Comment rules.

Each story belongs to a business. Webstory provides the comments, and the business looks after the comments on its own stories.

1. Commenting

• You need a Webstory account to comment, like or report. Anyone can read comments.
• You appear with your nickname, or your first name and last initial if you haven’t picked one. If you’ve added a profile picture, it shows too. Your nickname, picture and comments are public on the story. Your phone number never is.
• A comment can be up to 500 characters.
• Web addresses show as plain text, not as links.
• A reply from the business shows the business’s name and logo with the label “Author”. One of its team wrote it.

2. Please don’t post

• Spam, scams, or the same message over and over
• Harassment, threats or hate
• Sexual content, graphic violence, or anything that encourages self-harm
• False information presented as fact
• Advertising for yourself or for other businesses
• Other people’s private details
• Anything illegal
• A name or picture that pretends to be someone else, including the business or Webstory

3. How comments are checked

Comments normally appear straight away. Nobody approves them first. So that a thread doesn’t fill up with spam and abuse, each comment is also checked automatically.

• Limits. There’s a limit on how often you can comment, and new accounts have a lower one.
• Automatic rules. These look for things like links, contact details, repeated text, and swear words and slurs. They also take your account into account, such as how new it is, whether you’ve bought from a shop on Webstory, and whether your comments have been hidden before.
• An automatic AI check. It reads the text of your comment and scores it for things like spam, scams and hate. It sees the text only, not your name or account. See the Privacy Policy.

Depending on the result, a comment may be:

• Held: other people don’t see it for about 15 minutes. It then appears, unless someone reports it or the business hides it.
• Hidden: other people don’t see it unless the business brings it back.

A held or hidden comment still looks normal to you. It carries no label, and at the moment we don’t send you a message about it. If nobody seems to be seeing your comment, this may be why.

4. What the business can do

On its own stories, the business can reply, like, pin, hide or delete comments, and block someone from commenting on its stories. It can also choose its own settings, for example hiding comments that contain links or certain words, or how many reports hide a comment. A blocked person is told “You can’t comment here.”

Businesses decide about their own comment sections, so what’s acceptable can differ a little from story to story. They can’t change these rules for Webstory as a whole.

5. Reporting a comment

Tap ··· on a comment, then Report, and choose a reason:

• Spam or a scam
• Harassment or hate
• Nudity, violence or self-harm
• False information
• Something illegal

The business sees that a comment was reported and why, but not who reported it. If enough different people report a comment, it’s hidden until the business looks at it. That takes at least three people by default, and each business can change the number. Reports from new accounts count for less.

If you report something as illegal, we ask which law you think it breaks. These reports also go to Webstory, and we keep a copy of the comment for our review, with the account that wrote it and the story it was on, even if it’s later deleted.

6. Your own comments

You can delete your own comments at any time. Deleting your Webstory account deletes your comments, likes and reports. The exception is the copy described above, for a comment someone reported as illegal.

7. Webstory’s own action

Webstory can remove comments, and can stop an account from commenting, liking and reporting anywhere on Webstory, when someone keeps breaking these rules.

8. Contact

Questions and legal notices: hello@webstory.app. We may update these rules; the version and date at the top of this page show the current one.