Terms of Service for U.S. Operations

§ 1 General

(1) Stylink Social Media GmbH (hereinafter referred to as "stylink") offers an online platform under the domain stylink.com, which enables users of various social media channels (hereinafter referred to as an "influencer") to create product links for recommendations (also known as “affiliate links“) via the stylink Linkmaker and to publish them on the social media channels. These product links can be clicked on and used by interested parties (hereinafter referred to as "followers") to obtain product information and to make purchases from cooperation partners (“partners”).

(2) These General Terms and Conditions (“GTC”) constitute a binding agreement that regulates the use of the services (“services”) provided under the domain stylink.com, the use of the mobile applications of stylink, and the utilization of all other services provided by or through stylink (collectively, the “platform”).

(3) These GTC become part of the contractual agreements between stylink and the influencer. By clicking on the box and agreeing to these terms and conditions, each influencer hereby agrees to these GTC, approves them, and covenants and agrees to abide by them and to follow them in their entirety.

(4) The consent to these GTC is given by the influencer upon registration on stylink, and by clicking on the registration button.

§ 2 Registration, conclusion of the contract

(1) In order to use the services and platform of stylink, registration on the website under the domain stylink.com is necessary. The registration is carried out via the email address, a self-created password, name and social media account (in particular Instagram and YouTube) of the influencer.

(2) The influencer must be an individual, have full legal capacity to be bound by this GTC in its entirety and be at least eighteen years old. This is confirmed as part of the registration process.

(3) The influencer commits to create only one account on stylink.com.

(4) The influencer agrees that stylink may access parts of the influencer’s social media account that are relevant for the user relationship, and the influencer agrees to provide all access, passwords and other information and rights in order for stylink to have such access upon request.

(5) The influencer agrees that as part of the terms of the registration, stylink is permitted to display the contents of the influencer, as further described below.

(6) The use of stylink is free of charge for the influencer. There is no obligation to use stylink. Furthermore, every influencer is free to decide at any time whether, when and to what extent, the influencer wants to be active on stylink or whether the influencer wants to discontinue his/her/its activity.

(7) The Influencer must have a permanent residence as well as a bank account in Germany, Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, Austria, Switzerland, Ireland, United Kingdom, France or United States of America in order to be able to fully use the service and the platform. An influencer who does not fulfill these requirements cannot receive any payout of income earned via stylink.

(8) After registration, stylink has the sole and complete authority to determine whether the social media channel of the influencer and/or the influencer’s content visible are compatible with stylink and its business, operations and strategy and that of its partners (which determination may include an analysis based on the specifications and requirements of the online shops for which affiliate links may be used) and whether the influencer is allowed to use the platform for him/her/itself. An influencer with non-publicly visible social media accounts or empty accounts or accounts with no or minimal followers will generally not be compatible with stylink and its business. By registering with stylink, there is no automatic or guaranteed relationship and an influencer does not automatically have any claim or right to participate in the stylink platform. In addition, .

(9) Stylink reserves the right to exclude any influencer from the use of the platform, whether before or after any business relationship has started, or to to disable any user name, password, or other identifier, whether chosen by you or provided by us, at any time in our sole discretion for any or no reason, including if, in our opinion, you have violated any provision of these GTC.

(10) This GTC commences when the influencer registers for the platform and will continue in effect until terminated by the influencer or stylink. Influencer may terminate this GTC by terminating the account through the platform. Stylink may terminate this GTC at any time without notice. In addition, this GTC will terminate immediately and automatically without any notice if you violate any of the terms and conditions of this GTC. Upon termination, all rights granted to you under this GTC will also terminate; however, termination will not limit any of stylink’s rights or remedies at law or in equity, and those provisions that are intended to survive termination shall so survive.

§ 3 Description of service

An influencer has the opportunity to earn money with stylink. The influencer is paid for each unique click of a follower for a product that has been recommended by the influencer and for which the follower has clicked the relevant affiliate link. Unique clicks explicitly exclude click fraud, double clicks, clicks that do not originate from the United States of America, clicks as a result of so-called click baits, clicks as a result of incentives that do not correspond to any recommendation, as well as clicks that are not based on an intention to purchase or obtain information. The provisions of Section 5(5)(a) and (b) of these GTC apply to click fraud.

The amount of income generated by an influencer that complies with these GTC depends on a number of factors, including the payment conditions and requirements that stylink is provided by its partners. The Linkmaker contains the option to create specific, platform-dependent affiliate links (currently for Instagram and YouTube). These links may only be used and posted on the respective platform. An influencer can obtain the amount of the respective click price for the respective platforms in the stylink Linkmaker, but those prices are based only on the presumption that affiliate links will be correctly used and coded, and with the appropriate platform. Stylink reserves the right to set the compensation for fraudulently used affiliate links to zero.

§ 4 Transfer of rights of use

By using stylink, each influencer hereby transfers a non-exclusive, remuneration-free, comprehensive right of use, limited to the duration of the contractual relationship, to the photos, texts, illustrations, images, videos and other content made accessible by the influencer in the social media profiles, without limitation, for the purpose of duplication, editing and making publicly accessible on stylink.

The non-exclusive right of use also includes all trademarks, registered trademarks, copyrights, work titles, other similarly identifying brandings or works that an influencer transmits to stylink. The use is always limited to the purpose of these GTC.

§ 5 Rights and obligations

(1) Each influencer assures, and by using stylink each represents, warrants and covenants that she/he/it has provided and will provide true and complete information at registration and shall promptly update that information thereafter as appropriate. stylink reserves the right to exclude any influencer from using the platform if stylink discovers or otherwise is aware of any untrue or incomplete information provided to stylink with respect to such influencer.

(2) An influencer is not authorized to, and agrees not to, transmit or otherwise provide her/his/its stylink access data and passwords to third parties. Should third parties gain access to the stylink account of an influencer or the influencer suspects that an influencer stylink account has been misused, the influencer agrees to contact stylink immediately and the influencer agrees that she/he/it must change her/his/its access data and passwords.

(3) Each influencer must refrain, and agrees to refrain, from any activity or action or inaction that endangers or disturbs the operation and functionality of stylink. Each influencer agrees not to take any action or inaction that negatively affects the business relationship between stylink and the influencer.

(4) Each influencer represents, warrants and covenants that: (a) the influencer’s content shall be wholly original and not copied in whole or in part from any other work except materials in the public domain or supplied to influencer by stylink, and (b) neither the content nor the use thereof infringes upon or violates any right of privacy or publicity of, or constitutes libel, slander or any unfair competition against, or infringes upon or violates the copyright, trademark rights or other intellectual property rights of any person or entity.

In particular, each influencer is prohibited from, and agrees not to:

violate the rights of third parties, in particular copyrights, personal rights, trademark rights, company rights, and other similar rights,
offend common decency, make statements or choose a particular username that violates the religious feelings of others or are racist, sexist, or discriminatory in any manner,
use the e-mail address or Internet address as their username,
use social media accounts that are not owned by the influencer,
use, post, publish or link to any insulting or defamatory content on any third party website, whether or not such content affects other participants or other persons or companies,
(1) use, post or publish political, immoral, pornographic, morally reprehensible, offensive, violent, violence glorifying, sexist, right-wing or left-wing extremist content or content that violates any applicable laws, or (2) link to corresponding material on a third party website or (3) advertise, offer or distribute pornographic products or products that violate laws, in particular youth protection laws,
in any way violate any applicable federal, state, local, or international law or regulation (including, without limitation: (a) any laws regarding the export of data or software to and from the US or other countries, or (b) the Federal Trade Commission’s Guides Concerning Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising),
harass other influencers unreasonably (e.g., by spam), in particular by sending unsolicited messages, advertising or for other commercial or industrial purposes without the legally effective consent of the recipient,
publish, reproduce, make publicly available or distribute content protected by law (e.g., by copyright, trademark, patent, design or utility model law) without being entitled to do so,
engage in or promote anti-competitive activities, including progressive customer acquisition (such as chain, snowball or pyramid schemes, or multi-level marketing),
ask other influencers to provide personal data for commercial or illegal purposes or to provide their access data,
reproduce a picture of another person or make it publicly accessible without the written consent of the person concerned,
use our affiliate links on TikTok.

(5) stylink reserves the right to remove the content of any influencer from marketing in whole or in part and to delete the content (and remove the influencer from the stylink platform) if there are indications that the influencer violates:

- these GTC or legal requirements,

- the guidelines of social media providers,

- the guidelines of stylink partners, or

- in our good faith opinion, the guidelines of stylink partners.

(6) Each influencer is prohibited from committing click fraud. Click fraud occurs if a click on a product link is made without the intention of information or purchase behind this click. A distinction is made between manual and automatic click fraud.

(a) Manual click fraud

The influencer or another person clicks on the respective product links on their own behalf.

(b) Automatic click fraud

A special program (a so-called “click bot”), takes over the clicking of the product link instead of a human being.

(c) Purchased interactions
Interactions with posts in which stylink-links are used are purchased from third party vendors and various people use them based on that. These can be link-clicks in particular.

(7) If there are indications of violations against this Section 5 of these GTC, stylink is entitled to delete the influencer's stylink account and block it from any further use of the stylink platform. In addition, stylink reserves the right, to the fullest extent permitted by applicable law, not to pay to the relevant influencer any remuneration that she/he/it has fraudulently or inappropriately achieved (but has not yet been paid) as well as to report possible fraud to any authorities.

§ 6 Remuneration

(1) In order to be paid any remuneration by stylink, an influencer must achieve gross revenues through stylink.com of at least US$10, the compliance with the requirements contained in Section 2(7) of these GTCs, compliance with all of the anti-abuse provisions of these GTCs (including compliance with Section 5 of these GTCs) and the payment request of the influencer directed to stylink.

(2) The settlement of the amounts earned through clicks will be initiated by stylink within two full working days after the influencer's request. Thereafter, the payment of the amounts will be made by the relevant bank in accordance with the relevant bank’s usual terms for bank transfers. The influencer must, in advance of requesting any payment, enter and save her/his/its bank details in her/his/its account in order to be paid.

(3) Each influencer is responsible for all applicable taxes, including income taxes for her/him/itself.

(4) If you exceed the payout limit of $600 per year, you will receive the W9-form about your withholding tax that you need to fill out digitally and return to us. Once we receive your completed W9-form, the payout process will be continued.

§ 7 Warranty

(1) stylink does not promise or warrant that its website or consent will be error-free nor that its website will provide uninterrupted usability in whole or in part. stylink, like any other website, may have technical difficulties or periods where it is offline or all or part of the website is non-operational. Each influencer agrees that it has no, will not have any, claim or right against stylink for the content or usability of stylink.com or its platform.

(2) EXCEPT FOR ANY EXPRESS WARRANTIES UNDER THIS AGREEMENT, STYLINK HEREBY DISCLAIMS ANY AND ALL OTHER WARRANTIES, INCLUDING THE IMPLIED WARRANTY OF MERCHANTABILITY AND IMPLIED WARRANTY OF FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.

(3) stylink provides no assurances or guarantees that any affiliate link contains correct data acquisition. Affiliate links are provided by the affiliates, and stylink has no liability if those affiliate links are incorrect or coded incorrectly.

§ 8 Liability

(1) To the fullest extent permitted by law, stylink (and its affiliates, partners, clients, agents and representatives) shall be liable only for its gross negligence or willful misconduct. The liability of stylink shall in any case be limited to damages which were caused directly by stylink or its legal representatives by their gross negligence.

TO THE FULLEST EXTENT PROVIDED BY LAW, IN NO EVENT WILL THE COMPANY, ITS AFFILIATES, OR THEIR LICENSORS, SERVICE PROVIDERS, EMPLOYEES, AGENTS, OFFICERS, OR DIRECTORS BE LIABLE FOR DAMAGES OF ANY KIND, UNDER ANY LEGAL THEORY, ARISING OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH YOUR USE, OR INABILITY TO USE, THE WEBSITE, ANY WEBSITES LINKED TO IT, ANY CONTENT ON THE WEBSITE OR SUCH OTHER WEBSITES, INCLUDING ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, SPECIAL, INCIDENTAL, CONSEQUENTIAL, OR PUNITIVE DAMAGES, WHETHER CAUSED BY TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE), BREACH OF CONTRACT, OR OTHERWISE, EVEN IF FORESEEABLE. NOTWITHSTANDING ANYTHING TO THE CONTRARY SET FORTH HEREIN, TO THE FULLEST EXTENT PROVIDED BY LAW, IN NO EVENT WILL THE COLLECTIVE LIABILITY OF STYLINK AND ITS SUBSIDIARIES AND AFFILIATES, AND THEIR LICENSORS, SERVICE PROVIDERS, EMPLOYEES, AGENTS, OFFICERS, AND DIRECTORS, TO ANY PARTY (REGARDLESS OF THE FORM OF ACTION, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, TORT, OR OTHERWISE) EXCEED THE GREATER OF US $100 OR THE AMOUNT THE COMPANY HAS BEEN PAID AS A RESULT OF YOUR ACTIVITIES ON THE PLATFORM IN THE LAST 12 MONTHS OUT OF WHICH LIABILITY AROSE.

2) In particular, stylink assumes no responsibility or liability for any damage caused by or related to any external influence or outside persons or factors on the stylink system or affiliate’s systems or during the process of data transmission.

(3) stylink may from time to time provide to an influencer information, advice and recommendations. Such provision is only to its knowledge and only in its sole discretion. A contractual obligation for stylink to provide any influencer with information, advice or recommendations does not exist and is expressly waived. Information, advice and recommendations can (if provided) be a picture or text, regardless of whether such information, advice or recommendations are publicly accessible (e.g., on the websites under domain stylink.com) or may be given to the influencer personally. stylink is not liable to any influencer for any damage resulting from or arising out of any such information, advice or recommendation, unless such liability results from the gross negligence of stylink.

(4) An influencer may be directly liable to third parties in the event the influencer violates the rights of third parties. Each influencer commits her/him/itself and agrees to compensate stylink for any and all damages and liabilities in the event the influencer violates the rights of third parties or which arise due to the breach of these GTCs by the influencer.

(5) Each influencer hereby releases and agrees to hold harmless stylink from any and all claims and liabilities which other influencers or other third parties may assert against stylink due to or based upon or arising out of the alleged infringement by such influencer of other influencers’ or other third parties’ rights, whether through content posted by influencers, due to the infringement by influencer of obligations in another manner or otherwise. The influencer also agrees to pay the costs of the necessary legal defense of stylink including all court and lawyer's fees and expenses.

(6) Except as otherwise set forth in this Section 8, stylink shall not be liable to any influencer for any damages or liability, for any reason.

§ 9 Notes on data processing

(1) stylink collects and stores personal data of the influencer as part of, among other things, the registration and initial agreement with the influencer. In addition, stylink collects and stores data from the influencer’s social media channels.

(2) Any data transmitted in connection with the registration as a stylink influencer can be managed, changed or deleted by the influencer in her/his/its account. The influencer may delete her/his/its stylink user account at any time without giving any reason by sending an email to influencer@stylink.com.

(3) The collected, personal data of each influencer will be stored as long as it is necessary to fulfill the contract or other business relationship between the influencer and stylink, unless legal retention periods require storage beyond that.

(4) In all other respects, with regard to the collection, processing and use of data, reference is made to stylink’s privacy policy, which can be accessed at any time at https://www.stylink.com/us/privacy-policy.

(5) stylink.com may contain advertisements of third parties that use content provided by Rakuten Advertising. For more information about the data collected and used and your related rights with respect to Rakuten Advertising, please visit https://rakutenadvertising.com/legal-notices/services-privacy-policy/. stylink accepts no responsibility for any actions, omissions or services taken or provided by Rakuten Advertising.

§ 10 Final provisions

(1) These GTCs and any dispute between stylink and the influencer shall be governed by and construed in accordance with German law. Any dispute between stylink and the influencer shall be resolved in a court of competent jurisdiction located in Münster, Germany. This jurisdiction is the exclusive venue to bring a dispute between stylink and the influencer.

(2) The rights and obligations from this contractual relationship are only transferable or assignable with the written consent of the other contractual party.

(3) Claims from this contractual relationship may only be assigned with stylink’s written consent.

(4) stylink reserves the right to change, amend and adapt these GTC at any time and from time to time. Changes will be disclosed to the influencer in writing. An influencer may object in written or via email within two weeks of notification of the changes. To the fullest extent permitted by applicable law, if an influencer does not object within such two week period, then the changes disclosed to the influencer shall be deemed agreed. In addition, any subsequent, further use of stylink after changes to these GTC are disclosed to the influencer will be considered as an automatic agreement to the changed GTC.

(5) Should individual provisions of these GTC be or become completely or partially invalid or should there be a gap in these GTC, the validity of the remaining provisions shall not be affected. In place of an invalid provision, the valid provision shall be deemed agreed upon which comes closest to the purpose of the invalid provision. In the event of a gap, that provision shall be deemed agreed which corresponds to what would have been agreed in accordance with the economic purpose of these GTC if the parties had considered this circumstance from the outset.

(6) Oral collateral agreements do not exist. Amendments or supplements to these GTC - including this written form clause - must be made in writing.