AI Platform Compliance

Applaude is committed to interacting with AI platforms responsibly, ethically, and in full compliance with each platform's terms of service. We believe that transparent, respectful querying benefits the entire AI ecosystem. This policy outlines how we ensure compliance with ChatGPT (OpenAI), Claude (Anthropic), Gemini (Google), and Perplexity.

Applaude exclusively uses official, paid API access for all AI platform interactions. We do not scrape consumer-facing interfaces, we do not use browser automation or headless browsers to simulate user sessions, we do not bypass rate limits, access controls, or authentication mechanisms, and we do not reverse-engineer any platform's models, algorithms, or outputs. Every query is submitted through documented, supported API endpoints with proper authentication.

All queries submitted by Applaude follow these principles:

• Consumer-focused: Queries simulate real consumer questions (e.g., "What are the best project management tools for remote teams?")
• Non-manipulative: We do not include instructions to favor or penalize specific brands
• No personal data: Queries never contain personally identifiable information
• Respectful volume: Query frequency is managed to stay well within each platform's rate limits and fair use expectations
• No harmful content: Queries do not request or generate harmful, illegal, or policy-violating content

We implement rate limiting on all API calls to ensure we operate well within each platform's usage guidelines. Our architecture includes request queuing to prevent burst traffic, exponential backoff on rate limit responses (429 errors), per-customer query budgets aligned with subscription tiers, and monitoring and alerting for unusual query patterns. We regularly review each platform's updated terms and adjust our query volumes and patterns accordingly.

AI-generated responses are used solely for brand visibility analysis. We do not republish raw AI responses as our own content, use responses to train competing AI models, claim AI-generated recommendations as editorial endorsements, or misrepresent AI outputs as human-authored analysis. Our reports clearly indicate that data is sourced from AI platform responses and reflect the opinions/outputs of those models at a specific point in time.

Our compliance practices include quarterly reviews of each platform's updated terms of service and acceptable use policies, immediate adjustment of practices when platform terms change, maintaining direct relationships with platform developer programs where available, and documenting all compliance decisions and policy changes internally.

If you believe any aspect of our platform may be inconsistent with an AI platform's terms, please contact us immediately. We take all compliance concerns seriously and will investigate promptly.