privacy obligations). For clarity, the User Content shall not be used for other purposes, and in particular shall not be used for training publicly available large language models.

User Representations. You are solely responsible for ensuring that any User Content you submit to the WBS Services can be used in accordance hereto. In particular, by submitting User Content, you represent and warrant that (i) you own or otherwise control all of the rights to your User Content (in particular, the author of the Manuscript authorised you to use the Manuscript with the WBS Services), (ii) the use of your User Content does not violate these Terms of Use or the law, and will not violate any rights of or cause injury to any person or entity, (iii) your User Content complies with any applicable laws and third party rights, including but not limited to any intellectual property rights and privacy rights, and (iv) your User Content does not violate the additional User obligations set forth in Section 6 below.

WBS right to monitor or remove. You agree that you bear all risks associated with your User Content. You are solely responsible for safeguarding your User Content and WBS has no duty to store copies of User Content for future availability to you or any user except as otherwise provided hereunder. WBS shall further remove User Content from the WBS Services if it is informed or otherwise becomes aware that such User Content infringes on another person’s intellectual property rights or is otherwise non-compliant with the User’s obligations. Generally, we reserve the right to remove User Content from the WBS Services, in whole or in part, without prior notice, for any reason.

6. User obligations

Creating and managing your account. A WBS account is required in order to take full advantage of the WBS Services. The account can be created directly by filling out the appropriate form on the WBS Platform. You agree to provide only accurate and true information in connection with the creation of your account and to update your information as necessary.

You may not transfer your account to any third party. You are responsible for keeping your account login information confidential and for any and all activities that occur under your account. You agree to notify us immediately if you suspect or become aware of any unauthorized use of your account or other breach of security on the WBS Services. WBS retains the right at any time to deactivate your account if WBS suspects an unauthorized use thereof.

Respecting User restrictions. You agree that, at all times when using the WBS Services, you will not use the WBS Services to:

Decompile, disassemble, reverse engineer, copy, transfer, or otherwise use the WBS Services except as permitted hereunder.
Promote any illegal activity, or advocate, promote or assist any unlawful act.
Violate the legal rights (including the rights of publicity and privacy) of other persons or provide on the WBS Services any material that could give rise to any civil or criminal liability under applicable laws or regulations or that otherwise may be in conflict herewith.
Use the Manuscript other than in the Peer-Reviewing context on the WBS Platform and in particular download the Manuscript on the User personal computer or use it otherwise other than for Peer-Reviewing on the WBS Platform.
Transmit any material or content that is pornographic, threatening, harassing, libelous, hate-oriented, harmful, defamatory, racist, xenophobic, or otherwise illegal.
Transmit any material that may infringe the intellectual property rights or other rights of third parties, including trademark, copyright, patent, or right of publicity, or which otherwise constitutes or promotes counterfeit materials or goods.
In a manner that (a) is likely to interrupt, suspend, slow down or hinder the continuity of the WBS Services, (b) constitutes an intrusion or attempt to break into the WBS Services or WBS systems, (c) diverts the WBS Services' system resources, (d) places a disproportionate load on the infrastructure of the WBS Services, or (e) constitutes an attack on security and authentication measures of the WBS Services or systems.
Otherwise use the WBS Services for purposes other than those for which they were designed.

You will further ensure at all times that:

The use of any and all personal data that may be incorporated into the User Content is made strictly where necessary, in accordance with the applicable regulations and in particular with the Regulation (EU) 2016/679 (General Data Protection Regulation, “GDPR”) where applicable. The User shall ensure that it has obtained all the necessary consents and authorizations with respect to the aforesaid regulations, including but not limited to any consent related to these personal data, where applicable.

7. WBS obligations

Security/Confidentiality. WBS shall maintain reasonable administrative, physical, and technical safeguards for protection of the security, confidentiality and integrity of the WBS Services and/or User Content, as provided for under these Terms of Use. In particular, WBS shall ensure, to the extent set forth above, that no Manuscript is leaked to third parties, copied or otherwise used for purposes other than those detailed in Section 5 in connection with the WBS Services only.

Deletion of the User Content. In order to avoid any unauthorized use of the User Content and ensure that it is used solely for the uses provided for herein in connection with the WBS Services, WBS shall delete all User Content in connection with a given Manuscript from its servers no later than two months from the user's deletion request on the WBS Platform of the relevant Manuscript.

WBS Services provided as is. The User acknowledges that the WBS Services are provided “as is”. WBS disclaims any and all warranties, whether express, implied or statutory, including, without limitation, any implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose, to the fullest extent allowed under applicable law. WBS does not warrant that the WBS Services will be delivered or performed error-free or without interruption. Therefore, the entire risk arising out of the use or performance of the WBS Services remains with the User.

Accessibility of the WBS Services. Subject to your compliance herewith, WBS shall use commercially reasonable efforts to make the WBS Services accessible on a 24 hours a day, 7 days a week basis. WBS however reserves the right to suspend the availability of all or part of the WBS Services (a) in case of a force majeure event (as defined under the applicable law), (b) for maintenance purposes, including but not limited to, to fix anomalies, bugs or errors, to launch new or improved features or services, or to address immediate security concerns and (c) in any other events where WBS sees it necessary or appropriate to suspend the WBS Services. Generally and to the extent allowed under the applicable law, WBS shall not be held liable for any disruptions, interruptions and/or anomalies affecting the accessibility of the WBS Services, whatever the extent and duration. WBS further reserves the right to modify the WBS Services at all times, to discontinue all or part of the WBS Services, without prior notice to Users. WBS shall however do its best efforts to notify its Users in all such events.

No warranty. Due to the nature of the WBS Services, you understand and agree that the WBS Services are provided without any warranty, whether express or implied, regarding the quality and accuracy of the output generated by the use of the WBS Services.

Privacy. WBS is committed to protecting privacy and ensuring the security of all personal data that it may collect and process in connection with the use of the WBS Services, always in compliance with the applicable law and in particular the EU GDPR. The privacy rules applicable to us are detailed in our Privacy Policy.

IA Act. The WBS Services are AI-driven, based on available third-party solutions and technologies. WBS shall at all times comply with the requirements of the applicable regulations in this respect, and in particular the EU Artificial Intelligence Act 2024/1689 (“IA Act”). WBS may modify the WBS Services and/or these Terms of Use from time to time in accordance with the implementation of the IA Act and the good practices set forth by the AI Office.

8. Indemnification & liability

You agree to indemnify and hold WBS and its owners, directors, officers, employees and agents harmless from and against any and all claims, demands, suits, proceedings, liabilities, judgments, losses, damages, expenses and costs (including without limitation reasonable attorneys' fees) assessed or incurred by WBS directly or indirectly, with respect to or arising out of:

your failure to comply with these Terms of Use;
your breach of your obligations hereunder;
your use of the rights granted hereunder, including without limitation any claims made by any third parties;
your violation of any third party right, including without limitation any intellectual property, right of publicity, or privacy right; and/or
any claim that any of your User Content caused damage to a third party.

Exclusion of liability. WBS shall not be liable, to the full extent permitted under applicable law:

In case of a force majeure event (as defined by Dutch case law)
In case of temporary unavailability of the WBS Services,
In cases in connection with the use of the User Content,
Whenever the User is in breach hereof, or in violation of applicable laws,
Whenever the output of a given User is similar or identical to another User’s output,
For any loss of profits, income, revenue, business opportunities, loss or corruption of data or information,
For any failure to realize expected revenues or savings, loss or damage to goodwill, pure economic loss or other economic or pecuniary loss (regardless of whether any of this type of loss or damage are direct, indirect, special or consequential), or
For any indirect, special, incidental, punitive, exemplary, incidental or consequential damages of any kind, even if informed of the possibility of such damages in advance.

Limitation of liability. To the extent permitted by applicable law, the total aggregate liability of WBS in respect of any losses incurred by the User hereunder shall not exceed, where applicable, in the aggregate, the amount of the fees paid by the User in the twelve (12) calendar months preceding the date on which the event occurred.

9. Term – Termination

Term. The Terms of Use shall enter into effect upon each User signing in to the WBS Services and shall expire upon termination hereof.

Termination for cause. We may terminate your account or right to access all or portions of the WBS Services at any time, without notice, for conduct that we believe violates these Terms of Use or is harmful to WBS or to any third parties. All your rights and access to the WBS Services shall be immediately revoked, without prejudice to other rights and remedies available under applicable law.

Survival. After any termination hereof and/or after you otherwise stop using the WBS Services, the following shall survive and remain enforceable: sections 4, 5, 8, 10.

10. Misc

Modifications. We reserve the right to modify these Terms of Use at any time.

Entire agreement. These Terms of Use constitute the entire agreement and understanding reached between the Parties in relation to its subject matter, thus encompassing and leaving without effect any previous agreements, promises, understanding or covenants that may have been reached between the Parties with respect to the subject matter hereof.

Severance. The unlawfulness, invalidity or ineffectiveness of any of the clauses of these Terms of Use shall not affect the effectiveness of the rest, provided that the rights and obligations of the Parties are not materially affected. Said clauses shall be replaced or integrated with others which, being in accordance with the law, correspond to the purpose of those replaced.

Applicable law and Jurisdiction. These Terms of Use shall be governed and interpreted in accordance with the provisions of the law of the Netherlands. For the resolution of any discrepancies arising in the development and interpretation of these Terms of Use, the User and WBS agree, expressly waiving any other jurisdiction that may correspond to them, to submit to the exclusive jurisdiction of the Courts of Amsterdam, the Netherlands.

For any questions regarding these Terms of Use, please contact us.

Leave us feedback Contact Terms of service Privacy policy