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Earned Trust Beta Trial · Draft 18 · 12 September 2026 · This is the version you are agreeing to.
A separate page, signed with your consent form. Please read it before you sign either one. (Draft 18, 2026-09-12. Blank publishes with the design deposit (DOI 10.5281/zenodo.22547805); frozen for the phase. These documents were not drafted or reviewed by an attorney.)
The words this page uses without stopping to explain them — your code, your window, DOI, deposit, Zenodo, locked box, seal manifest, fingerprint, the ledger — are defined in the short list of words at the top of the consent form.
These Terms are an agreement between you (“you,” the tester) and William Stafford, an individual researcher in the State of Texas and the study’s principal investigator (PI) (“the study,” “we,” “us”). They accompany the Consent Form and the duty map dated the same day, signed together.
Nothing in these Terms limits, waives, or conditions any right the Consent Form gives you — including your right to withdraw at any time before publication, for no reason, with no penalty. And nothing in the Consent Form waives any right either — it discloses only; every limit lives here. If these documents ever conflict, the Consent Form governs your rights, these Terms govern the study’s limits, and the duty map governs what the study undertakes to do.
This is the independent research of one person. There is no institution, no university, no company, no staff, no funder, and no ethics board (the review committee a university would have) — no formal ethical review of this study was obtained. What stands in its place is described in the Consent Form. You are volunteering for a private research project run by an individual who is personally responsible for it, and you should decide whether to participate on that basis. The PI may add additional principal investigators as the trial needs them. Each is named on the beta page and in the report the day they join, with the date, and is bound by every rule that binds the PI. A co-PI is not staff, and is named.
The materials in this project — including these Terms, the Consent Form, the protocol, the kit, and the site — were drafted with substantial AI assistance under the Earned Trust Protocol, and reviewed and adopted by the researcher, who is responsible for them. They were not drafted or reviewed by an attorney. We tell you this because the method being tested is disclosure, and because you are entitled to know how the document in front of you was made.
During your trial the study makes no unscripted human reply to you. Every message you receive from the study is machine-sent or scripted; the PI composes nothing to you, answers nothing, and reads nothing beyond what a script requires. And you compose nothing to us: the study solicits no composed email and provides no blank body. Every participant return is generated by a published structured form — five in all: apply, intake, the exit form, Name and DOI correction, withdraw — and every form after apply asks first for your code (it looks like ET-0906-03), the one your enrollment confirmation carries. The forms have boxes for names, dates, your DOI, and set choices — nowhere to write sentences. Every form’s return is answered by script — confirmed, or not accepted — and nothing else is answered. The first valid form of each kind is the one that counts. A later duplicate is logged in the contact ledger and cannot replace it. Emails during the trial will not receive a response. If you do not complete the trial within your window, you will be logged as incomplete. Our entire support undertaking to you is the published question list. Two things make up that promise — the FAQ, and the withdraw form:
A fixed exit-form choice records whether the published materials lost your record. There is no separate form for reporting a security problem. What happens on your own machines, accounts, or deposit is outside our custody; Section 4 says whose job that is and what a compromise of ours obliges us to publish.
Every withdrawal and every unanswered question is counted in the published log.
There is no channel for words at all. The study asks you for none and gives you no place to write them. You may withdraw at any moment; the standing automatic reply says how.
That is the whole support list — the published question list — and the whole list of administrative actions — withdraw. And the study’s complete undertaking — everything it does, including the closed list of administrative messages, the five public checks described in the playbook, the care of Study Records, the exit-time preview and your documented-participant letter, and the published ledger — is the twelve-row duty map signed with these Terms. If it is not in the duty map’s left column, it is not promised, and you should not rely on us for it. In particular, and without limiting the above, the study does not undertake to: teach, coach, guide, train, tutor, review, edit, correct, proofread, advise on, troubleshoot, monitor, supervise, back up, safeguard, or fix anything of yours, at any time, including in an emergency of yours. Every fix, correction, and instruction — including how to correct a public deposit by depositing a new version — lives in the published materials and reaches you through your own AI, not through us.
Your AI is not ours. We do not operate, control, review, or endorse the AI you work with, we do not see what it tells you, and we are not responsible for what it says or for anything you do because it said so — including if it is wrong, confidently wrong, or contradicts the published materials. Where your AI and the published materials disagree, the published materials are the study’s only statement. Your AI service has its own terms and its own privacy practices; the study is not a party to them and has no control over what that company does with what you type. Decide what to type accordingly.
Neither the researcher nor any AI used in this project is licensed or qualified to provide, and none of them provides: medical or mental-health care, counseling, therapy, psychological or psychiatric services, social work, legal advice, financial or tax advice, or security or forensic services. Nothing in this study, the protocol, the kit, the site, the support log, or any message from us is professional advice, and no professional relationship of any kind is created by your participation.
This study inbox is not monitored and does not respond. Do not use it for anything urgent.
If something in this study or in your own project becomes personally difficult for you — for any reason — the study’s one and only answer is administrative: you may withdraw, immediately, with no reason given and no consequence. We will not counsel you, assess you, refer you, or accompany you through it, because we are not able to and not permitted to.
Two defined terms run through this whole project. “Participant-Controlled Materials” means your project, your manuscript, your transcripts, your working files, your locked box, your keys, your passphrase, your devices, your accounts, your AI service, and the deposit you create. “Study Records” means only the short, complete list in the Consent Form’s “What we collect.”
The study never receives, holds, hosts, stores, processes, backs up, or accesses Participant-Controlled Materials — with two exceptions. One is public: the deposit you chose to publish, which the study reads only through the five public checks described in the playbook, exactly as any stranger could. The other is an accident: if you send us Participant-Controlled Materials unasked, it is not read and not answered. The study has no custody of your work and no ability to protect it. We have no access to and no control over your devices, your accounts, your AI service, your storage, your network, or your Zenodo account.
You are solely responsible for your own devices, accounts, backups, passphrases, and privacy decisions. The study is not responsible for, and disclaims any duty regarding: loss, corruption, deletion, or inaccessibility of your files; a passphrase you forget or that proves too weak; unauthorised access to your machine, accounts, or deposits by anyone, including by a hacker; anything you choose to publish; anything a third-party service does or fails to do; or anything you send us that we did not ask for.
What we do hold — Study Records — is the short, complete list in the Consent Form. We keep it where and for as long as that form says, we take ordinary care with it, and we then delete it. The study’s records are seen by the PI and any named co-PI, and by no other person at the study. The study’s mail is hosted by Proton, and the study’s drafting uses AI tools under the standard, as the consent form says; those providers handle what passes through them as any mail or AI service does. We do not promise that it cannot be breached, because no honest person can promise that. If the study’s inbox or machine is ever compromised, that fact is published in the deviations log and every enrolled tester is told.
No expectation of privacy in your correspondence with the study. This is a publicly offered trial whose results publish. Enrolling carries no expectation of privacy in anything you send the study. Email is a postcard, not a locked safe. Send us nothing you could not bear a stranger reading. What the study publishes and what it keeps off the public line are editorial rules — descriptions of what we do, listed in the published pack — never privacy promises owed to you.
You publish your own record, on your own account, by your own hand, under a name you choose — the name the report prints (Section 7). It is your publication, not ours. Withdrawing from the study deletes what the study still holds — the Consent Form’s withdrawal paragraph names the one exception, an exit form you already sent, which is already the study’s raw data and still prints. A withdrawal filed after your exit cancels every letter not yet sent and keeps your filed exit line, which still prints; withdrawal cannot un-publish your deposit either, and neither can we.
What “permanent” really means. Treat every deposit you make as permanent, because in practice it is. The platform’s own rules — not the study’s — decide what is possible: as of 2026-08-15, Zenodo lets a record’s owner delete it within 30 days of publication, and after that allows deletion only “in duly justified cases, such as copyright infringement or exposure of personal data,” on request through their support line; a record that is removed leaves a permanent tombstone page with the citation. Those rules can change, requests can be refused, and anything already downloaded, indexed, cached, or cited by someone else is beyond anyone’s reach. So: plan as if nothing can ever be taken back. The platform’s published procedure is public, and the study’s published materials point to it.
Zenodo — the site that holds your deposit — is a separate organization, not part of the study. It may change its terms, refuse a deposit, restrict it, or remove it, at its own discretion and without liability to you or to us. The study does not control it and does not promise that your deposit will remain available. Under Zenodo’s terms, you — not the study — are responsible for what you upload and for ensuring it is suitable for open publication.
If any other living person’s words, story, health details, or personal information enter your sessions or your deposit, that is your undertaking and yours alone. You represent that you have obtained that person’s written agreement — or, where that person cannot be reached to consent, that you made the privacy decision yourself, deliberately, using the published privacy check — and that you have the right to use everything you use. The study does not ask to see that agreement, record it, or confirm it; the representation is yours. For any person under 18, you represent that you will run the published privacy check, and decide deliberately, before anything about them enters any public deposit; we cannot police that decision, and the check and the decision are yours. The study has no relationship with that person, makes them no promise, and cannot obtain, verify, police, or repair their consent. If that person ever contacts us or later objects, we have nothing of theirs to delete and no relationship with them to act on; we will say so, and count the contact in the published ledger. The deposit is yours to address.
If you take part, your name and — when you make a deposit — your work’s DOI will be published in the report; when there is a deposit, the DOI is required and public. That is what makes the trial checkable by anyone. The name that prints is the author name on your Zenodo record — a pen name is fine, but it has to be the name on the DOI publication, because the DOI is the check. The name you enrolled with is held privately; your letter and citation come to you under it. Whether the name on your Zenodo record is legal, common, or chosen is your own business, settled before you publish; we do not verify it, do not administer it, and make no promise about it. You see exactly how you print on the exit form before you send, and that recheck is the last word — there is no later change window. Your documented-participant letter is a receipt showing your citation line exactly as you confirmed it on the exit form’s recheck screen, and it is final; the report line and the documented-participant letter are generated from the filed or corrected exit line, and nothing is substituted. If your exit form says you made no deposit and the DOI field is blank, your record is counted at once as “no deposit found” within completed or stopped, as your form says. You get the confirmation of your exit and nothing else — no correction email, no note, no documented-participant letter. Once the report is published, treat it as permanent — including your confirmed citation. Section 5’s account of what the platform does and does not allow governs our deposit exactly as it governs yours.
When you press Submit, the exit form makes two lines from your answers. Your public line holds everything that prints — it goes in the report’s appendix word for word, and it is the only thing in the QR image. Your private line holds the five report-private answers; the study keeps it, counts it into totals, and never prints it. Both lines go in the same exit email. Your private line is held by the study and never printed; it is not encrypted, and email is a postcard. You are responsible for the content of your own words: anything you write to us that may be published (your public line — the support log publishes counts) is yours, and you should not put another person’s private information, another person’s identifiable story, or anything defamatory into it.
What you confirm on the recheck screen is how you appear — your name as it prints. That confirmation does not extend to the study’s findings, counts, or interpretations, including ones you disagree with — and an exit form you already sent is already the study’s raw data and still prints; withdrawal cannot pull it back, which is why you are told before you send it.
The protocol, the kit, the site, and the study materials are provided free of charge and “AS IS” AND “AS AVAILABLE,” WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS, IMPLIED, STATUTORY OR OTHERWISE, INCLUDING WITHOUT LIMITATION ANY IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, ACCURACY, NON-INFRINGEMENT, AND ANY WARRANTY THAT THE MATERIALS WILL BE ERROR-FREE, COMPLETE, SUITABLE FOR YOUR PROJECT, PRODUCTIVE OF ANY RESULT, OR CONTINUOUSLY AVAILABLE. In plain English: this is free, it might be wrong, and we don’t promise it will work for you. You use it at your own risk. No advice or information, whether oral or written, creates any warranty.
You accept the ordinary risks of taking part, which include at least: that the published materials may fail you; that your time may be spent for no result; that the process may be more effortful than you expected; that working on personal material may be emotionally uncomfortable; that a decision you make about your own deposit may be public and permanent; that a name, detail, or fact you did not intend to publish may end up published by your own hand; that another person whose story touches your work may object to what you chose to publish, and that answering that objection is yours to carry (Section 6); that your name, as it appears on your Zenodo record, and — when you make a deposit — your work’s DOI will appear in a permanent public report (Section 7); and that no support will be provided beyond pointers to published material. You accept these risks knowingly and voluntarily, and you accept that your own choices, devices, and decisions are your responsibility.
TO THE FULLEST EXTENT PERMITTED BY TEXAS LAW, THE STUDY AND THE RESEARCHER WILL NOT BE LIABLE TO YOU FOR ANY INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, CONSEQUENTIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR PUNITIVE DAMAGES, OR FOR LOST DATA, LOST WORK, LOST PROFITS, LOST OPPORTUNITY, REPUTATIONAL HARM, OR EMOTIONAL DISTRESS, ARISING OUT OF OR RELATING TO YOUR PARTICIPATION, THE MATERIALS, OR YOUR DEPOSIT. THE TOTAL LIABILITY OF THE STUDY AND THE RESEARCHER FOR ALL CLAIMS OF ANY KIND WILL NOT EXCEED ONE HUNDRED U.S. DOLLARS ($100), EXCEPT AS THE NEXT PARAGRAPH STATES.
And one plain fact, stated outside the capital letters because it is a fact and not a limit: no money is paid or owed in this study, in either direction.
This section does not apply to gross negligence, fraud, or intentional misconduct, or to harm caused by the study’s own negligence, and does not apply to any liability that cannot be limited under Texas law. Nothing in these Terms waives any right you have under any statute that cannot be waived. In plain English: this is a free study with no money in it; the hundred-dollar limit covers what goes wrong through your own choices, your devices, your AI service, or Zenodo — not what goes wrong through the study’s own carelessness, and nothing deliberate, reckless, or legally unwaivable is covered by that sentence.
Age and capacity. You represent that you are 18 or older and legally able to enter this agreement. Third-party content and services. The study is not responsible for any AI service, platform, repository, tool, or website you use, or for what it does with what you give it. No agency or partnership. Nothing here makes you an employee, agent, partner, contractor, or representative of the study, and nothing makes the study yours. Entire agreement on limits. These Terms, the Consent Form, and the duty map signed with them are the whole of the agreement between us; no other statement — on the site, in the FAQ, in the playbook, or in conversation — adds any promise or duty. This clause does not disclaim the procedures the study has published about its own conduct: the duty map’s left column and the published policies it names describe how this study behaves, and this clause does not erase them. We do what we published we would do, and if we ever fail to, we publish that too. Conflicts. If these documents ever conflict, the Consent Form governs your rights, these Terms govern the study’s limits, and the duty map governs the study’s undertakings — its left column is the complete list of what the study does. Severability. If any part of these Terms is held unenforceable, that part is limited or severed to the minimum extent necessary and the rest stays in force. Survival. Sections 3 through 10 survive the end of your participation and any withdrawal. The signed instruments themselves — these Terms, the Consent Form, and the duty map — are retained after withdrawal for the period the Consent Form names, so that either of us can show that you consented and then withdrew; that record protects you as much as it protects us. Governing law. These Terms are governed by the laws of the State of Texas, without regard to conflict-of-laws rules (meaning Texas law applies even if you live in another state). Where a claim is brought. Any claim relating to this study or these Terms must be brought in the state courts sitting in Bexar County, Texas, and you agree to that court’s jurisdiction (meaning a claim is heard there even if you live in another state). No waiver. A failure to enforce any part of these Terms is not a waiver of it. Changes. These Terms are frozen for your participation window and will not be changed on you mid-study. If they ever change for future testers, the changed version is published with a date and a changelog, and yours still governs you.
(Deliberately absent, on the author’s ruling: no arbitration clause, no waiver of Texas consumer-protection rights, no jury-trial waiver, no class-action waiver, no attorney-fee shifting, and no indemnification of any kind. The county-venue clause above was absent by the same ruling until R54, 2026-09-12, added it.)
I have read these Terms of Participation, the Consent Form, the duty map, and the published FAQ. I have had the chance to consult my own AI or adviser and to decline. I am signing all three voluntarily. I specifically acknowledge that I have read and understood the sections above titled “The complete list of what we undertake to do,” “No professional services,” “No custody,” “Permanent public deposits are yours,” “Free materials, no warranty,” and “Limitation of liability.”
Agreement to transact electronically. By completing the one published apply form and sending the email the form writes — that one email signs the Consent Form, these Terms, and the duty map together — you and the study each agree to conduct this agreement, and the records and signatures related to it, by electronic means.
Tester — typed name: ______________________ Date: ________ William Stafford, Principal Investigator: ______________________ Date: ________
A typed name returned by email is a signature under Texas’s electronic-signature law. By typing your name and sending it, you intend to sign this document. You are entitled to download and keep a complete copy of everything you sign; that is your copy, and the study keeps its own.