Terms of Service

1. Acceptance of Terms

By accessing or using DirectCut (“Platform,” “we,” “us,” or “our”), uploading content, or renting access to content, you (“you” or “User”) agree to be bound by these Terms of Service (“Terms”). If you do not agree, do not use the Platform. Your continued use of the Platform after any update to these Terms constitutes acceptance of the updated Terms.

These Terms apply to all users, including filmmakers who upload content (“Filmmakers”) and viewers who rent or stream content (“Viewers”).

2. Eligibility

You must be at least 18 years of age to use the Platform. By using the Platform, you represent and warrant that you are 18 or older and have the legal capacity to enter into a binding agreement. DirectCut does not knowingly permit use by anyone under 18.

3. Filmmaker Accounts

Any registered user may enable a Filmmaker account instantly from their account settings. No application or approval is required. You are responsible for maintaining the confidentiality of your account credentials and for all activity under your account.

4. Content Ownership & License

By uploading content to the Platform, you represent, warrant, and covenant that:

• You own or have obtained all necessary rights, licenses, consents, and permissions to upload, distribute, and monetize the content, including all underlying rights in the film, screenplay, music, sound recordings, artwork, photographs, trademarks, and the likenesses of any persons appearing in the content.
• All persons appearing in your content have signed valid, written release agreements authorizing their appearance and the distribution of the content on the Platform.
• Any music, footage, or third-party material incorporated into your content is either owned by you or used under a valid license that permits commercial distribution on streaming platforms.
• Your content does not infringe, misappropriate, or violate any copyright, trademark, trade secret, right of publicity, right of privacy, or other intellectual property or proprietary right of any third party.

You retain ownership of your content. By uploading, you grant DirectCut a non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty-free license to host, store, transcode, generate thumbnails, stream, display, and distribute your content solely for the purpose of operating the Platform. To the extent permitted by applicable law, you waive any moral rights you may have in your content with respect to DirectCut’s exercise of this license (including transcoding, thumbnail generation, and display across different devices and contexts). This license terminates when you remove your content or your account is terminated, subject to any prior rentals by Viewers and any archival copies retained for legal compliance purposes.

5. Feedback

If you submit ideas, suggestions, feature requests, or other feedback about the Platform to DirectCut (“Feedback”), you grant DirectCut a perpetual, irrevocable, worldwide, royalty-free license to use, reproduce, modify, and incorporate that Feedback into the Platform or any other product or service without any obligation of compensation, attribution, or confidentiality to you.

6. Content Restrictions

The following content is strictly prohibited on the Platform. Uploading prohibited content will result in immediate removal and permanent account termination, and may be referred to law enforcement:

• No adult or explicit content. Pornographic, sexually explicit, or sexually suggestive content of any kind is prohibited. DirectCut is an adult-free platform.
• No child sexual abuse material (CSAM). Any content that sexually depicts, exploits, or endangers minors is absolutely prohibited and will be immediately reported to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) and relevant law enforcement.
• No illegal content. Content that violates any applicable local, state, national, or international law or regulation is prohibited, including content that promotes, facilitates, or depicts illegal activity.
• No unauthorized third-party material. Content containing music, footage, images, or other material used without a valid license permitting commercial distribution is prohibited.
• No non-consensual recordings. Content recorded without the knowledge or consent of persons depicted, or in violation of any applicable privacy laws, is prohibited.
• No defamatory or harassing content. Content that defames, harasses, threatens, or invades the privacy of any individual is prohibited.
• No violent extremism or hate speech. Content that promotes, glorifies, or instructs terrorism, genocide, or violence against any person or group based on protected characteristics is prohibited.
• No materially false or misleading content. Content that makes demonstrably false factual claims about real-world events, persons, or places in a manner likely to cause harm, or that is presented as factual documentary content while containing fabricated events or testimony, is prohibited.
• AI-generated and synthetic content must be labeled. Content that is substantially generated by artificial intelligence or that meaningfully alters the likeness, voice, or statements of a real person through synthetic means must include a clear disclosure in the title or description stating that the content is AI-generated or synthetically manipulated.

DirectCut reserves the right, but has no obligation, to pre-screen, review, flag, filter, modify, refuse, or remove any content at its sole discretion. You remain solely responsible for the content you upload regardless of any review by DirectCut.

7. Platform Fees & Payments

DirectCut itemizes infrastructure and payment costs to the party that incurs them, at the posted rates stated below. For each paid rental, the Viewer’s checkout total consists of: (a) the sale price set by the Filmmaker; (b) a streaming fee for the film’s runtime at DirectCut’s posted streaming rate (currently $2 per 1,000 minutes), computed exactly rather than averaged, charged once per rental, and covering two full streams of the film within the rental window; and (c) a payment processing fee (currently 2.9% + $0.30 by card), calculated so that processing costs are borne by the checkout total rather than by the sale price. Of the sale price, the Filmmaker receives 80% and DirectCut retains a platform fee of 20%; no other deductions are made from the Filmmaker’s share. Rental prices must be $1.99 or more.

Viewer rentals are governed by our Refund Policy.

Storage hosting is billed to Filmmakers at DirectCut’s infrastructure cost for the film’s exact runtime (currently $5 per 1,000 minutes stored, per month), with no markup, plus payment processing fees only. Storage is charged a year at a time (12 months), up front, when a film is published, as a single transaction to minimize card fees. Streaming delivery is paid by the Viewer at checkout as described above and is not billed to the Filmmaker. Filmmaker earnings are paid out separately by Stripe and are not reduced by hosting costs.

Payments are processed through Stripe. Filmmaker earnings are transferred to the Filmmaker’s Stripe connected account at the time of each sale and paid out by Stripe according to its payout schedule. By selling on the Platform, you agree to Stripe’s Connected Account Agreement. DirectCut reserves the right to adjust its fee structure with 30 days’ notice.

8. Copyright Infringement & DMCA

DirectCut respects intellectual property rights and complies with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (17 U.S.C. § 512). If you believe content on the Platform infringes your copyright, please send a written notice containing all elements required by 17 U.S.C. § 512(c)(3) to:

Accounts that are the subject of multiple valid DMCA notices will be terminated under DirectCut’s repeat-infringer policy.

If you believe your content was removed in error, you may submit a counter-notice pursuant to 17 U.S.C. § 512(g).

9. Prohibited Uses

In addition to the content restrictions above, you may not:

• Use the Platform to circumvent, disable, or interfere with security features
• Attempt to gain unauthorized access to any portion of the Platform or its infrastructure
• Use automated tools to scrape, crawl, or harvest data from the Platform without written permission
• Impersonate any person or entity, or misrepresent your affiliation with any person or entity
• Use misleading titles, descriptions, tags, or metadata to misrepresent your content, deceive viewers, or manipulate search results
• Use the Platform for any commercial purpose not expressly permitted by these Terms
• Engage in fraud, money laundering, or any other illegal financial activity

10. Termination

DirectCut may suspend or terminate your account and remove your content at any time, for any reason, with or without notice, including for violation of these Terms. Termination does not affect rentals Viewers have already paid for; DirectCut will make reasonable efforts to fulfill outstanding access obligations.

You may delete your account at any time. Upon deletion, your content will be removed from public view. You remain responsible for any obligations (including chargebacks or disputes) that arose before termination.

11. Disclaimer of Warranties

THE PLATFORM IS PROVIDED “AS IS” AND “AS AVAILABLE” WITHOUT WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, NON-INFRINGEMENT, OR UNINTERRUPTED OR ERROR-FREE OPERATION. DIRECTCUT DOES NOT WARRANT THAT THE PLATFORM WILL MEET YOUR REQUIREMENTS OR THAT ANY DEFECTS WILL BE CORRECTED.

12. Limitation of Liability

TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW, DIRECTCUT AND ITS OFFICERS, DIRECTORS, EMPLOYEES, AND AGENTS SHALL NOT BE LIABLE FOR ANY INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, CONSEQUENTIAL, OR PUNITIVE DAMAGES ARISING FROM YOUR USE OF OR INABILITY TO USE THE PLATFORM, INCLUDING LOSS OF PROFITS, DATA, OR GOODWILL, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES.

IN NO EVENT SHALL DIRECTCUT’S TOTAL LIABILITY TO YOU FOR ALL CLAIMS ARISING FROM OR RELATING TO THE PLATFORM EXCEED THE GREATER OF (A) THE TOTAL FEES PAID BY YOU TO DIRECTCUT IN THE TWELVE (12) MONTHS PRECEDING THE CLAIM, OR (B) ONE HUNDRED U.S. DOLLARS ($100).

13. Indemnification

You agree to defend, indemnify, and hold harmless DirectCut and its officers, directors, employees, and agents from and against any claims, liabilities, damages, judgments, losses, costs, and expenses (including reasonable attorneys’ fees) arising out of or relating to: (a) your use of the Platform; (b) your content; (c) your breach of these Terms; or (d) your violation of any third-party right, including any intellectual property right, right of publicity, or privacy right.

14. Governing Law & Dispute Resolution

These Terms are governed by the laws of the State of Delaware, without regard to its conflict-of-law principles.

Any dispute arising out of or relating to these Terms or the Platform that cannot be resolved informally shall be resolved by binding arbitration administered by the American Arbitration Association (“AAA”) under its Consumer Arbitration Rules. Arbitration shall take place on an individual basis; class arbitrations and class actions are not permitted. You waive any right to a jury trial and any right to participate in a class-action lawsuit or class-wide arbitration.

Notwithstanding the foregoing, either party may seek injunctive or other equitable relief in any court of competent jurisdiction to prevent irreparable harm.

ANY CLAIM OR CAUSE OF ACTION ARISING OUT OF OR RELATING TO THESE TERMS OR THE PLATFORM MUST BE FILED WITHIN ONE (1) YEAR AFTER THE CLAIM OR CAUSE OF ACTION ACCRUED, OR IT WILL BE PERMANENTLY BARRED.

15. Force Majeure

DirectCut shall not be liable for any delay or failure to perform its obligations under these Terms to the extent that such delay or failure is caused by circumstances beyond its reasonable control, including acts of God, natural disasters, pandemics or epidemics, acts of war or terrorism, civil unrest, government orders or regulations, internet or telecommunications infrastructure failures, power outages, or failures of third-party service providers (including Cloudflare, Stripe, or other infrastructure partners). DirectCut’s obligations are suspended for the duration of such circumstances.

16. General Provisions

No Agency or Partnership

Nothing in these Terms creates or implies any agency, partnership, joint venture, employment, or franchise relationship between you and DirectCut. You have no authority to bind DirectCut to any obligation, and DirectCut is not responsible for your acts or omissions.

Assignment

You may not assign or transfer your rights or obligations under these Terms, in whole or in part, without DirectCut’s prior written consent; any attempted assignment without consent is void. DirectCut may assign these Terms or any of its rights and obligations hereunder without restriction, including in connection with a merger, acquisition, or sale of assets.

No Waiver

DirectCut’s failure to enforce any right or provision of these Terms on any occasion shall not constitute a waiver of that right or provision or of any other right or provision. No waiver is effective unless made in writing and signed by an authorized representative of DirectCut.

Severability

If any provision of these Terms is found to be invalid or unenforceable, that provision will be modified to the minimum extent necessary to make it enforceable, and the remaining provisions will continue in full force and effect.

Entire Agreement

These Terms constitute the entire agreement between you and DirectCut with respect to the Platform and supersede all prior agreements and understandings relating to the same subject matter.

17. Changes to These Terms

DirectCut may update these Terms at any time. We will provide notice of material changes by posting the updated Terms with a new effective date. Your continued use of the Platform after the updated Terms take effect constitutes your acceptance of the changes. If you do not agree to the updated Terms, you must stop using the Platform.

18. Contact

Questions about these Terms may be directed to: