Terms of Service – Open Climate Curriculum

Account Creation: Users must provide accurate personal details, including first name, last name, email, username, password, languages spoken, affiliation, and areas of expertise.
Terms of Service Acknowledgment: Before completing registration, users must read and accept the Terms of Service, which includes consent to share course information with OpenCC’s AI system for syllabus generation and material recommendations.
Email Verification: A verification email will be sent upon registration. Users must confirm their email address to activate their account.
Declining Terms: If users do not accept the Terms of Service, their information will be discarded, and they will not be registered on the platform.

Public Users: Can browse limited content on the homepage but do not have access to interactive platform features.
Registered Users: Gain access to personalized dashboards, the Explore page, ClimateTA, and the Share Materials page.
Contributors (Verified Users): Have additional privileges, including content creation, material sharing, AI-assisted syllabus development, and access to slide generation tools.
Administrator Privileges: Admins oversee platform moderation, verify contributors, and ensure compliance with content guidelines.

Application Process: Registered users can apply for contributor status, which requires submission of relevant credentials.
Approval & Verification: The site admin reviews applications and grants contributor status with a green checkmark for verified contributors.
Restricted Actions for Unverified Users: Until approved, users cannot create syllabi, upload materials, or access certain AI-powered tools.

User Dashboard: Logged-in users can access a personalized dashboard for browsing materials and managing their profile.
Contributor Search: Users can find contributors by searching for names, affiliations, areas of expertise, or spoken languages.
Course Material & Case Study Access: Registered users can read, download, and navigate through course content.
Author Attribution: All contributed materials are dynamically tagged to their respective authors.

AI-Powered Syllabus Creation: Contributors can use OpenAI Assistants API and AI Engine Pro to generate syllabi with guided prompts and recommendations.
Topic Extraction & Material Search:
- Users can upload documents, and AI extracts key topics while filtering out irrelevant information.
- Extracted topics are used to search for materials through Tavily Web Search API.
Material Recommendations & Downloads: AI-generated suggestions can be downloaded as PDFs or copied for further use.
Slide Generation with SlideSpeak API:
- Users can generate slide presentations by sending structured plain text arrays to the SlideSpeak API.
- The API processes the request and provides a hosted URL where the presentation is stored.
- No personal data, IP addresses, or sensitive metadata are included in the request.

Content Submission: Verified contributors can share:
- Course materials (lecture notes, slides, syllabi)
- Case studies (real-world examples, research cases)
- Teaching resources (guides, tools, assessments)
Submission Process:
- Users fill out a structured template to upload materials.
- A confirmation message appears upon successful submission.
- Submitted content is dynamically linked to the contributor’s profile and the Explore page.
Content Moderation: Admins review submitted materials for compliance with platform standards before public posting.

User Data Protection: Personal information is securely stored and is not shared with third parties without consent.
AI Data Processing: AI-driven searches and recommendations exclude personally identifiable information.
Secure Authentication: Multi-step verification ensures account security.
Content Integrity: Uploaded materials are monitored for plagiarism, copyright violations, and compliance with educational standards.
Slide Generation Security:
- Only plain text arrays are sent to the SlideSpeak API for slide generation.
- Generated slides are stored on external servers and accessed via a URL provided by the API.
- OpenCC does not store or modify slides after generation.

Prohibited Content: Users are not allowed to post content that includes:
- Plagiarized or unauthorized copyrighted materials.
- Offensive, discriminatory, or misleading information.
- AI-generated content that lacks human oversight or verification.
Community Engagement Guidelines:
- Users should engage respectfully in discussions.
- Content should align with academic and professional integrity standards.
- Misuse of AI tools for inappropriate content generation will result in account suspension.

Automatic Terms Updates: The Terms of Service page is linked to the registration form and updates dynamically.
User Agreement Requirement: Users must acknowledge updates before continuing platform use.
Violation Consequences: Breaching the terms may result in account suspension or permanent ban, depending on the severity of the violation.