Usage Policy
Effective: August 11, 2025
This Usage Policy (also called our Acceptable Use Policy or AUP) govern your access to and use of Gowanus, Gowanus.ai, and any related websites, applications, tools, documentation, and services we provide (collectively, the “Services”). By accessing or using the Services, you agree to be bound by these Usage Policy.
1) Overview & Scope
This Usage Policy (also called our Acceptable Use Policy or AUP) applies to anyone who uses the Services—individuals, teams, developers, and organizations. Its purpose is to help users stay safe and ensure the Services are used responsibly.
We categorize requirements as follows:
Universal Usage Standards — apply to all users and all use cases.
High-Risk Use Case Requirements — extra safeguards for domains that pose elevated risks of harm.
Disclosure Requirements — when you must clearly tell end users they are interacting with AI.
Altquid may update this Policy as our technology and risks evolve. Material changes become effective when posted.
2) Enforcement
Gowanus employs automated and manual reviews to detect and address abuse. If we learn that you have violated this Policy, we may throttle, suspend, or terminate access to the Services, and we may notify relevant authorities where appropriate.
If you discover inaccurate, biased, unsafe, or harmful outputs, report them to contact@gowanus.ai.
3) Universal Usage Standards
You may not use the Services to do any of the following.
A. Do not compromise children’s safety
Create, distribute, or promote CSAM or any content that exploits or abuses minors.
Facilitate trafficking, sextortion, grooming, or impersonation of a minor.
Depict, instruct on, or conceal child abuse.
Sexualize or fetishize minors, including roleplay.
B. Do not compromise critical infrastructure
Facilitate destruction or disruption of power, water, telecom, healthcare, transportation, or similar systems.
Seek unauthorized access to critical systems (e.g., voting machines, financial exchanges, hospital systems).
Interfere with military bases or related infrastructure.
C. Do not incite violence or hateful behavior
Incite, praise, or support violent extremism, terrorism, or hateful conduct.
Promote violence against people, animals, or property.
Advocate discrimination based on protected characteristics (e.g., race, ethnicity, religion, nationality, gender, sexual orientation).
D. Do not compromise privacy, security, or identity
Gain unauthorized access to accounts, devices, networks, or data (including social engineering).
Violate privacy or data-protection laws; share personal data without consent.
Misuse or solicit sensitive data (e.g., non-public contact info, health, biometric, or proprietary data).
Deceive users into believing AI output is human-generated or that they are communicating with a human when they are not.
E. Do not create or facilitate exchange of illegal or highly regulated weapons or goods
Design, produce, modify, market, or distribute weapons, explosives, or dangerous materials.
Facilitate illegal activity, including controlled substances, human trafficking, or prostitution.
F. Do not create psychologically or emotionally harmful content
Encourage, instruct, or conceal self-harm or eating disorders.
Bully, harass, intimidate, shame, or celebrate suffering.
Generate sexual-violence depictions, animal cruelty, or graphic gore.
Build or support deceptive techniques intended to cause emotional harm.
G. Do not spread misinformation
Create or distribute deceptive content about individuals, groups, institutions, or laws/procedures.
Impersonate entities or fabricate personas to mislead about content origin.
Provide false or misleading medical/health/science information.
H. Do not create political campaigns or interfere in elections
Advocate for or against candidates, parties, or ballot positions; solicit votes or donations.
Conduct lobbying to influence officials or regulatory outcomes.
Run campaigns that spread false information or disrupt civic processes.
Provide false or misleading information about election laws, procedures, security, or participation.
I. Do not use for criminal justice, law-enforcement, censorship, or surveillance purposes
Make determinations affecting liberty interests (e.g., sentencing, parole, predictive policing).
Track a person’s location, emotions, or communications without consent; build facial or emotion recognition systems.
Analyze or identify content for government censorship decisions.
Use the Services for biometric categorization inferring sensitive traits.
Limited permitted law-enforcement uses: internal back-office tasks (e.g., training, document summarization, accounting) and analysis to locate missing persons, provided such use does not infringe civil liberties or human rights and complies with all other parts of this Policy.
J. Do not engage in fraudulent, abusive, or predatory practices
Produce, acquire, or distribute counterfeit goods; promote spam.
Generate scams, phishing, malware, or deceptive product content.
Fabricate reviews, comments, or media; run pyramid or similar schemes.
Promote exploitative lending or abusive debt collection.
Deploy subliminal or manipulative techniques that impair decision-making.
Plagiarize or enable academic dishonesty.
K. Do not abuse our platform
Coordinate malicious activity across accounts; mass-create accounts to evade controls.
Circumvent bans or guardrails (including “jailbreaks”) without Altquid’s written approval.
Automate spammy behaviors or misuse rate limits.
Scrape prompts/completions to train other models without authorization.
L. Do not generate sexually explicit content
Request or depict sexual acts, fetishes, incest, or bestiality.
Engage in erotic roleplay or sexting.
4) High-Risk Use Case Requirements
Certain domains pose elevated risks of harm and require added safeguards:
High-Risk domains include:
Legal: interpretation, guidance, or decisions with legal implications.
Healthcare: medical advice, diagnosis, or decisions affecting patient care (wellness/lifestyle tips are excluded).
Insurance: underwriting, claims, or coverage determinations.
Finance: investment advice, lending decisions, creditworthiness.
Employment & Housing: resume screening, hiring, eligibility, leasing, or home loans.
Academic Testing/Accreditation/Admissions: evaluation, scoring, ranking, or certification.
Media/Journalism: automated generation for external publication.
If you operate in these domains, you must:
Use Human-in-the-Loop. A qualified professional must review any advice, recommendations, or subjective decisions that directly impact individuals before they are delivered or finalized.
Disclose Use of AI. Clearly inform users that Gowanus or similar AI systems helped inform decisions or recommendations.
(We strongly encourage additional safeguards such as auditing, logging, sensible rate limits, data-retention controls, and model/feature versioning.)
5) Disclosure Requirements (all users)
You must clearly disclose that users are interacting with an AI system (not a human) in the following cases, whether or not they are high-risk:
Customer-facing chatbots and interactive agents of any kind.
Products serving minors where minors can directly interact with AI features (and you must also comply with applicable youth-safety and privacy laws).
6) Data, Privacy, and Security
You are responsible for complying with all applicable privacy, data-protection, export, and security laws. Do not provide the Services with data you lack the right to use. Implement appropriate administrative, technical, and organizational safeguards for your use case.
7) Changes to this Policy
We may revise this Policy from time to time. Continued use of the Services after an update constitutes acceptance of the revised Policy. For questions about changes, email contact@gowanus.ai.
8) Contracting Flexibility
Altquid may enter into contracts with certain public-sector or regulated customers that tailor restrictions to their missions and legal authorities, provided, in Altquid’s judgment, the contractual safeguards adequately mitigate the risks addressed by this Policy.
9) Definitions
Services: Gowanus, Gowanus.ai, and any related APIs, models, tools, documentation, websites, and support.
User/You: Any individual or entity that accesses or uses the Services.
High-Risk Use Case: A domain listed in Section 4 requiring additional safeguards due to elevated risk of harm.
10) Contact
Questions, reports, or requests regarding this Policy: contact@gowanus.ai.