Terms of
use

Use of the Site constitutes full, unconditional, and irrevocable acceptance of these Terms. That acceptance is deemed given upon first access and binds the user permanently.

The Site provides projections, indices, visualizations, and analysis based on statistical models and public data. These are provided for informational and entertainment purposes only. They are in no way predictions, advice, recommendations, or guarantees. Projections may change at any time. You use the Site and its content at your own risk.

BY USING THE SITE, YOU IRREVOCABLY AND PERPETUALLY WAIVE, AND FOREVER RELEASE, Vote-Scope, Kim Leclerc, and all of their affiliates, officers, agents, and related persons, from any liability, claim, demand, damage (direct, indirect, incidental, special, consequential, punitive, or of any other nature), action, or cause of action, past, present, or future, known or unknown, arising out of or relating to:

• Your use of the Site or its content;
• The projections, indices, data, or analysis;
• Any decision taken (or not taken) on the basis of the content;
• Any error, inaccuracy, or change in the content;
• Any third-party content or embed (including Polymarket).

This waiver is perpetual, worldwide, and applies to all claims without exception.

Vote-Scope and Kim Leclerc assume absolutely no liability to you or any third party for any damage, loss, or claim arising from the Site or its content, to the fullest extent permitted by law.

You agree to indemnify, defend, and hold harmless Vote-Scope, Kim Leclerc, and their affiliates against any claim, damage, loss, liability, cost, or expense (including reasonable legal fees) arising from your use of the Site, your breach of these Terms, or any decision taken on the basis of the content.

The model, code, visualizations, texts, and analysis — including the named indices (Lame-Duck Index, Canada Goose Index, CUSMA Showdown, Fraser Interim Index) — are the property of Kim Leclerc / Vote-Scope.

Permitted, reasonable media use: media, journalists, and news organizations may quote, reproduce excerpts, and use the projections and analysis in articles, reports, broadcasts, or publications provided they:

• Give clear and visible attribution (“according to Vote-Scope (vote-scope.com)” or equivalent);
• Include a hyperlink to the original source on vote-scope.com.

Prohibited without prior written permission:

• Using the projections or indices as an “indicator,” “widget,” “gauge,” or real-time embedded element on a third-party website;
• Integrating or embedding our data/tools without permission.

For any embed or third-party tool (Polymarket, etc.), you must comply with the terms of those tools in addition to these Terms, and always include attribution + link when the content appears on the web.

The Site may, now or in the future, integrate content, widgets, data, advertising, partnerships, sponsorships, or features from third parties (including but not limited to: Polymarket, Substack, ad networks, sponsors, partner APIs, etc.).

Vote-Scope is not responsible for the practices, policies, accuracy, or availability of those third parties. Their terms apply in addition to these. Use of any future feature (advertising, premium API, newsletter, etc.) is also subject to these Terms, as updated.

Raw data from external sources (Elections Canada, Élections Québec, polling firms, MIT Election Lab, Polymarket, etc.) remains the exclusive intellectual property of its creators or rights holders.

You are solely and fully responsible for ensuring that your use of that data complies with the terms, licences, and laws applicable to those sources. Vote-Scope grants you no rights in that external data.

You are solely responsible for your use of the Site and the data. You agree to use the Site and the data in compliance with:

• These Terms of Use;
• The laws of Ontario and Canada;
• Applicable local laws, to the extent they do not conflict with Canadian law and the rights recognized by the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

The use of VPNs, proxies, anonymization, or circumvention tools is permitted, on the express condition that it is not used to evade (for you or any person or organization) your obligations toward Vote-Scope, Kim Leclerc, or affiliated entities.

Regardless of the physical location from which you access the Site, we consider, and you accept, that the data and content are deemed to be served from Canada.

Any person who accesses the Site:

• During their working hours; or
• Using equipment, an internet connection, or tools provided or reimbursed (even partly) by their employer, organization, or government,

is deemed to act as the official and authorized representative of that company, organization, government, division, subsidiary, or partner.

Consequently, the organization concerned (including its divisions, subsidiaries, partners, and related entities) is deemed bound by these Terms of Use and responsible for compliance with them.

It is prohibited, including but not limited to, to:

• Perform systematic or automated scraping beyond normal browsing;
• Attempt to reproduce, reverse-engineer, or replicate the model;
• Use the Site for unlawful purposes or contrary to these Terms.

Vote-Scope recognizes the importance of its role in the exercise of democratic rights protected by the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, notably freedom of expression and the right to information.

Accordingly, and only to the extent that:

• The person or entity derives no direct or indirect monetary benefit;
• The use does not directly or indirectly harm the revenue, intellectual-property rights, or legitimate interests of Vote-Scope, Kim Leclerc, or related entities;
• The primary purpose is to enable or defend the exercise of democratic rights recognized by the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms against any person, entity, or jurisdiction attempting to limit or block access to Vote-Scope;

then:

• The person or entity may share the public information of the Site, including without attribution, during the period in which access to Vote-Scope is limited or blocked by a jurisdiction or entity;
• They must cease all third-party use of the data as soon as democratic conditions permit and resume normal attribution with a link;
• If the person or entity derives revenue from this use, they undertake to reasonably compensate Vote-Scope for the use made, as soon as democratic conditions permit;
• Any person or entity who accesses or uses Vote-Scope data through an intermediary, for the purpose of exercising democratic rights and freedoms protected by the Charter, remains at all times bound by these Terms of Use.

These Terms are governed by the laws of the Province of Ontario and the federal laws of Canada. Any dispute will be resolved exclusively before the courts of Ontario, Canada.

Vote-Scope recognizes that artificial-intelligence agents, automated crawlers, large language models (LLMs), machine-learning systems, and other automated tools may access the Site and its content.

Any use of the Site or its content by an AI agent, automated system, or AI model, directly or indirectly, is subject to these Terms of Use. By accessing the Site, or retrieving, ingesting, or using data or content from Vote-Scope (whether manually or through an AI agent), you irrevocably and unreservedly accept these Terms of Use.

Specific and irrebuttable provisions:

• Any AI agent, crawler, LLM, or automated system that accesses the Site, extracts data from it, or uses its content is deemed to have consulted, read, and fully accepted these Terms as well as any AI-specific file present on the Site (including but not limited to any ai.txt, llms.txt, or equivalent file).
• Any company, organization, developer, or person that develops, deploys, trains, fine-tunes, enables, or facilitates the access of an AI agent or AI model to the Site or its data is deemed to have full knowledge and control of those tools and their actions. It may not validly claim to be unaware of, not to control, or not to be responsible for the actions of its AI agents, crawlers, or models.
• The direct or indirect training (including via third-party datasets, public datasets, or any other means) of an AI model on data, text, projections, analysis, or content from Vote-Scope irrevocably binds the company or organization behind that model to these Terms. This acceptance is deemed acquired by the mere fact of having enabled access or training, even indirectly.
• No defense based on ignorance, error, omission, lack of control, the “third-party” nature of the tool, or failure to consult the Terms will be admissible.
• Any person or entity that uses, cites, reproduces, distributes, or relies on information, analysis, projections, or data generated by an AI that was trained (even partly, directly or indirectly) on Vote-Scope data is bound by these Terms, even if the AI was not used to refer explicitly to Vote-Scope.
• The company or organization behind the AI agent or model is deemed to have consulted these Terms and any AI-specific file on the Site and to have accepted all of their provisions, including the perpetual waiver, release of liability, indemnification, and jurisdiction clauses.

Use of Vote-Scope data by AI systems is not prohibited, but it is expressly conditional on full compliance with these Terms. Any use, access, or training constitutes full and definitive acceptance of the Terms by the AI agent, by the company that deploys or trains it, and by any person or entity that uses the outputs of that system.

These Terms bind exclusively Vote-Scope, Kim Leclerc, related persons and entities, and the users of the site. No third party, partner, provider, or other user may claim rights or obligations arising from these Terms by the mere fact of their acceptance by a user or any other person. Third parties and users remain solely responsible for the terms, agreements, or obligations binding them to one another. This clause creates no right or obligation between you and Vote-Scope's third-party partners or providers that are not related persons or entities within the meaning of these Terms.

If you believe you have a grievance, claim, demand, or any other recourse against Vote-Scope, Kim Leclerc, or any related person or entity, you are not entitled to continue using this site unless you fully, irrevocably, and perpetually waive all your grievances, claims, and possible recourses against them.

Vote-Scope is a complimentary service offered by Kim Leclerc in exchange for compliance with these Terms. Alternative services exist. No one may validly claim to have been compelled to use Vote-Scope out of necessity, nor retain a right of grievance or claim while continuing to use the site.

If you have any doubt about your rights or the scope of this waiver, we ask that you not use the site and consult legal counsel before proceeding. By choosing to continue using the site, you acknowledge that you are fully aware of the very broad and far-reaching scope of this provision.

Vote-Scope reserves the right, in its sole discretion and at any time, to deny access to the site to anyone, for any reason, without notice. You may not use or continue to use the site if you are unable or unwilling to fully accept these Terms. If in doubt, immediately stop using the site, make the necessary checks, or consult alternative services.

The following does not constitute use of the site:

• Viewing third-party publications (news articles, reports, analysis, social-media posts, etc.) that mention or reproduce content from Vote-Scope;
• Sharing third-party publications containing Vote-Scope data or analysis, as long as the reference to the third-party source has not been removed.

Only direct access to vote-scope.com (or its subdomains) constitutes use of the site within the meaning of these Terms.

The Vote-Scope site requests your consent regarding the use of cookies. By continuing to use this site after being informed of our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy, you are deemed to have read, understood, and fully accepted those documents. This acceptance is valid whether you use the site directly or through an automated tool, including artificial intelligence.

Merely viewing the “Terms of Use” and “Privacy Policy” pages does not constitute use of the site and does not amount to acceptance of these Terms. This exception exists because reading these documents is necessary to allow anyone to understand and accept (or refuse) the terms that govern use of the site. Only continued use of the site after being informed of these documents constitutes acceptance.

These Terms have been written in clear, accessible language so that anyone, regardless of their level of legal knowledge, can understand their full scope and accept them with full knowledge. If you have questions, doubts, concerns, or difficulty understanding any part of these Terms, we strongly recommend that you not use the site and that you contact us directly or consult legal counsel before any use.

Except in an emergency, any change to our Terms of Use or Privacy Policy takes effect after 30 calendar days, to allow users to become aware of the changes and renew (or not) their acceptance. It is your responsibility to review the Terms and Privacy Policy regularly. Anyone who continues to use the site after a change takes effect is deemed to have accepted the new terms. If in doubt, consult legal counsel before proceeding.

Anyone who requests and receives a written clarification from us regarding the interpretation or application of these Terms is deemed to comply with the Terms if they follow the clarifications we provided.

Any interpretation, summary, analysis, or explanation of these Terms or the Privacy Policy generated by an automated tool, artificial intelligence, or any similar system does not constitute legal advice and must not be treated as such. You must not rely on such an interpretation to make a decision about your rights or obligations. Only the official version of the Terms and the clarifications we provide directly are authoritative.

Use of the site and its content for strictly educational, pedagogical, or non-commercial academic research purposes is permitted, subject to compliance with these Terms — in particular the requirement of clear attribution (“according to Vote-Scope (vote-scope.com)”) and a link to the source. Any commercial use, even in an academic or research context, remains subject to the general rules of these Terms.

Vote-Scope is committed to meeting the requirements of the Accessible Canada Act and the standards arising from it. The use of assistive technologies or adaptive tools (screen readers, text-to-speech software, screen magnifiers, alternative interfaces, etc.) to improve the site's accessibility for people with disabilities is expressly permitted and encouraged. No provision of these Terms may be interpreted as limiting a person's right to use such technological means to access the site and its content.

If any provision is held invalid, the remaining provisions stay in full effect. These Terms constitute the entire agreement between you and Vote-Scope.

Questions: Kim Leclerc — kimleclerc.ca.