Community guidelines

1. Purpose and Scope

Gippea is a global map-based social media platform that enables users to create, discover, share, and interact with geography-linked videos, pictures, audio, comments, reactions, groups, routes, places, and social connections. These Community Guidelines explain what is and is not allowed so that users can participate safely, lawfully, respectfully, and authentically.

Because Gippea content is tied to real-world places, these guidelines apply not only to uploaded media and social interactions, but also to location tags, maps, pins, place pages, routes, geofenced communities, live location features, and any metadata that may reveal where people are, have been, or are likely to go.

2. Core Principles

• Safety: Users must not use Gippea to cause or coordinate physical, emotional, financial, or digital harm.
• Respect: Users must treat others with dignity and must not harass, bully, threaten, or abuse individuals or groups.
• Authenticity: Users must not mislead others about who they are, what content depicts, where content was captured, or whether media has been edited or generated.
• Privacy: Users must respect personal information, location privacy, private spaces, and the dignity of people who appear in media.
• Integrity: Users must not manipulate engagement, misrepresent public-interest events, or exploit map-based discovery systems.
• Legality: Users are responsible for complying with applicable laws in the places where they create, upload, view, and share content.

3. Content Formats Covered

These guidelines apply to all Gippea features, including videos, images, audio, captions, hashtags, map pins, place reviews, routes, comments, direct messages, group posts, profile information, usernames, reactions, recommendations, links, thumbnails, overlays, augmented location elements, and any automated or AI-assisted content submitted through the platform.

4. Location Safety and Map-Based Content

• Do not post, request, trade, or amplify another person’s real-time or private location without their consent.
• Do not use location tags, maps, pins, comments, or groups to stalk, target, intimidate, expose, or coordinate harm against any person, household, school, workplace, shelter, medical facility, religious site, or protected location.
• Do not falsely tag media to a location in a way that misleads users about emergencies, public safety risks, civic events, disasters, crime, migration routes, protests, or public-interest matters.
• Do not encourage trespass, unsafe exploration, dangerous travel, unlawful entry, interference with emergency services, or disruption of sensitive sites.
• Gippea may restrict or reduce visibility for precise geotags involving minors, private residences, shelters, medical facilities, schools, high-risk public events, endangered wildlife habitats, and locations where publication could create foreseeable harm.

5. Violence, Threats, and Criminal Harm

• Do not post direct threats, calls for violence, instructions to commit harm, praise for serious violence, or content that coordinates attacks, harassment, vandalism, looting, trafficking, exploitation, or other criminal conduct.
• Do not use Gippea to identify targets, publish routes for harmful activity, share surveillance of private individuals, or coordinate real-world confrontation.
• Graphic or violent content may be removed or age-restricted when it shocks, sensationalises, glorifies harm, or lacks clear public-interest context.
• Content documenting conflict, emergencies, accidents, or human-rights concerns must avoid encouraging harm and should include context where possible.

6. Harassment, Bullying, and Abusive Behaviour

• Do not target people with repeated insults, humiliation, unwanted sexualised attention, degrading comparisons, threats, blackmail, or coordinated abuse.
• Do not post content that reveals or threatens to reveal private information, including addresses, travel patterns, phone numbers, personal documents, or private medical, family, identity, or employment information.
• Do not encourage others to mass-report, swarm, review-bomb, contact, visit, or confront a person or business in bad faith.
• Location-enabled harassment is treated as a heightened-risk violation because it can connect online abuse to real-world safety risks.

7. Hate, Dehumanisation, and Protected Characteristics

Gippea does not allow content that attacks, dehumanises, excludes, threatens, or promotes violence or discrimination against people based on protected characteristics, including race, ethnicity, nationality, religion, caste, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, disability, age, immigration status, or serious medical condition. Users may discuss social issues, policy debates, history, or lived experience, but must not use those discussions to target people with abuse or calls for harm.

8. Child and Youth Safety

• Do not exploit, endanger, sexualise, shame, bully, groom, contact, or manipulate minors.
• Do not publish a minor’s precise location, school, routine, private contact details, or identifying information in a way that could expose them to harm.
• Do not encourage minors to share private information, meet strangers, undertake dangerous challenges, or access restricted locations.
• Content involving minors may be removed, restricted, or reported to appropriate authorities where Gippea identifies potential exploitation, coercion, trafficking, abuse, or imminent harm.
• Gippea may reduce precision or visibility of geotags attached to content featuring minors, even where the content does not otherwise violate these guidelines.

9. Privacy, Consent, and Personal Data

• Respect people’s privacy before recording, uploading, tagging, or sharing content that identifies them, their home, workplace, vehicle, travel route, private event, or sensitive personal circumstances.
• Do not post non-public personal information, private communications, medical details, financial data, identity documents, biometric data, or non-consensual intimate material.
• Do not use audio, images, video, AI tools, captions, or location metadata to impersonate, shame, blackmail, extort, or deceive others.
• Where local law requires consent to record, photograph, or publish, users are responsible for obtaining that consent.

10. Misinformation, Manipulated Media, and Public-Interest Events

• Do not post false or misleading content that is likely to cause real-world harm, interfere with civic processes, obstruct emergency response, promote dangerous medical claims, incite violence, or create panic about places, routes, disasters, public events, or safety conditions.
• Do not mislabel old footage as current, tag content to the wrong place to deceive users, fabricate emergency reports, or use edited or AI-generated media without appropriate context where users may reasonably be misled.
• Satire, commentary, education, documentary, scientific, artistic, and newsworthy content may be allowed when context is clear and the content does not create a foreseeable risk of harm.
• Gippea may add labels, reduce distribution, disable location amplification, or require additional context for high-impact map-based claims during crises, elections, public-health events, natural disasters, or civil unrest.

11. Authenticity, Identity, and Platform Manipulation

• Do not impersonate another person, organisation, public authority, emergency service, media outlet, or Gippea representative.
• Do not purchase, sell, or coordinate fake engagement, false reviews, artificial check-ins, deceptive location trends, bot activity, spam networks, or mass account creation.
• Do not misrepresent sponsorship, affiliation, authority, credentials, or commercial relationships.
• Accounts, groups, or pages that exist mainly to evade enforcement, spread scams, manipulate location discovery, or mislead users may be restricted or removed.

12. Scams, Fraud, Spam, and Deceptive Commercial Activity

• Do not use Gippea to run scams, phishing, malware distribution, fake giveaways, fraudulent investment schemes, deceptive job offers, counterfeit ticket sales, or misleading travel and accommodation offers.
• Do not misuse place pages, reviews, pins, groups, direct messages, or mapped recommendations for spam, undisclosed advertising, fake ratings, or manipulative promotion.
• Users offering goods or services must comply with all applicable consumer-protection, advertising, tax, licensing, and local trading laws.

13. Regulated, Illegal, and High-Risk Goods or Services

Users must not use Gippea to buy, sell, trade, solicit, advertise, or facilitate illegal goods or services, including illegal drugs, weapons, stolen property, counterfeit documents, trafficking, exploitation, or unlawful surveillance. Content involving regulated goods or services, such as alcohol, tobacco, gambling, pharmaceuticals, financial products, medical services, transport, accommodation, or location-based tours, must comply with applicable laws and Gippea feature restrictions.

14. Self-Harm, Dangerous Challenges, and Crisis Content

Gippea does not allow content that encourages, instructs, glorifies, or coordinates suicide, self-harm, eating-disorder behaviours, dangerous stunts, unsafe travel, trespass, or challenges likely to cause serious injury. Supportive recovery, prevention, awareness, and help-seeking content may be allowed when it avoids instructional details and does not romanticise harm.

15. Sensitive, Adult, and Graphic Content

• Do not post sexual exploitation, non-consensual intimate content, sexualised content involving minors, or content that appears to coerce, threaten, or abuse any person.
• Adult nudity, sexual content, and highly graphic imagery may be removed, age-restricted, or limited depending on context, local law, and user-safety risk.
• Medical, educational, artistic, documentary, or newsworthy content may be treated differently when the context is clear and the content does not exploit or endanger people.

16. Intellectual Property and Rights of Others

Users must only upload content they own, are authorised to use, or may lawfully share. Do not upload copyrighted music, video, images, maps, voice recordings, trademarks, or third-party materials without permission or another lawful basis. Gippea may remove content in response to valid intellectual-property reports and may restrict repeat infringers.

17. Local Laws, Cultural Context, and Global Availability

Gippea operates across jurisdictions. Content that is lawful in one place may be restricted in another, and Gippea may limit availability by geography where required by law, court order, regulatory obligation, safety assessment, or user-protection concern. Users should consider local rules before recording, tagging, publishing, or promoting location-based content.

18. Reporting, Review, and Enforcement

• Users can report content, accounts, groups, locations, place pages, comments, messages, or interactions that may violate these guidelines.
• Gippea may use a combination of user reports, automated systems, human review, trusted partners, and legal or safety signals to detect and assess potential violations.
• Enforcement actions may include warning labels, reduced distribution, removal of content, disabled comments, restricted location visibility, temporary feature limits, account suspension, account termination, referral to law enforcement, or other proportionate measures.
• Gippea may act more quickly where content creates imminent risk, involves minors, exposes precise private locations, coordinates violence, or threatens public safety.

19. Appeals, Mistakes, and Account Standing

Users may be able to appeal certain enforcement decisions through Gippea’s designated review process. Appeals should explain why the user believes the decision was incorrect and may include relevant context, rights information, or evidence of consent. Repeated or severe violations may affect account standing and can lead to longer restrictions or permanent removal.

20. Examples of Gippea-Specific Violations

21. User Responsibilities

• Think before posting: consider whether your content could identify, expose, mislead, or endanger someone.
• Add context where content is sensitive, historical, edited, AI-generated, staged, or location-based.
• Use privacy controls and location settings responsibly.
• Report content that may violate these guidelines instead of retaliating or escalating conflict.
• Respect enforcement outcomes and use appeal channels where available.

22. Updates to These Guidelines

Gippea may update these Community Guidelines to reflect new features, technologies, risks, legal requirements, safety guidance, and user feedback. The most current version will apply to platform activity unless Gippea states otherwise.