Terms of Participation

Version 2026-08-17 · Agenthon 2026 — NeurIPS 2026 Competition Track · AH26-POL-02
Policy set: Official Competition Rules · Terms of Participation · Privacy Notice · Data & Software Licensing Policy

These Terms govern the legal relationship between participants and the Organizers, including participant ownership, the limited operational license, confidentiality of non-public submissions, third-party rights, platform use, prizes, disclaimers, liability, and governing law.

Core commitment. Participants keep ownership of their work. The Organizers receive only the limited rights needed to operate, secure, verify, report, and preserve the scientific record of the Competition.

1. Agreement and organizers

These Terms of Participation (“Terms”) apply to Agenthon 2026 (the “Competition”). By registering, accessing the competition environment, or submitting, you agree to these Terms, the Official Competition Rules, the Privacy Notice, the Data & Software Licensing Policy, applicable track instructions, and relevant platform terms.

The Competition is organized by the Society of Quantitative Analysts (SQA) and CEWIT at Stony Brook University (the “Organizers”), subject to applicable institutional approvals. Track leads, Question Partners, sponsors, evaluators, providers, and volunteers may assist without acquiring ownership of participant submissions merely because of that role.

If you participate as part of a team, these Terms apply to you individually. The team captain may act for the team on operational matters but may not transfer another member’s intellectual-property rights without authorization.

2. Eligibility, accounts, and platform terms

Eligibility, team structure, conflicts, sanctions compliance, conduct, and prize conditions are governed primarily by the Official Competition Rules.

You must provide accurate registration information, protect credentials, and comply with reasonable identity, eligibility, authorship, or prize-verification requests.

Competition activity may use third-party platforms or compute environments. Their terms and privacy practices may also apply. As between you and the Organizers, these Terms govern the Organizers’ rights to your submission to the extent the Organizers have authority to do so.

3. Participant ownership

You keep ownership of your submission. Participation does not assign your intellectual property to the Organizers, sponsors, Question Partners, infrastructure providers, or NeurIPS.

As between you and the Organizers, you retain all right, title, and interest you lawfully hold in participant-authored source code, models, methods, documentation, reports, and other original submission materials (“Submission Materials”). Third-party components remain governed by their original licenses and terms.

4. Limited license to operate and report the Competition

By submitting, you grant the Organizers a non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty-free license, limited to the period and scope reasonably necessary to operate, secure, verify, report, and preserve the scientific record of the Competition, to:

• host, copy, execute, and technically adapt Submission Materials for the designated evaluation environment;
• score, audit, security-test, investigate integrity, and reproduce results for verification;
• maintain leaderboards and publish scores, ranks, gate outcomes, and benchmark-level analyses;
• prepare Competition reports, presentations, and archival records; and
• promote Agenthon using public team and submission information, such as team name, project title, approved public summary, score, and rank.

This license does not transfer ownership and does not authorize the Organizers to publicly release non-public code, containers, model artifacts, or private verification materials; use a non-public submission to train a general-purpose model; sell or license participant technology; or use the submission for unrelated commercial or research purposes without separate permission.

Published leaderboard facts, approved public summaries, and aggregate scientific results may remain in the permanent Competition record. The underlying non-public submission remains confidential subject to the retention and legal exceptions described in the Privacy Notice.

5. Confidentiality and access

Non-public Submission Materials, including ordinary submissions and private prize-verification packages, are competition-confidential. Ranking, finalist status, or winning status does not by itself waive that confidentiality.

• Access is limited to Organizers, designated track leads/evaluators, platform or infrastructure providers, and other persons reasonably necessary for scoring, security, integrity, or verification, subject to appropriate handling obligations.
• Sponsors and Question Partners do not receive non-public submissions merely because they support Agenthon.
• A third party may access non-public materials only when assigned a necessary evaluation, verification, security, or scientific-analysis function and only to the extent reasonably required.
• The Organizers may disclose information where legally required, after taking reasonable steps to limit disclosure where permitted.

Do not include trade secrets, credentials, unnecessary personal data, or information that cannot lawfully be shared with those needed to evaluate the Competition.

6. Public information and publicity

The Organizers may publish team name, track participation, score, rank, and leaderboard information. For finalists and winners, they may also publish registered member names, affiliations, prize information, and approved public method summaries, as described in the Official Competition Rules and Privacy Notice.

Photography and recording. The in-person final and associated events may be photographed and recorded. By attending in person, you consent to appearing in photographs and recordings that may be published on Agenthon’s websites (agenthon.net, sqa-us.org, cewit.org) and social channels. If you prefer not to be photographed, tell the organizers at the event and we will make reasonable efforts not to feature you. Notice will also be posted at the venue. Identifiable photographs and recordings are otherwise handled under the Privacy Notice.

Participation does not create an employment, partnership, agency, sponsorship, investment-advisory, client, or fiduciary relationship, and does not guarantee employment, investment, publication, or commercial opportunity.

7. Third-party rights and participant warranties

You represent that you have sufficient rights to submit and permit evaluation of all included components. You are responsible for software, dataset, model, API, content, patent, confidentiality, employment, and other restrictions that apply to your work.

• Do not submit material that infringes intellectual-property, privacy, publicity, confidentiality, or other rights.
• Do not represent employer-owned or third-party material as exclusively yours.
• You remain responsible for attribution, notices, source-disclosure, copyleft, model-license, data-use, and other conditions.
• The license granted to the Organizers extends only to rights you can lawfully grant and does not override third-party terms.

8. Three-stage submission and reproducibility model

Participants need not relicense third-party software, data, models, weights, credentials, or other material they do not own. A permitted non-redistributable dependency must be identified with a lawful reproduction path. Failure of private verification may affect ranking or prize eligibility; failure of a confirmed winner to complete the public release may affect prize payment or acceptance. Neither transfers ownership.

9. Competition materials, privacy, and event requirements

The Competition Site, logos, private-test materials, oracle answers, hidden scoring logic, canary registries, audit materials, and other Organizer or third-party materials remain owned by their respective rights holders. Public code and data may be governed by separate licenses identified with the resource; no license is granted by implication.

Personal data is processed under the Agenthon Privacy Notice. The Organizers do not sell participant personal data or non-public submissions and do not use them to train general-purpose AI models.

Physical participation in a NeurIPS event is separately subject to NeurIPS registration, credentials, admission, Code of Conduct, safety, security, venue, travel, and immigration requirements. Finalist or winner status does not itself provide a badge, admission, visa, or travel support.

10. Prizes and no financial advice

Prizes, if any, are governed by the Official Competition Rules and announced prize terms. Potential winners may need to establish identity, eligibility, authorship, private reproducibility, tax status, and payment details.

Taxes and personal reporting are the winner’s responsibility, subject to legally required withholding or reporting. Prize payment may be withheld until a confirmed winner completes an announced public-release requirement.

The Competition is for research, education, and benchmarking. Datasets, outputs, scores, example strategies, simulated results, and submissions are not investment, trading, legal, tax, accounting, or other professional advice. Past or simulated performance does not guarantee future results.

11. Availability, security, disclaimers, and liability

The Competition Site, platforms, datasets, evaluation environment, and Organizer-provided materials are offered subject to technical limitations. The Organizers may quarantine unsafe submissions, correct evaluation defects, extend deadlines, or modify, suspend, or cancel the Competition when reasonably necessary for fairness, security, legal compliance, or scientific validity.

To the maximum extent permitted by law, the Competition and Organizer-provided materials are provided “as is” and “as available,” without warranties of uninterrupted availability, error-free operation, merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, or non-infringement. Nothing excludes rights or warranties that cannot lawfully be excluded.

To the maximum extent permitted by law, the Organizers and persons acting on their behalf are not liable for indirect, incidental, consequential, special, exemplary, or punitive damages, or for lost profits, opportunity, data, or business interruption arising from participation. Nothing limits liability that cannot legally be limited.

To the extent permitted by law, you are responsible for third-party claims arising directly from materials submitted in violation of Section 7 or from intentional misconduct. Any reimbursement obligation is limited to losses reasonably attributable to that violation and does not apply to claims caused by unauthorized Organizer use.

12. Governing law, disputes, changes, and miscellaneous

These Terms are governed by the laws of New York, USA, without regard to conflict-of-law rules, except where mandatory law provides otherwise. Any dispute arising out of or relating to these Terms or the Competition shall be resolved by binding arbitration administered by the American Arbitration Association under its Consumer Arbitration Rules, before a single arbitrator, seated in New York, New York, conducted in English. Judgment on the award may be entered in any court of competent jurisdiction. If the arbitration provision is found unenforceable or inapplicable to you or to a particular dispute, or if you are a consumer whose local law guarantees access to your home courts, such dispute shall instead be resolved exclusively in the state and federal courts located in New York County, New York, and the parties consent to personal jurisdiction there — provided that nothing in these Terms deprives you of any mandatory rights or protections under the laws of your country of residence.

The Organizers may update these Terms for legal requirements, material platform changes, security issues, or clear drafting defects. Material changes will be dated and announced. They will not retroactively take ownership or materially broaden use of a non-public submission without consent unless required by law.

If a provision is unenforceable, the remaining provisions remain effective to the extent permitted. Failure to enforce once is not a waiver. Headings are for readability and do not limit meaning. These Terms and the related Competition documents constitute the agreement concerning the Competition, subject to mandatory law and any separately signed agreement.

Questions about these Terms: admin@agenthon.net. Additional published contacts: admin@sqa-us.org and info@cewit.org.