Share-a-thon

Legal

Acceptable use

Last updated · July 16, 2026

Shareathon exists to help schools, clubs, churches, and nonprofits raise money in a way that feels good for everyone. Here's the short list of what's welcome and what isn't.

Draft — pending attorney review

1. Campaigns we welcome

  • K-12 schools, PTOs, booster clubs, and student programs.
  • Colleges, athletic teams, and student organizations.
  • Churches, ministries, and faith-based nonprofits.
  • Registered 501(c)(3) nonprofits.
  • Community and mission-driven groups with a clear purpose.

2. What's not allowed

You can't use Shareathon to raise for or promote:

  • Anything illegal in the United States or in the donor's state.
  • Hate, harassment, or content targeting a person or group based on identity.
  • Adult content, escort services, or pornography.
  • Weapons, ammunition, explosives, or related accessories.
  • Tobacco, vaping, cannabis, recreational drugs, or drug paraphernalia.
  • Gambling, sweepstakes, raffles where prohibited by state law, or anything labeled as "investment".
  • Political campaigns, PACs, and partisan electioneering. (Civic-education and nonpartisan voter-engagement nonprofits are welcome.)
  • Multi-level-marketing recruiting, pyramid schemes, or pay-to-play arrangements.
  • Cryptocurrency speculation, tokens, NFTs, or anything sold primarily as a financial product.
  • Personal fundraising on behalf of someone else without their written consent.
  • Causes that mislead donors about where the money goes.

3. How you share

  • Only contact people you actually know — friends, family, your community.
  • No purchased lists, no scraped emails, no spam, no unsolicited bulk SMS.
  • No impersonating someone else.
  • No fake donors, no self-dealing donations to manipulate the leaderboard.
  • Respect "stop" and unsubscribe requests immediately.

4. Referrals and the Share Fund

The Share Fund is designed to reward organizations that genuinely help other real organizations discover Shareathon. You may not use it to farm balances. In particular, you may not:

  • Refer an organization you control, are a beneficial owner of, or that shares administrators with your organization primarily to route Share Fund dollars between related entities.
  • Coordinate mutual referral rings with other organizations for the purpose of generating Share Fund allocations that would not otherwise exist.
  • Create sham organizations, sham campaigns, or fake donations to inflate referral totals or Share Fund balances.
  • Use bots, scripts, purchased traffic, or other automation to simulate donations, referrals, or campaign activity.
  • Misrepresent who referred whom or attempt to alter referrer-of-record attribution after signup.

We may withhold, delay, claw back, or forfeit Share Fund balances; reverse allocations; and suspend or close accounts on reasonable suspicion of any of the above. Full Share Fund rules — including attribution, single-hop credit, redemption window, and forfeiture — live in the Share Fund Terms.

5. Rewards and prizes

You can absolutely thank donors and reward sharers. You can't tie a donation to a regulated good or to a prize that turns the campaign into a raffle in states where that requires a license.

6. How we enforce

If we see a violation, we usually warn first and ask you to fix it. For serious or repeated issues we may suspend the campaign, hold funds for refund to donors, and close the account. For anything illegal we will cooperate with law enforcement.

7. Report a violation

See something off? Write safety@shareathon.com. We respond within one business day.

Questions?

Email legal@shareathon.com or head back to the Trust Center.