The Helm

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Terms of Use

The terms that apply when you use The Helm or create an account.

Effective date: 21 October 2026

1. About these terms

These Terms of Use (“Terms”) govern your use of The Helm, a personal and social accountability app supported through ayeaye.com.au (“we”, “us”). By using the app or creating an account, you agree to these Terms and to the Community Rules, which form part of them. If you do not agree, do not use the app.

This website provides product, support, privacy and account-deletion information. It is not the app and has no sign-in.

2. Your account

  • You must be 13 or older and legally able to agree to these Terms. A Junior sailor in a Family Convoy must also be 13 or older, and their Guardian must agree to these Terms on their behalf where the law requires a parent’s consent.
  • You can use The Helm without an account. If you create one, you are responsible for keeping access to your email and password secure and for activity under your account.
  • Keep your account information accurate and do not share, sell or transfer your account.
  • When you create an account, or before you first use convoys or signals, you are asked to confirm that you are 13 or older and that you agree to these Terms and the Community Rules. We record the version and the time you agreed.

3. Acceptable use and zero tolerance

You must follow the Community Rules. In particular, when using The Helm, you must not:

  • break the law or encourage another person to do so;
  • harass, threaten, bully, demean or abuse another person;
  • send or display hateful, sexually explicit, violent or otherwise objectionable or unlawful content, including in names;
  • impersonate another person or misrepresent an affiliation;
  • probe, scrape, overload, reverse engineer or disrupt the service or its security;
  • manipulate Merit, rank, Doubloons, passages, Convoy Objectives, Regattas, match races or convoy standings outside normal use of the app; or
  • use automated tools to access the service, create accounts or generate activity.

There is no tolerance for objectionable content or abusive users. We may remove content, and suspend or close an account that breaks these Terms or the Community Rules, without notice.

4. Convoys, signals and other people’s content

Convoys and Family Convoys are optional. Convoy members can see each other’s names, ships, ranks and progress, and the signals sent to them. Every member of a Family Convoy, including Junior sailors, must meet the age requirement in section 2.

  • Reporting. You can report a signal, a sailor, a ship’s name or a convoy’s name in the app. Reports go to our moderator, never to the person reported. We review every report within 24 hours and act on content and accounts that break the rules.
  • Blocking. You can block another sailor. They can no longer signal you or challenge you to a match race, you no longer see their signals, and they are not told.
  • Filtering. The service automatically refuses certain slurs and explicit words in names and signals. Filtering is not perfect: please report anything that gets through.
  • Removal and suspension. We may remove or replace content (a signal then reads “This signal was removed”, and a name is reset to “Sailor”, “Ship” or “Convoy”), and we may suspend an account from convoys, signals and challenges (it can still be used privately) or close it. We keep a record of reports and moderation decisions; see the Privacy Policy.
  • Leaving a convoy or Family Convoy, or being removed, ends your membership and keeps your own Log and progress.
  • Other sailors’ content is theirs, not ours. We don’t check content before it is shown, but we act on reports.

5. Your content

You own what you create, such as Duty names, Captain’s notes and messages. You give us a limited permission to store, process and display it only as needed to provide, secure, moderate and support The Helm. You are responsible for your content and must have the right to submit it.

6. Merit, Doubloons and other in-app values

  • Merit, levels, ranks, Doubloons and other rewards are features inside The Helm. They have no cash value and cannot be bought, sold, transferred, withdrawn or exchanged for money.
  • The service calculates these values and may correct them to fix an error or abuse.

7. Availability and changes

The Helm is in a closed test and is provided “as is” and “as available”. Access is by invitation and there is no public download. Features and rules may change as it is tested. We do not promise uninterrupted or error-free operation and may update, suspend or discontinue the service where reasonably necessary.

8. Signing out and deletion

Signing out does not delete your account, and your device keeps its Log. You can delete your account in the app at any time; see Delete your account. Reports you made, or that were made about you, may be kept as moderation records after deletion, as the Privacy Policy explains.

9. Intellectual property

The Helm, its marks, the app and website software, and the supplied artwork and design are owned by us or our licensors. Coastline data is from Natural Earth (public domain); other credits and licences are listed in the app under Ship’s Office → About The Helm. These Terms give you a personal, non-exclusive, non-transferable, revocable right to use the service for its intended purpose.

10. Disclaimer

The Helm supports personal habits and social accountability. It is not medical, psychological, health, financial or other professional advice, and it is not a substitute for professional care. Passages and charts are a game and are not for navigation. To the extent the law permits, the service is provided without warranties beyond those that cannot lawfully be excluded.

11. Liability and applicable law

To the extent permitted by law, we are not liable for indirect, incidental, special or consequential loss arising from use of The Helm, or for content posted by other users. Nothing in these Terms excludes, restricts or modifies a consumer guarantee, privacy right or other liability that cannot lawfully be excluded, restricted or modified. Applicable law continues to govern these Terms and your use of the service.

12. Contact and changes

Questions about these Terms, and urgent safety concerns, can be sent to support@ayeaye.com.au. If someone is in danger, contact emergency services first. We may update these Terms as the service changes; when we do, the app asks you to agree to the new version before you next use convoys or signals. The effective date at the top identifies the current version.