Community Guidelines

In current versions of the app, new trips you create are public by default. The first time, the app tells you so and lets you keep your trips public or make that trip private; trips created before then stay private until you publish them. You can make any trip private at any time from the icon at the top of the trip. A public trip is a separate public version of the plan, which anyone in Explore can find, like, save, comment on and adapt.

Exact dates, bookings, notes, the names of the people you travel with and your starting point are never published. The public version shows the places and nights, the month and length of the trip, a group-size range (for example “2 people”), the choices it was planned with — pace, interests, the kind of stay and transport — and an approximate per-person budget when there is enough to estimate from. Your public version shows your public handle and a simple avatar, never your full name or e-mail address. Your handle may be based on them; see Public handles.

The title is suggested from the trip (its number of days and first destination) and you can change it; the teaser is written by you. Likes and saves are counted, and the counts are shown. Comments, and the handle of whoever wrote them, are visible to people who can see the trip.

You must be at least 18 to use Variare, as the Terms say. That includes Explore and its community features.

Write about places and plans the way you would want to be read: be honest about what you did, be kind in comments and replies, and stay on topic. A comment can be up to 1,000 characters. You can start a comment with another traveler's handle, written with an @ in front, to mention them. People can be notified about comments, replies and mentions, according to the community activity setting in the app's notification settings.

Do not publish, comment or choose a handle to share:

• abuse, harassment or threats aimed at a person or group;
• hateful content, including slurs;
• sexual or otherwise inappropriate content;
• spam or advertising, including promotional links;
• misleading information presented as fact;
• content that infringes copyright or someone else's ownership of a work;
• anything illegal;
• content that pretends to be another person or business;
• other people's personal information, including anyone's contact details.

Some of this is checked automatically before text is accepted. Titles, teasers and comments are refused when they contain a link, an e-mail address, a phone-number-like run of digits, or a word from a list of severe abuse. This is a basic filter, not a promise that everything that breaks these guidelines is caught: reporting and moderation (below) exist for the rest.

Your handle is the only identity other travelers see. Variare gives every account one when it first signs in: the part of your e-mail address before the @, or, when that is not available, the name you shared when signing in, or otherwise a random eight-character id. Accents are removed, and digits are added when a handle is already taken. Handles are 3 to 20 characters, using lower-case letters, numbers, dots or underscores, and are unique across Variare. A random handle can be changed once, from your profile card in the app. Other handles cannot be changed in the app, but you can ask for a change through Support. A small set of names is reserved and cannot be claimed, and a handle is refused if one of its parts, separated by dots or underscores, is a word from the abuse list. The app does not say which rule a refused handle broke.

You can report a public trip or a comment from its menu, choosing one reason: spam, misleading information, inappropriate content, copyright or ownership concern, or something else. You cannot report your own content. Reports go to Variare, where a person reviews them. A report does not hide or remove anything by itself. The app does not tell the person you reported that you did, or who you are. We cannot promise how quickly a report will be looked at or what the outcome will be.

Blocking a traveler hides their trips and profile from your Explore. Neither of you can like, comment on or reply to the other. A comment from someone you blocked appears collapsed, and you can choose to show it. You can unblock someone at any time from Blocked users, in the app's Privacy settings.

Variare can review reported content and decide to dismiss the report, remove the content, or restore content that was removed. A removed trip is no longer shown in Explore, and its author sees that it was removed and cannot update it. A removed comment is replaced by the placeholder "This comment was removed". Variare can also restrict an account from the community features: a restricted account cannot publish or update public trips or post comments. Each of these actions is recorded.

If Variare removes your trip or your comment, the app shows you that it was removed and the general reason, which is one of: spam, misleading information, inappropriate content, a copyright or ownership concern, or another breach of these guidelines. Other travelers see only that it was removed. A moderator's own notes are internal and are not shown.

When a comment is removed by a moderator, its text is kept internally for review and so that the removal can be reversed. That copy is never shown in the app and is set to expire 90 days after the removal. Variare does not promise to read everything that is posted or to find every violation.

You are responsible for what you publish and write. Only publish what you have the right to share.

• Make a trip private. The public version is hidden. Its likes, comments and saves are kept, and you can publish it again.
• Delete the public version. It disappears from Explore together with its likes, comments and saves. Your own trip is not affected.
• Delete your own trip. Its public version stays in Explore with its likes, comments and saves, and can no longer be updated. Delete the public version first if you want it gone too.
• Delete a comment. If it has no replies it is removed. If it has replies, it shows as "Comment deleted" so the replies stay in place; its text and your handle are removed from it.

Deleting your account (You → Settings → Delete account) also removes your community presence. Your likes and saves are removed and the counts go down. Your replies, and your comments that have no replies, are deleted. Your comments that still have replies from others become a "Comment deleted" placeholder with no text and no author. Your public trips are deleted, and with them the likes, saves and comments other people left on those trips. Your blocks and your public handle are removed. Reports you made are kept without your identity.

Questions about these guidelines go through Support.