Terms of Use

These Terms of Use (the “terms”) are an agreement between you and Hriday Vanka, an individual developer living in India, of Hyderabad, Telangana, India (“I”, “me”). I make and run Yuga: the apps for iPhone, iPad and Android, the website, and the servers behind them (together, “Yuga”). Yuga is not a company; when these terms say “I”, it is that one person.

By using Yuga, with or without an account, you agree to these terms. If you don’t agree, please don’t use Yuga. Nothing in these terms takes away rights you have under the consumer law of the country you live in that can’t be excluded by contract.

These terms include, by reference: the Acceptable Use Policy, the AI and Content Policy, for the apps the App Licence, and for paid features the Subscription Terms. The Privacy Policy, the Privacy Notice for India and the Cookie Policy explain how personal data is handled; they are not contract terms you have to accept.

• You must be 13 or older. Yuga is not for children under 13.
• If you are under 18 (or under the age of majority where you live), a parent or guardian must agree to these terms for you, and should read the Young People and Parents page. Figures talk to you in teen mode.
• In India, under 18: from 13 May 2027, you can use Yuga only with a parent’s or guardian’s verifiable consent given in the way Yuga will provide, or not at all (Digital Personal Data Protection Act 2023, section 9).
• The examined figure is available only to signed-in adults (18 or over by the year of birth they give).
• You must not be barred from using Yuga by law, including sanctions laws, and must not have been banned from Yuga before.
• Give a true year of birth. Giving a false one to get around the age rules breaks these terms.

Yuga lets you talk with AI recreations of historical figures, and watch two of them debate. Each figure is an AI model playing a character, guided by my notes and by historical sources, including the figure’s own writing.

• The figures are not the real people, and don’t speak for them, their families, estates, countries or faiths. Their voices are designed, not recordings or clones.
• They can be wrong. AI makes mistakes, invents details, and gets dates, quotations and sources wrong. Figures also hold the views of their own time, some of which are offensive today. Check anything important against reliable sources. See the AI and Content Policy.
• Not advice. Nothing a figure says is medical, legal, financial, psychological or other professional advice, even from a doctor, lawyer or economist of the past.
• Not a crisis service. If you are in danger, call your local emergency number. The app shows helplines when a message suggests someone is at risk, but no person reads your messages.
• For learning and enjoyment, for your own personal, non-commercial use, unless I agree otherwise in writing.

An account is optional. You sign in with Google or Apple; Yuga has no passwords. You are responsible for what happens through your account, so keep your Google or Apple account secure and tell me at support@foundationalcreations.com if you think someone else is using yours. One account per person; don’t share or sell it.

You can delete your account at any time (how). An account not signed in to for 2 years is deleted automatically, after a warning email where possible.

Yuga is free to use. The free plan includes every figure by text (40 messages a day), the debate rooms, one debate of your own a week, and the figures’ AI voices for account holders: 15 minutes when you create an account, then 5 minutes a week. When voice minutes run out, the conversation goes on by text or in your phone’s own voice.

Yuga Plus (monthly or yearly, renewing automatically) and minute packs (one-off) add voice minutes and more. They are not on sale yet. When they are, they will be sold only in the apps through the App Store or Google Play, and the Subscription Terms will apply: what each plan includes, prices, the free trial, automatic renewal, cancelling in the store, refunds through Apple or Google, and minute packs that never expire but are lost if you delete your account. You will see the price and terms before you buy, and nothing in these terms commits you to pay anything.

To keep Yuga running and affordable there are also limits on how much each device or account can use it in a period of time, including a fair-use limit on Plus. I may change the free allowance and the limits, telling you in advance where the change is significant; changes to what you have paid for follow the Subscription Terms.

Your inputs

What you say or type to a figure, and your questions in a debate, are your “inputs”. You keep any rights you have in them. You give me a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free licence to process them only to run Yuga for you: to send them to the AI model and voice providers, check them for safety, and, if you report a reply, keep the report. Inputs are not stored otherwise, and are never used to train AI.

Don’t put into an input anything you have no right to share, or other people’s personal information.

The figures’ replies

The figures’ replies, voices and the clips and cards the app makes (“outputs”) are generated by AI. As between you and me, you may use outputs for your own personal, non-commercial purposes, such as study, homework, teaching, commentary or sharing with friends, as long as you follow the Acceptable Use Policy and keep them labelled as AI. I don’t claim ownership of a reply you receive, but I can’t promise that outputs are original, that others won’t receive similar ones, or that you own any rights in them; in many countries AI-generated material may not be protected by copyright at all. My own content in outputs (the figures’ portraits and rooms, the Yuga mark, the design) stays mine and is licensed to you only as part of the output.

Outputs may quote public-domain writing or passages licensed under Creative Commons (such as CC BY-SA 4.0 text from Wikipedia or Wikiquote). Where an output shows a passage with its source and licence, keep that attribution if you reuse it.

Sharing clips, cards and badges

When you share a clip, quote card or badge, keep the AI label and the file’s AI metadata, don’t edit the words, and don’t present it as a real recording or quotation. You are responsible for what you share and where; the platforms you share to have their own rules.

You must follow the Acceptable Use Policy. In short: explore any part of history, but don’t use Yuga to harass, sexualise, spread hate, glorify violence, encourage self-harm, get dangerous instructions, deceive people with AI content, attack or scrape the service, get around its limits or safety rules, or use outputs to train other AI.

Notice under India’s IT Rules. If you break these terms, the Privacy Policy or the Acceptable Use Policy, I may immediately suspend or end your access and remove or disable non-compliant content. If what you do breaks the law, you may be liable to penalty or punishment under the Information Technology Act 2000 or other law, including for creating unlawful AI-generated content (for example under the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita 2023, the POCSO Act 2012 or the Representation of the People Act 1951); where the law requires, I will report offences to the authorities and may disclose a violator’s identity to a victim. Where the law requires, this notice will also be repeated to users at least once every three months.

Yuga’s software, design, the figures’ portraits, rooms and voices as designed for Yuga, my research notes and prompts, the name and logo, and the website are owned by me or my licensors and protected by law. Apart from the licence in these terms and the App Licence, you get no rights in them. Historical sources in the public domain remain free for everyone; Creative Commons material is used under its licence.

If you send me ideas or feedback, I may use them without obligation to you. If you think something in Yuga infringes your rights, see Copyright and Likeness.

Yuga relies on services from other companies: Google and Apple for sign-in, Google Cloud for hosting, AI and voices, your phone’s speech recognition, and the App Store and Google Play. Their terms apply to your use of them. I’m not responsible for their services, though I choose them carefully and the Service Providers page lists them.

Yuga is a young service run by one person. I may add, change or remove figures, features and languages, and the service may sometimes be unavailable, for example for maintenance or because a provider fails. Some figures may be withdrawn, for example at the request of an estate. I will give reasonable notice of significant changes where I can. I may stop offering Yugaaltogether; if so, I will give at least 30 days’ notice where possible and delete account data as the Privacy Policy describes.

You can stop using Yuga and delete your account at any time (cancel any subscription in the store first; deleting doesn’t cancel it, and unused minute-pack minutes are lost). I may suspend or end your access, or limit it, if you seriously or repeatedly break these terms, if the law requires, or to protect other people or Yuga. Where it is fair and safe, I will warn you first and tell you why; you can appeal as described in the Acceptable Use Policy.

Sections that by their nature should survive the end of this agreement (such as those on intellectual property, disclaimers, liability and disputes) do.

Yuga is provided free of charge, “as is” and “as available”. To the extent the law allows, I give no promise that it will be uninterrupted, error-free or fit for a particular purpose, or that outputs will be accurate, complete, historically correct or inoffensive. You use outputs at your own risk and should check anything important.

This doesn’t affect rights you have by law that can’t be excluded, such as (where they apply) the right to a service provided with reasonable care and skill.

Nothing in these terms limits or excludes liability for death or personal injury caused by negligence, for fraud, for deliberate wrongdoing, or for anything else that can’t be limited or excluded by law.

Subject to that, and to the extent the law allows:

• I am not liable for losses that were not reasonably foreseeable, for indirect or consequential losses, or for loss of profits, business, data or goodwill;
• I am not liable for what you do with outputs, or for decisions you take based on what a figure says;
• my total liability to you for all claims about Yuga is limited to the greater of the amount you paid me for Yuga in the 12 months before the claim (today, nothing) and ₹8,000 (or US$100, or its equivalent in your currency).

If you live in the EU or UK, I am responsible for foreseeable loss caused by my breach of these terms or my failure to use reasonable care and skill, and the limits above apply only as far as your local law permits.

If you use Yuga in breach of these terms or the law (for example, by sharing an AI output as a real quotation in a way that harms someone) and that leads to a claim against me, you agree to cover my reasonable losses and costs from that claim, to the extent the law allows. This doesn’t apply to the extent the claim is my fault, and doesn’t apply where your local consumer law forbids it.

Please talk to me first: most problems can be fixed by email at support@foundationalcreations.com or through the grievance process.

These terms are governed by the laws of India. The courts at Hyderabad, India, India, have jurisdiction, subject to the following:

• if you are a consumer in India, you may also bring a complaint before the consumer commission that has jurisdiction where you live or work, under the Consumer Protection Act 2019;
• if you live in the European Union, the United Kingdom or another country whose law gives consumers mandatory protection, you keep that protection, and you may bring proceedings in the courts where you live;
• nothing here stops either of us from going to a small-claims court that has jurisdiction.

There is no arbitration clause and no waiver of class or collective actions.

I may change these terms when Yuga or the law changes. I will post the new version here with a new date and, for changes that matter, tell you in advance in the app or on the website, and by email if you have an account with an email address, at least 30 days before they take effect where possible (sooner only where the law or a safety issue requires). If you don’t agree to a change, you can stop using Yuga and delete your account; continuing after the change takes effect means you accept it.

If you got the app from Apple’s App Store or Google Play, the App Licence also applies, including the terms Apple and Google require. Apple and Google are not parties to these terms and are not responsible for Yuga.

• These terms (with the documents they include) are the whole agreement between us about Yuga.
• If a court finds part of them unenforceable, the rest still applies.
• If I don’t enforce a term straight away, I can still enforce it later.
• You may not transfer your rights under these terms. I may transfer mine to someone who takes over Yuga (for example a company I set up), as long as your rights are not reduced; I will tell you if that happens.
• Nobody else has rights under these terms, except Apple and Google as the App Licence describes.
• I am not responsible for delays or failures caused by events beyond my reasonable control.
• These terms are written in English. Any translation is for convenience; the English version applies if they differ.

Hriday Vanka, Hyderabad, Telangana, India, India. Email: support@foundationalcreations.com. Grievance Officer: Pranay Vanka, support@foundationalcreations.com; see Grievance Redressal and Contact for response times.