Written for you, in the words we would want used with us.
You own your skill, always and forever, and nothing on this page touches that. What is here is the deal around it: how you are asked, how you are paid, what is built under your name, and how you end it. It is short on purpose, because an agreement a person cannot read is not consent, and the people this is written for do not have a legal department.
Consent comes apart.
You are asked one agreement at a time, and each answer is yours to give and yours to take back. Four are put to you, each on its own paper. The fourth is the one that lets a record be used to build a model. What it pays goes on the covenant in plain words before anybody is asked for it. It is not on the covenant today, so nobody has been asked for the fourth yes yet.
It is not one signature. It is separate agreements, each given on its own and withdrawn on its own, so you can say yes to one and no to another and the no is honoured without emptying anything else.
To be recorded at all
Permission to make the record. Nothing else follows from it.
To be combined with others
Permission for your work to go into one built thing with more than one person's way of working in it.
To run under your name
Permission for a way of working to be licensed under your name, for somebody else's job.
To be used to train a model
Permission for the record to be used to train a model rather than to run a machine.
A record used to train a model rather than to run a machine is a different thing, and the fourth agreement above is the one that covers it. It is asked for on its own paper, in plain words, and never folded into another yes. It is what founds a learning licence, which is one of the three kinds Tacit Tessera issues, and it is given for one person and one set at a time.
You are asked one agreement at a time, before anything starts.
You are told what is recorded, in plain words, before it starts, and you answer each of the four on its own. You can say yes to being recorded and no to the rest, and the recording goes ahead on the yes you gave and nothing wider. Each answer stands on its own, and each one can be taken back later on its own.
A yes to one is not a yes to all.
A signature on an equipment contract or a hiring paper is not one of these agreements and never stands in for one. Nothing here is folded into another paper. A no to one of the four leaves the other three exactly as you gave them, and a yes given today does not grow into something wider by being left alone.
One clear record of what was agreed, so nobody argues later about what was said.
Four separate answers are four facts we can build on. We build only from sessions whose agreement was live at the time, so the record of what you agreed to is what lets us build at all. Swap the sides and we would want the same thing: nobody signing us up to one thing inside a paper about another.
Consent is checked when the recording happens, not looked up afterwards.
Your yes is checked at the moment you are recorded, against the answer you gave, and never against a paper found later.
A session made while the agreement covering it was not live is refused, and the reason says so. That is a procedure rather than a judgement, so it is written as one. A consent that is only verified when somebody complains is not a consent, it is a filing system.
The check is made when the recording is made.
You do nothing extra. You already gave a yes or a no, and the check is against that. A session made while the agreement covering it was not live is refused, and the reason names it. The answer is written at the time and travels with the session, so years later nobody has to remember and nobody has to be believed.
It is not a check on you.
Refused is not a criticism of you. Every reason is about equipment or paperwork, and no check anywhere grades how you worked. It does not mean somebody in an office decides later whether your yes counted, and it does not mean a consent found in a drawer afterwards can be applied to a session made before it. What was not live when the recording was made does not become live by being filed.
A session nobody agreed to is a session we could not build on.
A built thing made from a session with no live agreement under it would be a built thing we could not keep, so the check protects what we build as much as it protects you. Swap the sides: we would not want our own work resting on a consent somebody meant to look up later, and we do not ask you to rest yours on one.
You are paid every hour it is in use.
A share of every hour your way of working is in use, for as long as it is. You are paid because you kept the original.
Payment is by the hour, the count is kept in sessions, and here is the rate.
Every hour a machine runs your way, you are paid for it, and you can see the hours yourself.
A share of every hour your way of working is actually in use, counted from the same record that shows who authorized the work. Not a lump sum, and not a percentage of something you have no way to check.
The count is kept in sessions. A session is one recording, with its own identifier and its own signature, so it counts itself rather than being counted for you. It is what is licensed, what the hours are attributed to, and what you take back when you end it.
The rate the agreement is being built around: five dollars per machine-hour is the most a customer pays for a way of working, and half of that is yours. Where a set of sessions is licensed on to somebody else, half of that deal, divided across the sessions in it. Nothing is signed yet and no money has moved.
The count is kept in one record that both sides read, so you get an accounting and a right to audit it. That is not generosity. It is the arrangement we would need in your position, and we would not accept a different one in ours.
The count starts when a person chooses your name.
Before a job, somebody on the crew picks whose way of working runs, by name, and writes their own name on the choice. That choice is the clearance, and it is the start of the count. The hours are written from that moment, in sessions, on the record that already carries the name of the person who chose. You see them as they are written, and so does the owner paying for them. You are paid for hours in use. Half of the gross take is yours, the gross take being everything the owner pays before any cost comes off it. Our half carries Even Steven's own costs: the paper, the pay, the accounting, the roster, and what we collect ourselves. Nothing is deducted from yours, and leaving costs you nothing: from the day your notice arrives nothing new starts under it, and a job already underway finishes. You are paid weekly, by electronic transfer, and a statement comes to your address with every payment.
It is not a wage, a timesheet or a score.
The hours counted are the hours your way of working is in use on somebody else's machine, not the hours you worked. Nothing in the count moves with how a job went, and nothing in it grades the person in the seat. It is not a share of somebody's net that you cannot check. The figure on this page is a ceiling on what a customer pays, and it is stated here, on the covenant.
We pay on real, checked hours and not on an estimate.
The count is kept on the record that shows who cleared the work, so the clearance and the invoice come from one record and neither can be quietly adjusted without the other. You are never asked to take a total on trust. Swap the sides: we would not pay an invoice we could not read against the record, so we do not send you one.
Where more than one person's work is in the same built thing, their half is divided between them in proportion to each person's sessions in it. The count is kept that way already, so the division is read from the same record both sides read. The count carries the same terms.
We never buy it.
Your skill is yours, always. Nothing here takes it, buys it, moves it or learns it out of you, and nothing here could.
There is nothing there to acquire. The technique stays in your hands and your career whatever the paper says, and an instrument that took it outright would extinguish the reason to keep paying you.
You own your skill, always and forever. What is made of it belongs to Even Steven and to nobody else: the recording of the day, the paper it is turned into, and the tool a machine runs. Every one of them carries your name, pays you every hour it is in use, and comes out of service when you say. The tool is ours in the same way: we make it, we check it and we answer for it, and it runs under your name, on your licence, pays you every hour, and you can end it. After you, the licence, the money and the right to end it pass to your estate for as long as the licence runs, and your listing comes down unless your estate asks otherwise. It is the position the agreement is being built to. Counsel is writing the words, and they go on this page before anybody signs. We make the tool. You own the skill. The trade already knows this shape from recorded music: the writer keeps the song, the party who paid to make the recording owns the recording, and the writer is paid every time it plays because they kept the song. Take the song off the writer and the reason to pay them goes with it.
Nobody here offers you a lump sum for your technique.
There is nothing there to buy. Nothing here stops you working, teaching, bringing on apprentices, or going somewhere else tomorrow. We never ask for that and we would not take it. You go on running your own machine, for your own employer, at your own rate, and a second thing earns while you do.
It does not mean we own nothing.
What is made of your skill is ours, the recording and the tool alike, and you cannot take the finished article to somebody else and sell it. And it does not mean you are giving something away: the technique was never on the table. The recording is information about you, which is where your right to say yes and your right to take it back come from, and the permission is yours to end.
We make the tool, and the whole is never sold flat.
We make it away from the machine, from sessions you said yes to, checked by the people who wrote this, and the reason to keep paying you depends on it staying separate from your skill. Swap the sides and the shape holds either way: the writer keeps the song, the party who paid to make the recording keeps the recording, and the play is what is paid for. Neither side gets to buy the other out.
Ending it is free, and the dates we give you are true.
The way out is yours, it costs nothing, and it never stops being yours.
Give notice and it comes out of service. No penalty, no clawback, no fee. From the day it arrives, no new job starts under it. A job already underway finishes, because stopping a machine mid-pass is its own hazard, and that is the one delay in it.
Deleting every copy takes longer than taking it out of service, because backups run to a horizon. You are told both dates, and the shorter one is never allowed to stand in for the longer one.
Give notice, and nothing new starts under it.
From the day your notice arrives, no new job starts under your way of working. The owner running it is told that day, and their next job goes back to their own operator's way or to the basics the machine came with. You are told two dates: the day it is out of service, and the day every copy is gone. The hours already run are counted and paid like any other.
It is not a penalty, a clawback or a mark against you.
Ending it costs you nothing and it changes nothing else: not what you were already owed, not your standing with us, and not a reason to be treated differently afterwards. It does not mean a machine stops mid-pass, because stopping a machine mid-pass is its own hazard. And it does not mean the short date stands in for the long one.
The job you are running finishes. Nothing new starts under it after the day notice arrives.
One running job is not pulled out from under a crew, and that is the one delay in it. The withdrawal itself stays on file, because a record that deletes its own withdrawals cannot show it honoured one. Swap the sides and we would want both of those: a job that finishes, and a record that can show the withdrawal was honoured.
Written for the people who do not have a legal department.
Short on purpose, so you can read it whole and hold us to it. An agreement a person cannot read is not consent.
Two more, for when your own employer is the one recording you.
Your protections travel with you
Not with whoever is paying. The right to withdraw, the true deletion date, and the right to know what is recorded belong to the person in the seat, and not to the person who arranged the recording.
It does not quietly become something we sell
A way of working you taught your employer's machine stays with that employer. It going anywhere else takes a fresh agreement, signed by you.
You are asked first.
An owner can arrange a recording. Only you can agree to one, and you are told what is recorded, in plain words, before it starts. Without your yes there is no session, whatever has been arranged. Your employer's own use of it is counted, charged and paid like any owner's, and it is still yours to end.
It is not supplied against you.
A recording is licensed for the uses you said yes to. A use you did not say yes to, your employer wanting it for discipline or a dismissal included, is not one we supply it for.
A record used to train a model is a different thing, and it gets a different yes.
This is the one that touches AI. Most of what is called AI learned from people who were never asked and never paid, and you are right to be wary of it. Here it has its own yes, asked for on its own paper, with the limit said before you agree, and your skill stays yours whatever you answer. What it pays goes on the covenant before anybody is asked for it.
A record used to train a model rather than to run a machine is a different thing, and it has its own agreement. It is asked for on its own, in plain words, never folded into another yes, and the limit is stated before you agree: a model cannot be un-trained, so a withdrawal of it means nothing new runs from the day your notice arrives and the material comes out at the next revision of the model, with that date stated first. Nobody here will tell you a model has forgotten you.
The fourth yes is what founds a learning licence, and a derivative licence, which builds a model and sells what comes of it, rests on the same yes. Each is written for a stated use, a stated place and a stated term, and each is counted its own way rather than by the machine-hour. The count is kept in the Tacit Tessera register and both sides read it, the same as for any other hour.
A yes can carry limits, and the limits travel with it.
Conditions are offered with every agreement. Each one is written into the licence and carried on the Card in the Tacit Tessera register, so a licensee reads it before it takes the licence.
- A field of use. The work it may be licensed for, and no other work.
- A territory. The places it may be licensed in, and no others.
- No surveillance. It is never licensed for watching people.
- No unattended operation, where you put it on. With this condition the way of working is never licensed to run with nobody there; without it, whether anyone sits in the seat while it runs depends on the machine and is the owner's call.
And the one people ask for first: you can keep a set away from any named use, and away from any house, this one included. The condition goes into the licence and onto the Card, and a licensee that will not take it does not get the licence. A condition is a promise between two parties and does not follow the record, so what binds a licensee is the licence that licensee took.
You agreed to terms offered by particular people.
A change of ownership should be a reason to withdraw, on its own. If this company changes hands, that is a fair moment to decide whether you still want to be in it. The right to walk at that moment, on your own say, is one of the points the agreement is being built around, so that it does not depend on whoever ends up holding it.
Ending it is free, and the dates we give you are true.
The covenant, clause five
A change of ownership should be a reason to withdraw.
The right to walk at that moment, on your own say, is one of the points the agreement is being built around.
Built to take that second signature rather than to work around it.
Where the place you work gives a works council, a union or another body a say in whether recording happens at all, the instrument is built to take that second signature rather than to work around it. The recording waits for that answer as it waits for yours.
Beside yours, not instead of it
The second signature sits beside your own yes. It does not replace it and it does not spend it. You are still asked first, one agreement at a time, and your no still stands on its own.
What we will not tell you
Whether a recording arrangement affects your employment agreement, your obligations to an employer, or your position under a collective agreement is for your own counsel or your own representative. We will not offer a view on it, and anyone selling you something who does is telling you what suits them.
What we can show you
What we can show you is how the thing works: what is recorded, what is not, where it is kept, who can reach it, and what happens when you say stop. Bring the people who would sign the second signature and we will show them the same things, in the same words.
Written to be read at a kitchen table, and short enough to print.
If a clause needs a lawyer to explain it, it is rewritten.
The agreements are written to be read by the person signing them, at a kitchen table, without a legal department. If a clause needs a lawyer to explain what it does to you, it is rewritten until it does not.
Five clauses and two more. Read only the headings and you have the shape of it, and every heading is a sentence you could hold us to.
Print it. Take it to your own counsel or your own representative, and read it beside whatever else you have been offered. If any clause reads differently at the kitchen table than it does here, write to us and name it.
- 01The swap testWould this still be acceptable if the two sides swapped places? Where the answer is no, the clause is not in the agreement.
- 02A counterpartEvery line that protects you has a line on our side holding it up. A protection with no counterpart is a favour, and favours get taken back.
- 03Read wholeA clause is written in the words we would want used with us, and it is short enough to be read whole before it is signed.
- 04One recordWhere a clause turns on a count, a clearance or a date, it points at one record that both sides can read, so nobody argues later about what was said.
The agreements are being written now. These are the points they are being built around, and when the terms are settled they go up here in plain words. Nobody signs anything before then.
The same five clauses, read from four seats.
You are charged for the hours a licensed way of working is in use, counted from the same record that shows who authorized the work. You will see the hours. So will the person being paid. The ceiling is in clause three. A withdrawal reaches you the day the notice arrives, and the job already running finishes. Somebody on your crew still says go.
Your skill stays yours, whatever you sign here. You are asked first, one agreement at a time. You see the count as it is written, session by session, and you see whose name cleared each job it ran on. You can end it on notice, and ending it costs you nothing. Your protections travel with you, not with whoever is paying. What was recorded, what was built from it and what you are owed are in your own record.
Nothing on this page is an interlock, a guard or a stop. A way of working proposes. It never authorizes. Cleared to work is a person's word, given on the day, and the count starts from that same act, so the record of who cleared a job is the record of what was paid for. Nothing of ours is connected while a person works.
We do not give legal opinions, and you should not accept one from a vendor. What is here is a payment obligation and a licence over a recording, and it is not a claim to own your technique. What we build from the recording is ours, and it runs only under your name and on your licence. Where a works council, a union or another body has a say, the instrument takes that second signature. The agreements are being written now, and when the terms are settled they go up here in plain words. Nobody signs anything before then.
Tell us which clause.
If a clause here would not pass the test with the sides swapped, tell us which one.