Terms of Service and Submission Agreement

The Penta-Ledger provides independent mathematical and scientific assumption audits, automated cryptographic timestamping, and epistemic triage.

• Independent Editorial Platform: The Penta-Ledger is an independent research and editorial publication. It is not an accredited university, an academic press, or a traditional peer-reviewed journal.
• Epistemic Classifications: All evaluations and taxonomy badges (Impossible, Unknowable, Undecidable, Possible, Code Flagged, Validated) represent editorial and analytical opinions based on stated axioms and models. They do not constitute formal academic certification or legal/commercial warranty.

• Author Ownership: Submitters retain full copyright and ownership of their original manuscripts, text, and accompanying code.
• Grant of Platform License: By submitting a paper, you grant The Penta-Ledger a non-exclusive, perpetual, irrevocable, royalty-free license to parse, hash, store, index, and publicly display the manuscript and its metadata across the platform.
• Cryptographic Priority: Timestamped receipts provide verifiable mathematical proof of document possession at a specific timestamp, but do not replace statutory patent filings or formal copyright registrations.

To prevent frivolous "idea theft" or front-running claims, authors explicitly acknowledge and agree to the following conditions prior to deposit:

• No Confidentiality / Public Submission: All uploads to The Penta-Ledger are treated as non-confidential research disclosures.
• Editorial Independence: The platform operators, reviewers, and contributors retain full freedom to independently review, critique, formulate alternative proofs, or develop mathematical concepts inspired by public submissions.
• Reciprocal Citation Guarantee: In return, any published editorial blog post, critique, or derivative theorem on The Penta-Ledger will explicitly cite the submitter's immutable SHA-256 hash and uploaded manuscript as the primary submission reference.

• Active Content Prohibited: Manuscripts must consist strictly of passive PDF document structures. All uploads undergo automated binary inspection scanning for dangerous trigger keywords (`/JavaScript`, `/JS`, `/Launch`, `/EmbeddedFiles`, `/SubmitForm`).
• Rejection of Exploit Payloads: Any file containing active executable scripting or corrupted magic headers will be rejected immediately with HTTP 422.

To prevent unauthorized deletion requests by imposters for anonymous submissions:

• Asymmetric Keypair Custody: During upload, the browser generates an ephemeral Ed25519 keypair. The public key is stored in D1; the secret key is retained by the author in local storage and in their receipt JSON.
• Signed Challenge Authentication: Any future unlisting, deletion, or metadata update request must be cryptographically signed by the author's private key matching the public key on record.

The Penta-Ledger respects intellectual property rights and complies with standard copyright infringement notice procedures.

• Immediate Unlisting for Unverified Authorship: Because anonymous submitters cannot be identified in advance, contested papers without verified authorship will be immediately unlisted and removed from public storage upon receiving a valid infringement notice.
• Notice Procedure: Contact the designated agent at legal@penta-ledger.org with the submission URL, the exact SHA-256 hash, identification of the copyrighted work, and proof of authorization. Full details are available in the dedicated DMCA & Copyright Takedown Procedure.

• "As-Is" Service: All services, cryptographic receipts, and editorial reviews are provided on an "AS IS" and "AS AVAILABLE" basis without warranties of any kind, either express or implied.
• No Operational Guarantees: The Penta-Ledger does not guarantee uninterrupted uptime, permanent data preservation, or zero-error cryptographic verification. Authors must maintain their own local backups of manuscripts and generated receipt files.
• Liability Cap: Under no circumstances shall the platform operators, editors, or contributors be held liable for any direct, indirect, incidental, or consequential damages resulting from lost priority, academic disputes, server downtime, or reliance on published reviews.