Terms of Service
Welcome to Emergent Futures Lab, Inc. ("EFL", "we", "us", "our"). By accessing or using our websites emergentfutureslab.com and academy.emergentfutureslab.com, subscribing to our Emerging Futures newsletter, purchasing our book Innovating Emergent Futures, enrolling in our courses, or using any of our services, you agree to be bound by these Terms of Service ("Terms", "Agreement").
Acceptance of Terms
By using EFL's websites, products or services, you confirm that you accept these Terms and that you agree to comply with them. If you do not agree to these Terms, you must not use our websites, products or services.
Intellectual Property
All content and materials available on EFL's websites, in our Emerging Futures newsletter, in our book Innovating Emergent Futures, and in our courses, including but not limited to text, graphics, website name, code, images, logos, and the Innovation Design Approach framework, are the intellectual property of EFL and are protected by applicable copyright and trademark law. You may not use, reproduce, distribute or modify any content without our express written consent.
User Conduct
You agree to use EFL's websites, products and services only for lawful purposes. You must not use our websites in any way that breaches any applicable laws or regulations or infringes on the rights of EFL or any third party. Specifically:
- You may not scrape, reproduce or distribute any content from our websites without permission
- AI companies are strictly prohibited from using our websites or content to train their LLMs
- You may not use our websites, products or services for any commercial purpose without a formal agreement
Purchases and Payments
If you purchase any products or services from EFL, including our book or courses, you agree to provide accurate and current payment information. You affirm that you are authorized to use the designated payment method.
We reserve the right to refuse or cancel your order at any time for reasons including but not limited to: product or service availability, errors in the description or price of the product or service, error in your order, or other reasons.
Refund Policy
Due to the digital nature of our products, we generally do not offer refunds. If you are unsatisfied with your purchase for any reason, please contact us and we will work with you to find a solution.
Third Party Websites and Content
EFL's websites may contain links to third-party web sites or services that are not owned or controlled by EFL. We have no control over, and assume no responsibility for, the content, privacy policies, or practices of any third party web sites or services.
Limitation of Liability
In no event shall EFL be liable for any indirect, incidental, special, consequential or punitive damages arising out of or relating to your use of our websites, products or services. Our liability to you shall not exceed the total amount paid by you to EFL in the six (6) months prior to the event giving rise to the liability.
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE AND MACHINE LEARNING RESTRICTIONS
Prohibition on AI Training and Data Mining
All content, materials, and information created, posted, or shared within the WorldMakers and Academy Communities (including but not limited to text, images, files, videos, discussion posts, and any other user-generated or Emergent Futures Lab-provided materials) are expressly protected from use in training, developing, fine-tuning, or otherwise enhancing any artificial intelligence, machine learning, large language model (LLM), neural network, or any other AI-related system or technology of any kind.
Prohibited Uses Include:
Members, automated systems, bots, scraping services, software agents, AI developers, and any third parties are strictly prohibited from:
- Using our content or Community materials to train, fine-tune, or improve any LLM, generative AI model, or machine learning system
- Downloading, scraping, crawling, or extracting Community content using automated tools or services designed for AI training purposes
- Ingesting, mining, or processing our content to create datasets for AI development
- Using our content to improve, enhance, or optimize any AI system's performance, capabilities, or outputs
- Analyzing our content to extract patterns, statistics, or other information for AI model development
- Creating derivative AI models, embeddings, or vector representations based on our content
- Using our content to train proprietary or open-source AI systems of any kind
Express Written Consent Required
Any use of Community content for AI, machine learning, or LLM training purposes requires explicit prior written consent from Emergent Futures Lab. Unauthorized use constitutes a material breach of these Terms of Service and violates applicable intellectual property and data protection laws. We may grant or deny such requests at our sole discretion.
Copyright Infringement
Members acknowledge that unauthorized use of copyrighted materials within the Communities to train AI systems may violate the U.S. Copyright Act, the EU AI Act, the GDPR, and other applicable intellectual property and privacy laws. Emergent Futures Lab reserves all rights to pursue legal action for such violations, including but not limited to claims for copyright infringement, breach of contract, and violations of computer access laws.
Enforcement and Remedies
Emergent Futures Lab reserves the right to:
- Immediately revoke access to any member or entity using our content for AI training purposes
- Pursue legal action to obtain injunctive relief and monetary damages
- Report violations to law enforcement and relevant regulatory authorities
- Cooperate with other content creators and rights holders in collective enforcement actions
- Implement technical measures (including blocking, filtering, and rate-limiting) to prevent unauthorized access and scraping
Technical Protections
Members agree not to circumvent, disable, or interfere with any technical measures implemented to protect our content from AI training and data mining, including robots.txt directives, authentication requirements, or other access controls. Attempting to bypass these measures may violate the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) and other applicable laws.
Liability
Members are solely liable for any use of our content in violation of this Section 11. If a member's breach of this provision results in harm to Emergent Futures Lab or other members, the breaching member shall indemnify and hold harmless Emergent Futures Lab from all resulting claims, damages, and legal fees.
Changes to the Terms
We reserve the right, at our sole discretion, to modify or replace these Terms at any time. If a revision is material, we will try to provide at least 30 days notice prior to any new terms taking effect. What constitutes a material change will be determined at our sole discretion. These Terms of Service were last updated on January 6, 2026.
Contact Us
If you have any questions about these Terms of Service, please contact us.
By using EFL's websites, products or services, you agree to be bound by these Terms. If you do not agree with any part of the terms then you may not access our websites, products or services.
