Terms of Service — SmartCiter

1. Acceptance of Terms

By accessing or using SmartCiter — whether through the web analyzer at smartciter.com/analyze, the Microsoft Word add-in, or any associated service — you agree to be bound by these Terms of Service. If you are using SmartCiter on behalf of an institution, you represent that you have authority to bind that institution to these terms.

2. Description of Service

SmartCiter provides AI-assisted citation analysis tools for academic manuscripts. The service includes a browser-based citation analyzer, a Microsoft Word add-in, and institutional administration tools. SmartCiter is a citation quality assessment tool — it is not a citation database, a plagiarism detector, or a manuscript editing service.

3. Acceptable Use

You may use SmartCiter for:

Analyzing academic manuscripts, theses, dissertations, and research papers for citation quality
Identifying missing, weak, or mismatched citations in your own work
Finding peer-reviewed papers relevant to your research topic
Generating correctly formatted bibliographies for academic submission

You may not use SmartCiter to:

Analyze manuscripts you do not have rights to process
Systematically scrape or harvest citation data for commercial redistribution
Misrepresent AI-generated citation suggestions as independently verified facts
Circumvent institutional access controls or share institutional login credentials
Submit AI-generated content as your own original academic work in violation of your institution's academic integrity policies

4. Citation Accuracy Disclaimer

    SmartCiter's AI scoring and paper suggestions are tools to assist your judgment — not replace it. You are responsible for verifying all citations before submission.
  

Specifically:

Citation scores (Relevance, Credibility, Recency) are AI estimates and may be inaccurate
Suggested replacement papers must be independently verified — always check that the DOI resolves to a real paper matching the description
SmartCiter does not query live retraction databases; retraction alerts are heuristic only
The reviewer report is AI-generated and does not constitute peer review by a human expert
SmartCiter is not liable for academic penalties, journal rejections, or errors arising from use of its output

5. AI-Generated Content

SmartCiter uses third-party AI providers (Groq, OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, xAI) to power its analysis features. By using these features you acknowledge that:

AI responses are probabilistic and may contain errors or hallucinations
Your manuscript text is transmitted to your chosen AI provider and is subject to their terms of service and privacy policies
SmartCiter is not responsible for the content of AI-generated responses
Paper suggestions generated by AI must be verified before use in academic work

6. Institutional Licensing

Institutional licenses grant access to all current users of the licensed domain. The subscribing institution is responsible for:

Ensuring all users comply with these Terms of Service
Maintaining accurate domain registration in the admin dashboard
Notifying SmartCiter of any unauthorized use discovered within their institution
Paying annual license fees as agreed at the time of purchase

Institutional licenses are non-transferable between institutions. Licenses may not be resold or sublicensed.

7. Free Tier

The free tier of the web analyzer is provided without warranty and may be modified, rate-limited, or discontinued at any time. Free tier users bring their own AI API keys and are responsible for any costs incurred through their chosen AI provider.

8. Intellectual Property

SmartCiter, its code, design, branding, and documentation are the property of SmartCiter and its developers. Nothing in these Terms grants you any right to use SmartCiter's name, logo, or branding without explicit written permission. Your manuscripts remain entirely your intellectual property — SmartCiter claims no rights over content you upload or paste.

9. Limitation of Liability

To the fullest extent permitted by law, SmartCiter and its developers are not liable for any indirect, incidental, special, or consequential damages including but not limited to: academic penalties, publication rejections, citation errors in published work, or losses arising from reliance on AI-generated suggestions. Our total liability for any claim shall not exceed the amount paid by you for the service in the preceding 12 months.

10. Service Availability

SmartCiter is provided "as is" without warranty of uninterrupted availability. We will make reasonable efforts to maintain uptime but do not guarantee it. Scheduled maintenance will be communicated in advance where possible.

11. Termination

We may suspend or terminate access for violation of these terms with or without notice. Institutional licensees may terminate their subscription at the end of the current billing period. No refunds are provided for partial periods.

12. Changes to Terms

We may update these terms at any time. Continued use of SmartCiter after changes constitutes acceptance. Material changes will be communicated to institutional administrators by email.

13. Governing Law

These terms are governed by the laws of the jurisdiction in which SmartCiter is registered. Any disputes shall be resolved through binding arbitration before resorting to litigation.

14. Contact

Legal inquiries: admin@f2yapps.com