Terms and Conditions of Use

1. Introduction

These Terms and Conditions of Use govern access to and use of the ByteBuddies Academy platform, curriculum hub, lesson materials, teaching resources, planner tools, certificate tools, reports, administrative tools and any related digital services made available through the platform.

The platform is operated for authorised educational use by teachers, schools, facilitators, administrators, parents and other approved users. References to "ByteBuddies", "we", "us" or "our" include ByteBuddies Academy and Networks (Pty) Ltd where applicable. References to "you" or "your" refer to the person, school, organisation or authorised user accessing or using the platform.

2. Acceptance of Terms

By registering an account, logging in, accessing the platform, using any lesson, downloading or viewing any resource, creating a planner item, generating a certificate or otherwise using ByteBuddies Academy, you agree to be bound by these Terms.

If you access the platform on behalf of a school, company, organisation or other legal entity, you warrant that you are authorised to accept these Terms on behalf of that entity and its authorised users. If you do not agree to these Terms, you must not access or use the platform.

3. Authorised Educational Use

ByteBuddies Academy is provided for authorised educational, classroom, school, facilitation and learning-support purposes only. Use is limited to the account, subscription, licence, school, organisation or access arrangement approved by ByteBuddies.

Teachers and schools may use the platform to plan, prepare and deliver lessons, manage teaching resources, support learners, create internal classroom certificates and access curriculum content in accordance with their authorised access level.

Access may not be shared with unauthorised persons, external organisations, competing providers, public audiences or persons outside the approved account, school, licence or subscription.

4. Account Registration and Security

You may be required to create an account and provide accurate information in order to access the platform. You are responsible for maintaining the confidentiality of your login credentials and for all activity that occurs under your account.

You must notify us or your school administrator promptly if you become aware of unauthorised access, suspected misuse, compromised credentials or any security incident relating to your account. We may suspend or restrict access where we reasonably believe an account has been misused, compromised or used outside its authorised scope.

5. Access Levels, Plans and Subscriptions

Certain features, lessons, resources, downloads, reports, certificates, premium content or administrative tools may be restricted by role, plan, subscription, payment status or manual approval. Free, educator, school, enterprise and administrative access levels may differ.

No payment gateway is implied by these Terms. Where access is manually approved, upgraded, suspended or amended by ByteBuddies or an authorised administrator, the relevant access level will apply until changed, expired, cancelled or revoked.

We may update plan limits, feature availability and subscription rules from time to time. Any material commercial terms may be supplemented by a separate written proposal, invoice, service agreement or subscription arrangement.

6. Licence to Use the Platform

Subject to these Terms, we grant you a limited, revocable, non-exclusive, non-transferable licence to access and use ByteBuddies Academy for authorised educational purposes only. This licence does not transfer ownership of the platform, curriculum, content, software, designs, templates, resources or intellectual property to you.

We may withdraw, limit or suspend this licence if you breach these Terms, misuse the platform, exceed authorised access, fail to comply with applicable policies, or use the platform in a manner that may harm ByteBuddies, its users, its content or its reputation.

7. Prohibited Resale, Redistribution and Commercial Reuse

You may not copy, resell, redistribute, publish, sublicense, transfer, mirror, upload, publicly share, commercially exploit, repackage or make available the ByteBuddies Academy platform, curriculum, lesson content, resources, worksheets, templates, certificate designs, reports, downloads or system materials without prior written permission.

You may not use ByteBuddies Academy content to create a competing curriculum, training product, learning platform, commercial course, white-labelled product, public resource library, resale package or derivative commercial offering.

You may not scrape, harvest, export, bulk download, reverse engineer, decompile, copy the structure of, or otherwise extract platform content or system materials except as expressly permitted for your authorised educational use.

8. Intellectual Property and Confidential Information

All intellectual property rights in and to ByteBuddies Academy, including its name, brand assets, visual identity, platform structure, curriculum framework, lesson materials, teaching resources, worksheets, activities, certificate templates, reports, software, source code, user interface, designs and documentation, are owned by ByteBuddies and/or Networks (Pty) Ltd where applicable.

Any platform information, curriculum structure, administrative configuration, non-public content, business information, technical information, training methodology or other proprietary material made available to you must be treated as confidential and used only for authorised educational purposes.

9. User Content and Classroom Information

You may enter information into the platform, including planner items, private notes, certificate details, learner names, activity records, submissions, reports and related classroom information. You remain responsible for ensuring that any information you enter is accurate, lawful, appropriate and permitted by your school or organisation.

You must not upload or enter unlawful, harmful, defamatory, discriminatory, offensive, confidential third-party information, unnecessary sensitive personal information, or any material that infringes another person's rights.

We may remove, restrict or disable access to user-submitted content where we reasonably believe it breaches these Terms, applicable law, school safety requirements or the intended educational purpose of the platform.

10. Educational Support and Professional Judgement

ByteBuddies Academy provides educational support materials and teaching tools. The platform is not a replacement for school policy, educator training, safeguarding duties, curriculum obligations, professional judgement, classroom supervision or local legal requirements.

Teachers, schools and facilitators remain responsible for selecting appropriate lessons, adapting activities to the needs of learners, supervising classroom use, complying with applicable school policies and ensuring safe delivery of any coding, robotics, AI literacy, STEM or screen-free activity.

11. Ask Byte and Technology-Assisted Features

Ask Byte and related assistant features are intended to support lesson preparation and classroom planning. Unless expressly stated otherwise, such features use ByteBuddies saved curriculum content and internal platform records only.

Any assistant output should be reviewed by a responsible teacher or authorised adult before being used with learners. Assistant features do not replace educator judgement, school policy or child-safety obligations.

12. Acceptable Use

You agree that you will not:

1. use the platform for unlawful, harmful, misleading, abusive, defamatory, discriminatory or unauthorised purposes;
2. attempt to bypass access controls, plan limits, premium restrictions, authentication, role permissions or security controls;
3. interfere with the operation, security, integrity or availability of the platform;
4. use automated scripts, scraping tools, bots or extraction mechanisms without written permission;
5. impersonate another person, school, administrator or organisation;
6. upload malware, harmful code, unsolicited communications or disruptive material; or
7. use the platform in any manner that may damage ByteBuddies, Networks (Pty) Ltd, schools, learners, teachers or other users.

13. Third-Party Services and Links

The platform may include links to or integrations with third-party services, hosting providers, PDF tools, email services, analytics services, payment or administrative services, external websites, resources or embedded content.

Third-party services may be subject to their own terms and privacy policies. We are not responsible for independent third-party services except where applicable law requires responsibility for a service provider acting on our behalf.

14. Availability, Maintenance and Changes

We aim to keep ByteBuddies Academy available and useful, but we do not guarantee uninterrupted, error-free or continuous access. The platform may be unavailable due to maintenance, updates, hosting issues, network failures, third-party service interruptions or other circumstances beyond our control.

We may improve, modify, update, remove or replace features, layouts, lesson content, plans, access rules or resources from time to time. We will take reasonable steps to avoid unnecessary disruption to authorised users.

15. Suspension and Termination

We may suspend, restrict or terminate access to the platform where we reasonably believe that you have breached these Terms, misused the platform, infringed intellectual property rights, shared access unlawfully, failed to comply with applicable access arrangements, created security risk, or used the platform in a way that may cause harm.

On termination or expiry of your authorised access, you must stop using the platform and any restricted content. Clauses dealing with intellectual property, confidentiality, prohibited reuse, liability, indemnity, governing law and any provisions that by their nature survive termination will continue to apply.

16. Disclaimers

To the fullest extent permitted by law, ByteBuddies Academy is provided on an "as is" and "as available" basis. We do not warrant that the platform will be uninterrupted, error-free, virus-free, suitable for every learner, suitable for every school policy, or fit for every particular educational purpose.

We do not accept responsibility for decisions made by teachers, schools, facilitators, administrators, parents or users based on platform content, assistant output, lesson suggestions, resources, reports or certificates. Users must apply professional judgement and comply with their own legal, safety and policy obligations.

17. Limitation of Liability

To the maximum extent permitted by applicable law, ByteBuddies, Networks (Pty) Ltd, their directors, employees, contractors, service providers and affiliates will not be liable for indirect, incidental, special, consequential or punitive loss or damage, including loss of profit, loss of data, loss of business, interruption of teaching, reputational harm or loss arising from use of or inability to use the platform.

Nothing in these Terms limits liability that cannot legally be limited under applicable law.

18. Indemnity

You indemnify and hold harmless ByteBuddies, Networks (Pty) Ltd, their directors, employees, contractors, service providers and affiliates against any claim, loss, damage, liability, cost or expense arising from your breach of these Terms, unauthorised use of the platform, infringement of intellectual property, misuse of content, unlawful sharing of access, or information that you upload, enter or generate through the platform.

19. Privacy

Personal information is processed in accordance with the ByteBuddies Academy Privacy Statement, as updated from time to time. By using the platform, you acknowledge that account, school, lesson, planner, certificate, report and usage information may be processed for the purposes described in that Privacy Statement.

20. Notices and Electronic Communications

You consent to receive platform notices, administrative messages, security notices, account messages, subscription notices and other communications electronically, including by email, platform notification or other reasonable digital means.

21. Governing Law

These Terms are governed by the laws of the Republic of South Africa, unless a mandatory law provides otherwise. Any dispute arising from these Terms or the platform will be dealt with by the courts or competent forums having jurisdiction in South Africa, subject to any applicable consumer or education law requirements.

22. Amendments

We may update these Terms from time to time to reflect changes in the platform, access rules, legal requirements, commercial arrangements or operational requirements. Continued use of the platform after updated Terms become effective constitutes acceptance of the updated Terms.

23. Contact

Questions about these Terms may be directed to the ByteBuddies Academy platform owner or authorised school administrator. A formal legal contact address may be inserted here before final publication.