Terms of Use

Last updated April 21, 2025

Unfold Studio is free and open-source software released under the MIT License. Bascially, this means anyone is free to do whatever they want with the software. You can get a download of Unfold Studio, see the project's history, or join the development team, at the project's GitHub repository. Chris Proctor, an assistant professor of Learning Sciences at the University at Buffalo (SUNY), leads the design and development of Unfold Studio, along with members of the Computational Literacies Lab. Anyone interested in becoming a member of the lab is encouraged to contact Chris.

User agreement

This public instance of Unfold Studio, located at https://unfoldstudio.net, is provided by Chris Proctor as a free service. By using this site, you agree to the terms on this page, including our privacy policy and community guidelines. If you do not agree, please do not use Unfold Studio.

We many need to change these terms from time to time. You can always find the current terms of use at https://unfoldstudio.net/user-guide/terms. You can check a box on your Unfold Studio account profile to opt-in to notifications when we change these terms.

Many teachers and schools use this free, public version of Unfold Studio, and value being able to participate in a broader community of readers and writers. However, it is also possible to deploy a private instance of Unfold Studio if that is a better fit for your school's needs. Private instances can be integrated with your school's Single Sign On (SSO) accounts, and can be restricted to members of the school community. Please contact Chris if you are interested in a private instance.

If you have a student account created using your teacher's join code, that account is provided to you by your school, and is subject to your school's rules and any relevant laws. Teachers can see all student-created stories and activity, including stories which are not shared. Teachers can modify student-created stories, and can freeze student accounts. If your teacher enables the option, you can convert your student account to a regular account.

If you ever want to close your Unfold Studio account and have all your data deleted, please contact us. We have the right to suspend or delete accounts which do not follow these terms, and to remove stories which do not follow our community guidelines.

Stories written on Unfold Studio belong to their authors, and are licensed under the Creative Commons Addribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. This means that when you share a story on Unfold Studio, others are allowed to read your stories and make copies ("fork") to edit into new stories, as long as they give credit to everyone whose work you used. (Stories automatically show which story they are forked from; you should also give credit, either in comments or in the text of your stories.) If you do not want to give others permission to fork your stories, do not share them on Unfold Studio.

Authors are responsible for respecting the intellectual property of others. The principle of Fair Use defines how much, for what purposes, and in what contexts, you are allowed to use a copyrighted work in your own work. If you believe that a story on Unfold Studio violates your rights, please contact us.

We do our best to enforce the community guidelines to ensure that Unfold Studio remains a safe and supportive community for young adult literature, but we cannot make any guarantees about this site or about authors' content and will not be held liable for any harm which arises from use of this site or interaction with its content. When Unfold Studio is used in educational contexts, we encourage teachers to consider Unfold Studio part of the school environment, and to have the same expectations for student conduct they would have while on school grounds.

Privacy

Data privacy is rightly a major concern, especially in educational contexts. Our approach to privacy is simple: your personal information is safest when you never share it in the first place. We have designed Unfold Studio so that we need as little of your information as possible to run the site.

What information do we collect from users?

When you create an account, we ask you to choose a username and a password. Your username should not contain anything that others could use to identify you, including parts of your real name or your location. For regular accounts, we also ask for an email address. We keep your email address private, and only use it for account issues such as resetting your password. For student accounts, we only ask for a username and a password--ask your teacher for help if you need to reset your password.
The stories and books you create are saved. Do not share stories which contain any information which could identify you or others, including names, contact information, or locations.
We also save a record of your interactions on the site, such as when you read or write stories.

What do we do with information collected from users?

We run the site.
We study usage of the site. For example, we monitor the amount of traffic to make sure we have enough servers.
We conduct scientific research using de-identified user information, and share the results with educators and researchers. See the research page for more details.
We enforce these terms of use and comply with our legal obligations.

Your information may pass through service providers such as website hosting and email services as part of running the site.
De-identified and aggregated information is shared with researchers. See the research page for more details.
We will share your information with law enforcement if we are legally required to do so.

Compliance with education and privacy laws

Unfold Studio complies with privacy laws related to children and education. If you have any questions about Unfold Studio's data practices or compliance with privacy laws, please don't hesitate to contact us. We will continue to update this section to address additional privacy laws in response to inquiries.

FERPA protects the privacy of students' education records. Unfold Studio does not collect any information which is part of a student's education record. No personally-identifiable information is collected for student accounts. The only personally-identifiable collected for regular accounts is an email address, and we do not share this information except as allowed and required by FERPA.
COPPA protects the information of children under 13. Although COPPA does not apply to Unfold Studio (COPPA applies to commercial websites, and Unfold Studio is noncommercial), we strongly support the principles of COPPA and are compliant with its requirements.
New York Education Law 2d requires school districts and other education organizations to protect the privacy and security of personally-identifiable information. The easiest way for teachers to use Unfold Studio while remaining compliant with Education Law 2d is to have students create student accounts managed by a teacher. In this case, Unfold Studio does not collect any personally-identifiable information about students at all.
Users in the European Economic Area, UK, and Switzerland have data protection rights, including the right to access, correct, and export your information, and to stop using or delete your personal information. Please contact us with any requests.