Terms of Service

1. Agreement to Terms

If you do not agree to these Terms, you must not access or use the Services. We may modify these Terms at any time. Material changes will be posted on this page with an updated effective date. Your continued use after changes become effective constitutes acceptance of the revised Terms.

In the event of conflict between these Terms and a separate written agreement you have with us (for example, a contributor or advertising contract), the separate agreement prevails for the subject matter it covers.

2. Description of Services

The Horizon Wire provides digital journalism and civic-engagement features, including:

• Original and curated news articles across politics, business, investigations, opinion, technology, and related topics;
• The Global Wire — aggregated and rewritten stories from licensed and publicly available third-party sources;
• Breaking news alerts and featured editorial programming;
• Public opinion polls with optional demographic inputs;
• Reader accounts for authentication and profile management;
• Search, RSS/Atom feeds, sitemaps, and programmatic APIs for discovery and syndication.

We reserve the right to modify, suspend, or discontinue any part of the Services at any time, with or without notice, including for maintenance, security, legal compliance, or editorial judgment.

3. Eligibility

You must be at least 18 years old (or the age of majority in your jurisdiction, if higher) to create an account or participate in polls requiring personal data. By using the Services, you represent that you meet this requirement and that all registration information you provide is accurate and current.

Use of the Services from outside Kenya is permitted where lawful in your location. You are responsible for compliance with local laws applicable to you.

4. User Accounts

When you register for a reader account, you agree to:

• Maintain the confidentiality of your login credentials;
• Notify us promptly of any unauthorised access or security breach;
• Accept responsibility for activity occurring under your account;
• Provide accurate profile information and update it when it changes.

We may suspend or terminate accounts that violate these Terms, our editorial standards, or applicable law. Staff and editorial dashboard accounts are governed by separate internal access policies and employment or contractor agreements.

5. Acceptable Use

You agree not to:

• Use the Services for any unlawful, fraudulent, harassing, defamatory, or abusive purpose;
• Attempt to gain unauthorised access to our systems, APIs, staff dashboards, or other users’ accounts;
• Scrape, crawl, or harvest data from the Services except via expressly permitted interfaces (such as our public RSS feed or documented API) and subject to reasonable rate limits;
• Interfere with or disrupt the integrity or performance of the Services, including through malware, DDoS attacks, or automated vote manipulation;
• Circumvent poll participation limits, paywalls, or access controls;
• Impersonate any person or entity, or misrepresent your affiliation;
• Upload or transmit content that infringes intellectual property, privacy, or other third-party rights;
• Use our content to train machine-learning models or build competing datasets without our prior written consent.

We may investigate violations and cooperate with law enforcement where appropriate.

6. Content & Intellectual Property

6.1 Our content

Unless otherwise indicated, all text, graphics, logos, layouts, photographs, audio, video, software, and compilation of content on the Services are owned by or licensed to The Horizon Wire and protected by Kenyan and international copyright, trademark, and related intellectual property laws.

You may:

• View and share reasonable excerpts of articles for personal, non-commercial use with clear attribution and a link to the original page;
• Subscribe to our RSS feed and link to our pages from your website or social channels;
• Quote brief passages for fair dealing, commentary, or news reporting as permitted by law.

You may not republish full articles, sell our content, remove attribution, or create derivative commercial products without written permission.

6.2 Third-party and wire content

Global Wire and certain syndicated items may incorporate material from third-party publishers. Rights in underlying source material remain with the respective owners. We provide links to original sources where available. Your use of third-party content is subject to the originator’s terms.

6.3 Feedback

If you submit ideas, tips, or feedback, you grant us a perpetual, worldwide, royalty-free licence to use that material for editorial and operational purposes without obligation to compensate you, except where a separate agreement provides otherwise or applicable law requires payment for certain journalistic contributions.

7. Polls & User Submissions

Polls reflect voluntary opinions of participants at a point in time. They are not scientific surveys and should not be treated as representative of the general population unless we expressly state otherwise.

By voting, you agree that:

• Your vote and any optional demographic data you provide may be stored and aggregated for editorial display;
• We may apply technical measures to limit duplicate voting (such as session or account checks);
• We may remove or disregard votes that appear fraudulent, automated, or in violation of these Terms;
• Poll results may be published, archived, and cited in our reporting.

8. Editorial Disclaimers

The Services provide news, analysis, and opinion for general information purposes only. Nothing on the Services constitutes legal, financial, investment, medical, or other professional advice. You should seek qualified professional advice before acting on any information published here.

While we strive for accuracy, journalism involves timely reporting that may later be updated or corrected. We publish corrections and clarifications where significant errors are identified. See our corrections policy (available on request at legal@thehorizonwire.co.ke).

Opinion pieces reflect the views of named authors or publications and do not necessarily represent the institutional position of The Horizon Wire.

9. Third-Party Links & Services

The Services may contain links to third-party websites, embeds, advertisements, or social platforms. We do not control and are not responsible for third-party content, privacy practices, or terms. Your interactions with third parties are solely between you and them.

10. APIs, Feeds & Automated Access

Access to our public API, RSS feed, and sitemap is provided on an “as available” basis. We may impose rate limits, require authentication for certain endpoints, or revoke access that degrades service quality or violates these Terms. Documentation is available at our API docs endpoint. Commercial or high-volume use requires prior written agreement.

11. Disclaimers of Warranties

TO THE FULLEST EXTENT PERMITTED BY APPLICABLE LAW, THE SERVICES ARE PROVIDED ON AN “AS IS” AND “AS AVAILABLE” BASIS WITHOUT WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, WHETHER EXPRESS, IMPLIED, OR STATUTORY, INCLUDING IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, TITLE, NON-INFRINGEMENT, AND ACCURACY.

We do not warrant that the Services will be uninterrupted, error-free, secure, or free of harmful components, or that defects will be corrected.

12. Limitation of Liability

TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY KENYAN LAW, The Horizon Wire, ITS DIRECTORS, OFFICERS, EMPLOYEES, CONTRACTORS, AGENTS, AND LICENSORS SHALL NOT BE LIABLE FOR ANY INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, CONSEQUENTIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR PUNITIVE DAMAGES, OR ANY LOSS OF PROFITS, REVENUE, DATA, GOODWILL, OR BUSINESS OPPORTUNITY, ARISING FROM OR RELATED TO YOUR USE OF (OR INABILITY TO USE) THE SERVICES, EVEN IF WE HAVE BEEN ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES.

OUR TOTAL AGGREGATE LIABILITY FOR ALL CLAIMS ARISING OUT OF OR RELATING TO THESE TERMS OR THE SERVICES SHALL NOT EXCEED THE GREATER OF (A) THE AMOUNT YOU PAID US, IF ANY, IN THE TWELVE (12) MONTHS PRECEDING THE CLAIM, OR (B) KES 10,000.

Some jurisdictions do not allow certain limitations; in those cases, our liability is limited to the fullest extent permitted by law.

13. Indemnification

You agree to indemnify, defend, and hold harmless The Horizon Wire and its personnel from and against any claims, liabilities, damages, losses, and expenses (including reasonable legal fees) arising out of or related to: (a) your use of the Services; (b) your violation of these Terms; (c) your violation of any third-party right; or (d) content you submit or activity under your account.

14. Suspension & Termination

We may suspend or terminate your access to the Services immediately, without prior notice, for conduct that we reasonably believe violates these Terms, poses a security risk, causes harm to other users or our reputation, or is required by law.

Upon termination, provisions that by their nature should survive (including intellectual property, disclaimers, limitation of liability, indemnity, and governing law) will remain in effect.

15. Governing Law & Dispute Resolution

These Terms are governed by the laws of the Republic of Kenya, without regard to conflict-of-law principles.

Before initiating formal proceedings, you agree to contact us at legal@thehorizonwire.co.ke and attempt to resolve the dispute informally within thirty (30) days.

Subject to mandatory consumer protections and the exclusive jurisdiction of courts where you reside if required by law, any dispute not resolved informally shall be submitted to the competent courts of Nairobi, Kenya.

16. General Provisions

• Entire agreement: These Terms and the Privacy Policy constitute the entire agreement between you and us regarding the Services;
• Severability: If any provision is held invalid, the remaining provisions remain in full force;
• No waiver: Failure to enforce a provision is not a waiver of our right to do so later;
• Assignment: You may not assign your rights under these Terms without our consent; we may assign ours in connection with a reorganisation or sale;
• Force majeure: We are not liable for delays or failures due to events beyond our reasonable control, including natural disasters, war, labour disputes, internet outages, or government actions.

17. Contact