Terms of Use

These terms are the agreement between you and the developer of Vestige. They cover what you may do with the archive, what we promise and what we do not, and they include the specific terms Apple requires for apps distributed through the App Store.

The short version. Downloading Vestige and reading its free story selection is free; Vestige Plus is an optional subscription through the App Store. Read as much as you like, keep your own collections, and take the archive with you between your devices. Do not scrape it, resell it, or pass it off as your own. Everything in it is written to be accurate and labelled for reliability, but it is popular history for the curious — not a source you should cite in a thesis or rely on for a decision that matters. You can close your account whenever you want, from inside the app.

1. Who this agreement is with

Vestige is published by Hiel Digital, a one-person business established in the Netherlands (Sem Hiel, Dom Helder Camarastraat 132, 1447 ZM Purmerend, Netherlands, Chamber of Commerce no. 42134222, sem@hiel.digital) — referred to below as we, us or Vestige. You are the person using the app.

By downloading, opening or using Vestige you accept these terms. If you do not accept them, do not use the app. Our Privacy Policy (https://learnvestige.app/privacy.html) forms part of this agreement.

2. Your licence to use Vestige

Downloading Vestige and reading its selection of free stories is free of charge. Vestige Plus is an optional auto-renewing subscription that unlocks the premium layer (stories marked Vestige Plus and Vestige Films). It is sold exclusively through Apple's in-app purchase system, in two terms: Vestige Plus — Yearly, a 12-month subscription, and Vestige Plus — Monthly, a 1-month subscription. Introductory offers, including any free trial, depend on eligibility and the current App Store offer. The applicable duration and renewal price are shown before purchase. You pay the price shown on the offer screen and in the App Store purchase sheet before you confirm; either term renews automatically at the same price unless cancelled at least 24 hours before the end of the current period, and both can be managed or cancelled at any time in your App Store subscription settings. A free trial, where offered, converts into a paid subscription unless cancelled before the trial ends. We grant you a personal, limited, non-exclusive, non-transferable, revocable licence to install and use the app for your own private, non-commercial reading.

The app is licensed to you, not sold. We keep every right we do not expressly grant here. On Apple devices, the scope of this licence is governed by the Usage Rules in the Apple Media Services Terms and Conditions, as described in section 11.

You need a compatible device and an internet connection. Data charges from your mobile operator are yours to pay.

3. Your account

• You can read as a guest. Some features — syncing between devices, collections that survive a reinstall — require an account.
• You must be at least 16 years old to create an account. By creating one you confirm that you are.
• Give accurate sign-in details and keep your password to yourself. You are responsible for what happens under your account. Tell us promptly if you think someone else has got into it.
• An account is for one person. Do not share, sell or transfer it.

4. Acceptable use

You agree not to:

• copy, scrape, crawl, bulk-download or systematically extract the archive's articles, artwork, audio or data, by any automated or manual means;
• republish, redistribute, sell, sublicense or use the archive's content to build or train another product, dataset or model;
• reverse-engineer, decompile or disassemble the app, or try to derive its source code, except to the extent that mandatory law expressly allows it;
• interfere with the service — attacking it, overloading it, probing it for vulnerabilities, circumventing rate limits, or reaching for data that is not yours;
• use the app to break the law, infringe anyone's rights, or harass anyone;
• impersonate another person, in your display name, avatar or anywhere else.

Security research is welcome if it is responsible: tell us at sem@hiel.digital before you publish anything, and do not touch other readers' data.

5. The archive's content

The articles, editorial text, plates and illustrations, narration audio, the Vestige name and logo, the app's design and its software are owned by us or licensed to us, and are protected by copyright, database rights and trade mark law. Historical facts themselves belong to nobody; the way we research, write, draw and arrange them does not.

You may read, listen to and save content for your own use, and quote briefly from it with attribution to Vestige, as permitted by copyright law. Anything beyond that needs our written permission.

6. Accuracy and reliability labels

Every story in Vestige carries a reliability label — Historical Fact, Historical Debate, Scientific Theory, Legend, Speculation or Conspiracy Theory — because legend and fact should not wear the same badge. Those labels are our honest editorial judgement of the state of the evidence at the time of writing. They are a guide, not a guarantee.

Vestige is popular history written for curious readers. History is contested and evidence moves; articles may contain errors, and interpretations we present as settled may not stay that way. The app is provided for general information and entertainment. It is not academic, legal, medical, financial or professional advice, and it should not be relied on as a primary source or as the basis for any decision that matters. Verify against primary sources before you cite anything.

Found a mistake? Tell us — corrections are the point of an archive that means to be trusted.

7. What you add

Your display name, avatar image and the collections you build stay yours. You grant us a worldwide, royalty-free licence to store, reproduce and display that material for the sole purpose of operating Vestige for you — showing your avatar on your profile, syncing your collections to your other devices. That licence ends when you delete the content or your account. We do not use it for anything else, and we do not publish it.

You confirm you have the right to upload what you upload — in particular, that an avatar image is yours to use.

8. Availability and changes

We aim to keep Vestige available and working, but we do not promise uninterrupted service. Maintenance, outages at our providers, and the ordinary hazards of software all happen.

We may add, change or remove features, and articles may be revised, relabelled or withdrawn as our understanding improves. If we ever discontinue Vestige altogether, we will give reasonable notice in the app so you can export or record what matters to you.

We may update these terms — to reflect a new feature, or a change in the law. The version and date at the top will change, and we will notify you in the app before material changes take effect. If you do not accept the new terms, stop using the app and delete your account; continuing to use it means you accept them.

9. Ending the agreement

You may end this agreement at any time by deleting your account (Profile → Account & sync → Delete account) and removing the app. Deletion is immediate and permanent — see the Privacy Policy (https://learnvestige.app/privacy.html#delete) for what is erased.

We may suspend or terminate your account if you seriously or repeatedly breach these terms, or where we must to comply with the law. Except where the breach makes it inappropriate, we will warn you first and give you a chance to put it right. If we terminate your account without good reason, you may take that up with us under section 12.

10. Warranties and liability

Nothing in these terms limits your mandatory rights as a consumer under Dutch or EU law, and nothing excludes our liability for death or personal injury caused by our negligence, for fraud, or for anything else that cannot lawfully be excluded. Where the two conflict, your statutory rights win.

Subject to that: Vestige is provided "as is" and "as available", and to the fullest extent permitted by law we exclude implied warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose and non-infringement. We do not warrant that the app will be error-free, uninterrupted, secure against every attack, or that its historical content is complete or free of error.

To the fullest extent permitted by law, we are not liable for indirect or consequential loss, loss of profit, loss of data, or loss arising from your reliance on the archive's content. Where we are liable, our total liability arising out of or in connection with this agreement is limited to EUR 500. This limit reflects Vestige's modest subscription price. It does not apply to the claims described in the first paragraph of this section, and it does not limit any claim for compensation you may have under Article 82 of the GDPR.

We are not responsible for your device, your operating system, your network, or third-party services you reach from the app.

11. Terms required by Apple

The following apply where you obtained Vestige from the Apple App Store. They are required by Apple and, where they conflict with anything else in these terms, they prevail for the App Store version of the app.

• a. Acknowledgement. This agreement is concluded between you and us only, and not with Apple. We alone — not Apple — are responsible for Vestige and its content.
• b. Scope of licence. The licence granted to you in section 2 is a non-transferable licence to use Vestige on any Apple-branded products that you own or control, and as permitted by the Usage Rules set out in the Apple Media Services Terms and Conditions, except that Vestige may be accessed and used by other accounts associated with you via Family Sharing or volume purchasing.
• c. Maintenance and support. We are solely responsible for providing any maintenance and support services for Vestige, as specified in these terms or as required by applicable law. Apple has no obligation whatsoever to furnish any maintenance and support services in respect of Vestige.
• d. Warranty. We are solely responsible for any product warranties, whether express or implied by law, to the extent not effectively disclaimed. In the event of any failure of Vestige to conform to any applicable warranty, you may notify Apple, and Apple will refund the purchase price (if any) for the app to you. To the maximum extent permitted by applicable law, Apple will have no other warranty obligation whatsoever with respect to Vestige, and any other claims, losses, liabilities, damages, costs or expenses attributable to any failure to conform to any warranty will be our sole responsibility.
• e. Product claims. We, not Apple, are responsible for addressing any claims by you or any third party relating to Vestige or your possession and use of it, including product liability claims, any claim that Vestige fails to conform to any applicable legal or regulatory requirement, and claims arising under consumer protection, privacy or similar legislation.
• f. Intellectual property rights. In the event of any third-party claim that Vestige or your possession and use of it infringes that third party's intellectual property rights, we, not Apple, will be solely responsible for the investigation, defence, settlement and discharge of any such claim.
• g. Legal compliance. You represent and warrant that you are not located in a country subject to a U.S. Government embargo or designated by the U.S. Government as a "terrorist supporting" country, and that you are not listed on any U.S. Government list of prohibited or restricted parties.
• h. Developer name and address. Questions, complaints and claims about Vestige should be directed to Hiel Digital (Sem Hiel), Dom Helder Camarastraat 132, 1447 ZM Purmerend, Netherlands, sem@hiel.digital.
• i. Third-party terms. You must comply with applicable third-party terms of agreement when using Vestige.
• j. Third-party beneficiary. You acknowledge and agree that Apple and Apple's subsidiaries are third-party beneficiaries of these terms, and that upon your acceptance of these terms Apple will have the right (and will be deemed to have accepted the right) to enforce these terms against you as a third-party beneficiary.

12. Governing law and disputes

These terms are governed by the law of the Netherlands. If you are a consumer resident in the European Union, this choice of law does not deprive you of the protection of the mandatory rules of the country where you live, and you may bring proceedings in the courts of that country. Otherwise, disputes will be submitted to the competent court in the Netherlands.

Please write to us first — most things are settled faster by email than by anyone's court list.

13. Everything else

• Whole agreement. These terms and the Privacy Policy are the entire agreement between us about Vestige, and replace anything said earlier.
• Severability. If a court finds any provision unenforceable, the rest stays in force and the unenforceable part is read down to the narrowest change that makes it valid.
• No waiver. If we do not enforce a right straight away, we have not given it up.
• Assignment. You may not transfer your rights under these terms. We may transfer ours to a successor of the app, provided your rights are not reduced.
• Language. These terms are written in English. A translation, if we publish one, is for convenience; the English text governs, except where mandatory consumer law in your country provides otherwise.

14. Contact

sem@hiel.digital — for support, corrections to an article, or anything in this document.