Welcome to DormEats. These Terms of Service (the "Terms") are a binding agreement between you and Arjun J. Verma (the operator of DormEats, referred to as "DormEats", "we", "us", or "our"). They govern your use of the DormEats mobile app on iOS and Android, the in-browser web demo at dormeats.arjunjv.com, the DormEats marketing website, and any backend services we offer (together, the "Service").
1. Acceptance of these Terms; assumption of risk
By installing, opening, or using the Service, or by checking the "I agree" box at the end of onboarding, you agree to these Terms and to our Privacy Policy. If you do not agree, do not use the Service.
You assume all risk of using DormEats. The Service provides menu information and AI-generated recommendations that may be incomplete, inaccurate, or out of date. You are solely responsible for your food choices and for verifying that any food you eat is safe and appropriate for you, including with respect to allergies, intolerances, medical conditions, and religious requirements. Sections 6 and 7 explain these risks in more detail.
2. Eligibility
You must be at least 13 years old to use DormEats. By using the Service, you represent that you meet this age requirement, that you have the legal capacity to enter into these Terms in your jurisdiction (if you are between 13 and the age of majority, with the involvement of your parent or guardian if required), and that your use of the Service does not violate any applicable law.
3. The Service
DormEats helps college students decide where to eat by combining daily campus dining hall menus with personalized, AI-generated rankings based on the preferences you provide during onboarding. The Service is currently in beta. Features, supported colleges, and behavior may change at any time. DormEats is provided to students for free; we may introduce paid features in the future, and if we do, the terms for those features will be presented before purchase.
4. License to use the Service
Subject to your compliance with these Terms, we grant you a limited, personal, non-exclusive, non-transferable, non-sublicensable, and revocable license to install and use the DormEats app on devices you own or control and to use the Service for your personal, non-commercial use.
5. Acceptable use
You agree not to:
- Reverse engineer, decompile, or disassemble the app, except to the extent applicable law expressly allows it;
- Scrape, harvest, or extract data from the Service in bulk, or use automated tools to access the API outside of normal app usage;
- Attempt to bypass rate limits, security controls, or abuse-prevention measures;
- Use the Service to harass, defame, or violate the rights of any other person;
- Use the Service to break any law, university policy, or campus dining program rule;
- Resell, redistribute, or build a competing service on top of our API;
- Upload free-text content (e.g., as "other dietary restrictions") that is unlawful, threatening, harassing, or contains personally identifying information about another person.
6. Dietary and allergen disclaimer — read this carefully
Without limiting the above:
- Dietary tags (e.g., "vegetarian", "vegan", "gluten-free", "dairy-free", "nut-free") shown in the app may be incorrect, incomplete, or out of date.
- Ingredient lists, descriptions, and AI-generated explanations may be wrong, including with respect to the presence of allergens or cross-contamination.
- Dining halls may change menus, ingredients, or substitutions at any time without us knowing about it.
- If you have a food allergy or any medical condition affecting your diet, always confirm directly with the dining hall staff and the original campus dining service before eating.
DormEats and its operator are not liable for any allergic reaction, illness, injury, or other harm arising from your reliance on information shown in the Service. If in doubt, do not eat the item.
7. AI-generated content disclaimer
Recommendations, menu descriptions, dietary tags, and other content in the Service may be generated by AI systems operated by third parties (currently Google Gemini, Cerebras, and OpenRouter). AI output can be inaccurate, incomplete, biased, or fabricated. Recommendations are based on the preferences you provide, which the AI does not independently verify.
AI recommendations do not constitute medical, dietetic, nutritional, or other professional advice. They are not a substitute for the advice of a licensed healthcare professional. Do not rely on the Service to manage any medical condition, nutritional plan, or eating disorder. If you need professional advice about your diet or health, consult a qualified professional.
8. Third-party data sources and services
DormEats fetches menu data from third-party campus dining services (for example, the UCSB Dining APIs at UC Santa Barbara) and forwards your preferences to third-party AI providers to generate recommendations. We do not control those third parties and we are not responsible for their accuracy, availability, terms, or privacy practices. Your use of the Service is also subject to any applicable terms and policies of those third parties.
DormEats is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by any university, dining program, or food service provider.
9. Your content and feedback
The free-text fields in DormEats (e.g., allergies, "other dietary restrictions", custom food preferences, liked or disliked food items) are stored on your device and are sent to our server only as part of a recommendation request, where they are forwarded to an AI provider to compute that recommendation. You retain ownership of your content. To the extent any of that content reaches our server, you grant us a worldwide, royalty-free, non-exclusive license to process it for the limited purpose of operating the Service as described in our Privacy Policy.
If you send us feedback (for example, by email), you grant us permission to use that feedback to improve the Service without any obligation to you.
10. Intellectual property
The DormEats app, website, designs, text, graphics, and other materials we create (the "DormEats Content") are owned by us and protected by intellectual property laws. Except for the license in Section 4, no other rights are granted to you.
Menu data and college information shown in the Service belong to their respective owners (e.g., the relevant university and its dining program) and are surfaced for informational purposes only.
11. Disclaimer of warranties
THE SERVICE IS PROVIDED "AS IS" AND "AS AVAILABLE" WITHOUT WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, WHETHER EXPRESS, IMPLIED, OR STATUTORY, INCLUDING WITHOUT LIMITATION ANY IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, NON-INFRINGEMENT, OR ACCURACY. WE DO NOT WARRANT THAT THE SERVICE WILL BE UNINTERRUPTED, ERROR-FREE, OR FREE OF HARMFUL COMPONENTS, OR THAT ANY CONTENT (INCLUDING MENU OR DIETARY INFORMATION) IS COMPLETE, CURRENT, OR ACCURATE.
12. Exclusion of indirect and consequential damages
TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW, IN NO EVENT WILL DORMEATS OR ARJUN J. VERMA BE LIABLE FOR ANY INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, CONSEQUENTIAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR PUNITIVE DAMAGES, OR FOR ANY LOSS OF PROFITS, REVENUE, DATA, GOODWILL, OR BUSINESS OPPORTUNITY, ARISING OUT OF OR RELATED TO YOUR USE OF — OR INABILITY TO USE — THE SERVICE, WHETHER BASED IN CONTRACT, TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE), STRICT LIABILITY, PRODUCT LIABILITY, STATUTE, OR ANY OTHER LEGAL THEORY, AND EVEN IF DORMEATS HAS BEEN ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES.
This exclusion is a separate and independent provision from the liability cap in Section 13 and is intended to remain in force even if the cap is found unenforceable for any reason.
13. Cap on total liability
TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW, THE TOTAL CUMULATIVE LIABILITY OF DORMEATS AND ARJUN J. VERMA TO YOU FOR ALL CLAIMS ARISING OUT OF OR RELATING TO THESE TERMS OR THE SERVICE WILL NOT EXCEED ONE HUNDRED U.S. DOLLARS (USD $100), REGARDLESS OF THE FORM OF ACTION OR THE LEGAL THEORY OF LIABILITY.
Some jurisdictions do not allow the exclusion or limitation of certain warranties or damages, so portions of Section 12 or this Section 13 may not apply to you. In that case, the relevant exclusion or limitation will apply to the maximum extent permitted by law.
14. Indemnification
You agree to indemnify, defend, and hold harmless Arjun J. Verma and DormEats from and against any claims, liabilities, damages, losses, and expenses (including reasonable attorneys' fees) arising out of or in any way connected with (a) your use of the Service, (b) your violation of these Terms, (c) your violation of any third-party right, or (d) any food allergy, intolerance, or medical event arising from your reliance on the Service.
15. Binding individual arbitration; class action waiver
15.1 Agreement to arbitrate. Except for the disputes listed in Section 15.4, you and DormEats agree that any dispute, claim, or controversy arising out of or relating to these Terms, the Service, or your relationship with DormEats (a "Dispute") will be resolved exclusively by final and binding individual arbitration, rather than in court. This agreement to arbitrate is governed by the Federal Arbitration Act (9 U.S.C. §§ 1–16).
15.2 Arbitration procedure. The arbitration will be administered by the American Arbitration Association (AAA) under its Consumer Arbitration Rules, available at www.adr.org. The arbitration will take place in Santa Barbara County, California, or, at your election, in the U.S. county in which you reside. It may also be conducted by telephone or video, or based solely on written submissions, as the arbitrator decides. The arbitrator's decision will be final and binding, and judgment on the arbitration award may be entered in any court of competent jurisdiction.
15.3 Class action waiver. You and DormEats agree that each may bring claims against the other only in your or its individual capacity, and not as a plaintiff or class member in any purported class, collective, consolidated, or representative proceeding. The arbitrator may not consolidate the claims of more than one person and may not preside over any form of representative, consolidated, or class proceeding. If a court decides that this Section 15.3 is unenforceable as to a particular claim or remedy, that claim or remedy (and only that claim or remedy) will be severed and brought in court, and the remaining claims will continue to be resolved by arbitration.
15.4 Exceptions. The agreement to arbitrate in this Section 15 does not apply to: (a) claims that may be brought in a small-claims court if they qualify; (b) claims for injunctive or equitable relief regarding intellectual property infringement, misuse, or misappropriation; (c) any dispute between you and Apple, Inc. arising out of or relating to the App Store or to the additional terms in Section 21; or (d) any dispute that cannot, as a matter of law, be subject to mandatory arbitration.
15.5 Fees. Arbitration filing fees and arbitrator fees will be allocated as set out in the AAA Consumer Arbitration Rules. In jurisdictions where consumer protection law requires us to pay a different share, we will pay the share required by law.
15.6 30-day opt-out. You may opt out of this Section 15 within 30 days of first agreeing to these Terms by sending an email to [email protected] with the subject line "Arbitration Opt-Out" and including, in the body of the email, your name, the date you first agreed to these Terms, and a clear statement that you wish to opt out. If you opt out, neither you nor DormEats will be bound by Sections 15.1 through 15.5 with respect to disputes you bring against us, but the rest of these Terms (including the class action waiver in Section 15.3 as it relates to court proceedings, the governing law in Section 16, the time limit in Section 17, and the pre-suit notice in Section 18) will continue to apply.
16. Governing law and forum (for disputes not subject to arbitration)
These Terms and any Dispute arising out of or relating to them are governed by the laws of the State of California, without regard to its conflict-of-law principles. For any Dispute that is not subject to arbitration under Section 15 (including any small-claims action or any action brought after a valid opt-out), the exclusive jurisdiction and venue will be the state and federal courts located in Santa Barbara County, California, and you consent to the personal jurisdiction of those courts.
17. Time limit on claims
To the maximum extent permitted by law, any claim or cause of action arising out of or relating to these Terms or the Service must be filed within one (1) year after the event giving rise to the claim occurred, or it will be permanently barred.
18. Pre-suit notice and good-faith resolution
Before initiating any arbitration, lawsuit, or other formal proceeding against DormEats, you agree to first send a written notice of your claim to [email protected] that includes your name, a description of the claim, the relief you are seeking, and your contact information. We will have 30 days from our receipt of that notice to attempt to resolve the claim informally before you may initiate any formal proceeding. Compliance with this Section 18 is a condition precedent to filing any claim, and the one-year period in Section 17 is tolled during the 30-day notice window.
19. Termination
You may stop using the Service at any time. You can delete your DormEats data by tapping Settings → Start Over, by following the steps at /data-deletion, or by uninstalling the app. We may suspend or terminate your access to the Service at any time, with or without notice, including if we believe you have violated these Terms or to protect the Service. Sections 6, 7, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, and 18 will survive any termination.
20. Changes to these Terms
We may update these Terms from time to time. The updated Terms will be posted on this page with a new "Effective date". For material changes we will attempt to surface a notice in the app. By continuing to use the Service after a change takes effect, you accept the updated Terms.
21. Apple App Store additional terms
If you obtained the DormEats app from the Apple App Store, the following additional terms apply:
- These Terms are entered into between you and DormEats only, not with Apple. Apple is not responsible for the app or its content.
- Apple has no obligation to provide maintenance or support services for the app.
- If the app fails to conform to any applicable warranty, you may notify Apple and Apple will refund the purchase price (if any). To the maximum extent permitted by law, Apple has no other warranty obligation with respect to the app.
- We, not Apple, are responsible for addressing any claims by you or any third party relating to the app, including product liability claims, claims that the app fails to conform to legal or regulatory requirements, consumer protection claims, and intellectual property infringement claims.
- You must comply with the Usage Rules in Apple's then-current Media Services Terms when using the app.
- You represent that you are not located in a country subject to a U.S. Government embargo or designated as a "terrorist supporting" country, and that you are not listed on any U.S. Government list of prohibited or restricted parties.
- Apple and Apple's subsidiaries are third-party beneficiaries of these Terms and, upon your acceptance of these Terms, will have the right to enforce them against you.
22. Miscellaneous
These Terms, together with the Privacy Policy, are the entire agreement between you and us about the Service. If any provision of these Terms is held to be unenforceable, the remaining provisions will continue in full force and effect. Our failure to enforce any right or provision will not be a waiver of that right or provision. You may not assign these Terms; we may assign them to a successor in connection with a corporate transaction or reorganization.
23. Contact
Questions about these Terms? Email [email protected].