Terms of Service

1. Who can use the Site

You must be 18 or older to create an account, buy anything or join our email list. Students may use Pharos Terminal (grades 7–12) and Reality Writes! only through an account their parent or guardian creates and supervises. Reality Writes! is intended for 11th–12th graders, and advanced students no younger than 8th grade. You are responsible for your account, for keeping your password and your students' passwords private, and for activity under your account. Tell us right away if you think someone has used it without permission.

2. The store

• We sell digital products: the Pharos Terminal subscription, lesson packets, and courses (Reality Writes!, Through the Fading Darkness, Beyond the Fading Darkness, Winter’s Ghosts and Pitch to Profit). Each course is included with an active Pharos Terminal subscription, and each is sold on its own once its standalone version is on sale. You need an account to buy. Payments are processed by Stripe. West Virginia sales tax is added where it applies.
• Prices are listed on the Site and may change. A price change won't affect an order you've already paid for. A new price for a subscription applies from your next renewal, and we'll email you before it does.
• We may correct pricing errors, and we may refuse or cancel an order (with a full refund) if a product is listed in error or we suspect fraud.

3. Pharos Terminal subscription

• What you get. Access for each student on your subscription to Nexus Points, lesson packets, the parent tracker and year-end portfolio, and every course (Reality Writes!, Pitch to Profit, Through the Fading Darkness, Beyond the Fading Darkness and Winter’s Ghosts), plus special projects as they’re released, for as long as your subscription is active. Features may change and improve over time. We won’t remove a core feature you’ve paid for during your current year without offering a refund for the unused time. Pausing downloads after you cancel, as described below and in our Refund & Cancellation Policy, isn’t a removal of a feature.
• Billing and renewal. $499 for two semesters for the first student, and $399 for each additional student. The first 100 families to subscribe get $100 off each additional student’s first-year price, applied to your payment and shown on your receipt. Renewals, and students added after the first subscription year, are $399. Two semesters is one year of access, billed once a year. Your subscription renews automatically each year at the then-current price until you cancel. Your renewal date is shown on your Account page, and we email you a reminder 14 days before each renewal. You can cancel any time by emailing us, or through Manage subscription on your Account page. Canceling stops the next renewal. Your online lessons stay available until the end of the paid year. Downloads of the lesson packets, lessons and courses included with your subscription are paused once you cancel. Courses and packets you bought separately aren’t affected. Download pausing applies to subscription years that start on or after November 16, 2026. Refunds follow our Refund & Cancellation Policy. One-time purchases made before November 16, 2026, keep the terms that were in effect when they were placed. A subscription year that started before November 16, 2026, keeps the terms that were in effect when it started. Renewals charged on or after November 16, 2026, follow these terms.
• When a subscription ends, your account becomes read-only. Courses included with your subscription close, and courses you bought on their own stay yours. You can still view and download your records and portfolios for the period stated in our Student Data & Privacy Notice.
• Availability. We work to keep Pharos Terminal running, but it may be unavailable at times for maintenance or reasons outside our control. We don’t promise uninterrupted service.
• Testing programs. If we invite you to test new features, those features may be unfinished and may change or end at any time.

4. Your license to our materials

All content on the Site, including books, lesson packets, Nexus Points, the Reality Writes! curriculum, text, images, videos, software, logos and "The Thevenin Cipher," belongs to Zac Northup or our licensors and is protected by copyright and trademark law.

When you buy a product or subscribe, we give you a personal, non-transferable license to use it for the students covered by your purchase:

• Pharos Terminal: for the number of students on your subscription.
• Lesson packets and courses: one license per family, for the students in your own household. You may print copies for them. A micro-school, learning pod or co-op needs a license for each family that uses the material. For group pricing, email us.

You may not resell, share, post, upload or distribute our materials, or share your account or license codes outside the covered students. Short quotes for review or commentary are fine.

5. Educational content and your responsibilities

• You're the teacher. Pharos Terminal and our packets are tools to support your homeschool, micro-school or learning pod. You remain responsible for meeting your state's homeschool requirements, including any notice of intent and annual assessment.
• Standards. Lessons are cross-walked to West Virginia Academic Standards for planning and record-keeping. That is not an endorsement by the West Virginia Board of Education or the West Virginia Department of Education, and we don't guarantee that any evaluator, school, college or program will accept a portfolio or credit.
• Current events. Nexus Points cover real and changing news. We cite our sources and correct errors when we find them, but facts can change after publication. Please preview material before teaching it, and decide what fits your student.
• Outdoor, field and hands-on activities (including Outdoors & Field Study and Trades & Skills) require adult supervision. You are responsible for your students' safety.
• How we make content. Our AI Use Policy explains how AI tools help us build Pharos Terminal and draft materials, and how we review them.

6. Your content

You and your students own what you create and upload, including notes, work samples and manuscripts. You give us permission to store, process and display that content only to provide the service to you. We claim no ownership of it.

Reality Writes! books belong to the student. We don't take any ownership of, or royalties from, a student's book. Publishing on Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) is governed by Amazon's terms. The KDP account must belong to an adult. You are responsible for following Amazon's rules and for making sure what you publish doesn't infringe anyone else's rights.

You agree not to upload anything illegal, anything that infringes someone else's rights, or anything harmful.

7. Prohibited conduct

You agree not to:

• use the Site in violation of any law;
• scrape, data-mine or copy content from the Site by automated means, or use it to train AI models;
• try to gain unauthorized access to the Site, Pharos Terminal, other accounts or other families' records;
• interfere with or disrupt the Site, or introduce malware;
• share your login or license codes with people outside your purchase.

We may suspend or close an account that breaks these terms. If we close an account for a reason other than a breach, we'll refund the unused part of your subscription.

8. The Thevenin Cipher and other real-world activities

The Site promotes "The Thevenin Cipher," a real-world quest. Taking part in it, or in any real-world activity described on the Site, is voluntary and at your own risk. Obey all laws, respect private property, and supervise any minors. To the extent the law allows, we are not responsible for injury, property damage, trespass or other loss resulting from these activities.

9. Third-party sites and services

The Site links to other sites, including Amazon, Audible, Substack and social media. Books and audiobooks sold through those retailers are sold by them under their own terms. We don't control those sites and aren't responsible for them.

10. Disclaimers

Except as stated in these terms, the Site and our products are provided "as is" and "as available." To the extent the law allows, we disclaim implied warranties, including merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose and non-infringement. We don't guarantee any particular educational result.

11. Limitation of liability

To the extent the law allows, we will not be liable for indirect, incidental, special, consequential or punitive damages. Our total liability for any claim relating to the Site or our products is limited to the amount you paid us in the 12 months before the claim. Some states don't allow these limits, so they may not apply to you.

12. Indemnification

You agree to cover our reasonable costs, including attorneys' fees, arising from your breach of these terms or from content you upload or publish.

13. Disputes and governing law

If you have a problem, please email us first, and we'll try to resolve it informally. These terms are governed by the laws of the State of West Virginia, without regard to its conflict-of-law rules. Any dispute that we can't resolve informally will be decided in the state or federal courts located in West Virginia, and you and we agree to those courts' jurisdiction, unless the law where you live gives you the right to bring a claim elsewhere. These terms do not require arbitration.

14. Changes to these terms

We may update these terms. We'll post the new version here with a new date, and we'll email account holders about material changes before they take effect. Changes don't apply to a dispute that arose before the change.

15. Contact

Zac Northup Books and Publications
PO Box 1321
Scott Depot, WV 25526
officialzacnorthup@zacnorthup.com