Written to be read by someone who is not a lawyer, because the people bound by it are Masons, not counsel.
The short version
LodgeWise is an app your lodge uses to run its business. Your lodge gave you access and can take it away. Your lodge's data belongs to your lodge, not to us. We do not sell anything about you. Be careful what you write about other brothers, because they can ask to see it. And the app is young — expect defects, and do not let it be the only copy of anything that matters.
The rest of this is the same thing in the words a court needs.
1. Agreeing to this
By using LodgeWise you agree to these Terms. If you do not agree, do not use it — tell your Secretary, who can keep your lodge's record the way he did before.
These Terms are between you and Mishan Warnakulasuriya, who operates LodgeWise as a sole proprietor ("we", "us"). They are separate from any agreement between your lodge and us, and separate from your lodge's own rules, which still apply to you.
Notices to us go to [email protected].
2. Who may use LodgeWise
3. Your account
Keep your password to yourself. Do not share your login, and do not use anyone else's. If you think someone has got into your account, tell your lodge's administrator and write to [email protected].
You are responsible for what happens under your login, unless it happens because of a failure on our side.
4. What you may not do
Do not:
(a) pretend to be another member or officer, or misrepresent your office; (b) try to reach another lodge's data, or any data in your own lodge that you have not been given access to; (c) copy, scrape or bulk-download the roster or any other member data, except through an export feature made available to you; (d) probe or attack the service, or test its security without our written permission — if you think you have found a weakness, please tell us at [email protected] and give us a chance to fix it; (e) upload anything unlawful, defamatory, harassing, or infringing, or anything containing malware; (f) use LodgeWise to send unsolicited commercial messages; (g) use it for ritual content, ballot tallies, or the private internals of a tyled communication — the app is deliberately not built to hold these, and in some jurisdictions putting them in a hosted system is forbidden; (h) reverse-engineer, decompile or disassemble the app, or try to derive its source code, except where the law gives you a right that cannot be contracted away; (i) copy any part of LodgeWise itself, or use it to help build a competing product.
5. What you write about other brothers
This deserves its own section, because the app makes it easy to forget.
Notes on a member's record, messages, and minutes are records about real people, and in many places those people have a legal right to ask for a copy of everything held about them. Write accordingly. Officers: the free-text notes field on a roster record is not private correspondence.
If you record anything about a brother's health, family circumstances, or standing, do it because the lodge needs it, and keep it to what the lodge needs.
6. What belongs to whom
Your lodge's data belongs to your lodge. Roster, minutes, events, documents, messages — none of it is ours and we do not sell it, rent it, use it for advertising, or use it to train machine-learning models.
What you write stays yours, but by putting it into LodgeWise you allow your lodge and us to store it, display it to the members your lodge has authorised, and back it up, so the app can work. Some of it — minutes, attendance, dues — is the lodge's own record and will stay in the lodge's record even if you leave or delete your account. See §8.
LodgeWise itself belongs to us — the software, the design, the name and the logo. You may use the app; you get no other rights in it.
Feedback. If you tell us something is broken or missing, we may act on it freely, with no obligation to you. You keep whatever rights you have in what you sent.
7. Your privacy
The Privacy Policy explains what we hold, why, who can see it, and how long it lasts. It is part of these Terms.
Two things worth knowing without reading it:
8. Leaving, and deleting your account
You can delete your LodgeWise account from within the app at any time. What that does, precisely:
If your lodge removes you instead, your access ends and your roster record stays with the lodge, subject to the lodge's own rules.
9. The app is young
LodgeWise is actively developed and will have defects. Do not rely on it as the only copy of anything your lodge cannot lose. Keep whatever record your lodge kept before, at least while it is new to you.
10. No warranty
LodgeWise is provided "as is" and "as available", without warranty of any kind, express or implied, including merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose and non-infringement. We do not promise it will be uninterrupted, secure, or free of error.
Some places do not allow these exclusions, in which case they do not apply to you.
11. What we owe you if something goes wrong
To the fullest extent the law allows, we are not liable for indirect, incidental, special, consequential or punitive damages, or for lost data, lost profits or lost goodwill.
Our total liability to you, for everything, is capped at one hundred US dollars (US$100). You pay us nothing — your lodge is our customer, not you — and that is the trade.
This does not limit liability that cannot lawfully be limited, including for death or personal injury caused by negligence, or for fraud. Nothing here takes away rights you have as a consumer that cannot be waived, and if you live somewhere that gives you such rights, you keep them.
12. Ending it
You may stop using LodgeWise at any time and delete your account (§8).
Your lodge may end your access at any time. We may suspend or end your access if you breach these Terms, or where we must to protect the service or other users. Where it is reasonable to do so, we will tell you why.
Sections 5, 6, 10, 11, 13 and 14 survive.
13. Disputes
Write to us first at [email protected]. Most things can be sorted out without anyone filing anything, and we ask you to try for thirty (30) days.
If that does not resolve it, any dispute will be resolved by binding arbitration before a single arbitrator administered by JAMS under its Streamlined Arbitration Rules, in Santa Barbara County, California, or by videoconference. Claims must be brought individually and not as part of a class or representative action.
You can still bring an individual claim in small-claims court, and either of us may go to court for an injunction to protect intellectual property or confidential information.
You can opt out of this section. Write to [email protected] within thirty (30) days of first accepting these Terms and say so. Nothing else about your account changes, and we will not treat you differently for it.
14. Governing law
The laws of the State of California, without regard to its conflict-of-law rules. Where arbitration does not apply, the state and federal courts sitting in Santa Barbara County, California have exclusive jurisdiction — subject to any right you have to bring proceedings where you live.
15. Changes to these Terms
We may update these Terms. If a change matters, we will tell you in the app or by email before it takes effect and give you at least thirty (30) days. Continuing to use LodgeWise after that means you accept them. If you do not, delete your account.
16. No affiliation with any Grand Lodge
LodgeWise is an independent product. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by any Grand Lodge or Masonic governing body.
17. Contact
Apple note: if you obtained the app from the App Store, Apple is not a party to these Terms, has no obligation to provide support, and Apple and its subsidiaries are third-party beneficiaries entitled to enforce them against you. Apple is not responsible for the app or any claim relating to it.