Terms

These terms cover your use of Ballast, a marketplace where hosts share idle GPUs and renters buy inference from them. By signing in you agree to them.

Test mode

Ballast currently runs payments in Stripe test mode. Buying credits makes no real charge, and host payouts are a test ledger that sends no money. Credits and earnings have no cash value until Ballast says live payments have started.

Renters

• Credits are prepaid, priced in cents, and are not refundable. Each request reserves its worst-case cost and is settled to the tokens actually delivered.
• Each key is limited to 60 requests per minute and 8 at once, and each request to 120 seconds and 4096 output tokens. You can hold up to 10 active keys.
• Prompts run on community hosts who can read them. You are responsible for what you send. See Privacy.
• Dedicated GPU rentals pin one catalog model to one host GPU for up to 24 hours at a time. If the host drops, the rental moves to another idle GPU of the same class or ends, and unused time is credited back. You are billed only for minutes the GPU was healthy.

Hosts

• The Ballast host client runs only catalog models through Ollama, runs no renter code and opens no listening port. You can have up to 4 devices.
• You earn 80 percent of what renters pay for work your device serves. Earnings are held for 24 hours and are reversed if your device fails a spot-check in that time.
• Spot-checks are test prompts with known answers. A device that fails them or keeps failing jobs is paused from real work until it passes again.
• Estimates of what a GPU can earn are estimates, not promises. Earnings depend on demand.
• A test payout needs at least $20 of available earnings. It records a payout and moves no money.

Acceptable use

Do not use Ballast to break the law, to attack other people or systems, to send content you have no right to send, to probe or overload the network, or to tamper with spot-checks or billing. We may pause or close accounts that do.

No warranty

Ballast is early software. The service is provided as is, hosts can go offline at any time, and answers from a model can be wrong. To the extent the law allows, Ballast is not liable for indirect loss or for more than the credits you bought in the 12 months before a claim.

Changes and ending

We may change these terms and will post the new date here. You can stop using Ballast and delete your account at any time.

Contact

Use the support form.