Contributor Terms

For Contributors

Last updated: October 2026 · Applies to all writing submitted to travelescape.in

Plain English first. You write it, you own it. We publish it with your name on it. After 90 days you can publish it anywhere else too. We keep it on the site. If something changes, we talk.

At a Glance

You keep the copyright

The writing stays yours. Travelescape gets a licence to publish it, not ownership.

Your name on it

Every piece carries your byline. You can ask to appear as "A TE Contributor" instead, but never under Nilabh's name.

Nothing hidden

A free stay, a flight, a fee: if anything was given to you for the trip you write about, say so. We add a note to the piece.

Written by you

From your own experience, in your own words. AI can help you edit or translate your words; it cannot write the piece or the trip for you.

Notes from the community

Members can let us keep the tips, memories and photos they share, credited to them, unpaid, and taken down whenever they ask (section 13).

Children stay safe

No child can be identified in your words or photos without their parent's or guardian's consent, and nothing sexual or harmful is ever published (section 14).

Who These Terms Apply To

Anyone who submits writing to Travelescape (TE) for publication. Submitting a piece means you agree to these terms; if you don't, please don't submit.

Travelescape is owned and run by Nilabh Ranjan, a one-person studio in Bangalore, India. Questions: nilabh@travelescape.in

Copyright and Licence

You keep full copyright in your work, including your photographs. By submitting a piece, you give Travelescape a non-exclusive, royalty-free, worldwide, perpetual licence to publish, display and archive it, and the photographs you send with it, on travelescape.in and in Travelescape's own emails and posts. Photographs are always credited to you, and used only with your piece or to share it.

That is all the licence covers. Travelescape does not own your work and will not sell it, license it to anyone else or use it commercially in any other way.

You may republish the piece on your own site, Substack or anywhere else, 90 days after it appears on Travelescape.
You may include it in a portfolio, book or collection of your work, crediting its first publication on Travelescape.
You may not republish it elsewhere within those 90 days without our written permission.

When you republish, please add: "First published on Travelescape (travelescape.in)."

Byline and Attribution

Pieces are published under your real name, unless you ask in writing, before publication, to be anonymous. Then the byline reads "A TE Contributor", never Nilabh's name or the Travelescape editorial voice.

A one- or two-line bio goes beneath your piece. Write it yourself, or we draft one for your approval.

We will never change your byline, misattribute your work or present it as someone else's.

Editing

We edit for length, clarity, punctuation and house style.

What we won't change without asking you: your voice, your facts, the feeling of the piece, or anything that changes what you meant. You see and approve every significant edit before publication.

If we can't agree on edits, we may decline the piece. It stays entirely yours, and no kill fee applies unless it was commissioned (see 07).

We may decline any submission without giving editorial reasons.

After publication

A published piece stays accurate, safe and lawful over time. Later on, we may add a dated editors' note, mark details that have changed, fix or remove links and images, update its title or description for search, or move it to another section. Like every link on the site, the links in your piece, including the one to your own site, are checked routinely: a link that is dead, does not respond, is not secure or now leads somewhere else is removed without notice, and your words around it stay. Your first-hand account, your voice and what you meant stay as you wrote them: any update is shown as ours, never as yours. If a change in the law, a court order or a platform change makes part of a piece unlawful or unsafe to keep, we change or remove that part, and tell you where we can.

What We Publish

Every piece must:

Come from real, personal experience. Travelescape publishes first-person, reflective writing. Invented or composite experiences presented as real are not accepted.
Disclose anything you were given. A free stay, flight, press trip, payment or any other benefit connected to the experience must be declared. We add a note to the piece.
Be written by you. AI help with editing, research, structure or translating your own words is fine. If your piece was translated, send the original with it; we add a short translator's note. AI-generated writing presented as your own travel experience is not accepted.
Be new. Not already published elsewhere, including your own blog or social media (a short excerpt is fine).
Be fair to others. No defamatory claims about identifiable people or organisations, and nothing that could expose you or Travelescape to legal action.
Stay with us for 90 days. It must not appear on another platform until 90 days after it is published here.
Carry no paid links, unless agreed with us in writing and marked as sponsored. Links added only for search rankings are removed.

A piece that doesn't meet these standards is declined or, if already published, removed. We tell you before removing it, unless the content is harmful or illegal.

Payment

Payment is agreed before you write, per piece or per contributor, and paid on publication, not on acceptance: within 14 days of the piece going live, in Indian rupees or US dollars, by bank transfer, Wise or PayPal. A fee for a piece includes the photographs sent with it.

If we accept a piece and publication is delayed more than 90 days through no fault of yours, you choose: we publish within a further 30 days, or you are released from the 90-day window.

Payment covers the licence in 02 only. It does not buy the copyright.

Travelescape is an independent studio run by one person. Rates are modest but honest, and will rise as the studio grows. Contributors who join early will be treated as founding contributors when rates are reviewed.

Commissions and the Kill Fee

A commission is a written request from us (an email is enough) for a piece on a defined brief. An unsolicited pitch that we accept is not a commission.

If we commission a piece and then decide not to publish it for editorial reasons, not because it falls short of 05, we pay a kill fee of 50% of the agreed amount.

There is no kill fee if:

the piece does not meet the standards in 05;
you decline reasonable editorial changes;
the piece rests on invented experience or an undisclosed benefit;
you withdraw the piece yourself.

Removing a Piece

Once published, a piece stays on the site as part of the archive, with these exceptions:

Your name off it. Ask in writing and we replace your byline with "A TE Contributor". The piece stays up.
Safety. If a piece puts you at real risk of harm, legal or personal, we take it down promptly on request. No questions asked.
Unpaid pieces. We remove them within 14 days of your request, no reason needed.
Paid pieces. We are not obliged to remove a paid piece because you have changed your mind, but write to us: we look at each case on its own.
Our side. We may change or remove a piece, or part of it, if the law requires it, if it no longer meets 05, or as the site changes (see "After publication" in 04 and our Terms of Service). A fee already paid stays yours.

Send every removal request to nilabh@travelescape.in.

Sending Drafts

Send your draft by email, as a document (Word, Google Docs or plain text) with your photographs as full-size original files; if the piece was translated, include the original too. Regular contributors may be given access to the site's writing workspace on GitHub instead. Sending a draft doesn't publish it: every piece is approved by the editor before it goes live.

If we stop working together, any workspace access ends. Your published pieces stay up under your byline, or as "A TE Contributor" if you asked for that.

Your Promises and Liability

By submitting a piece, you confirm that:

you wrote it, took the photographs you send with it, and have the right to grant the licence in 02;
it doesn't infringe anyone's copyright, privacy or other rights;
it contains nothing defamatory, illegal or harmful;
you have disclosed anything you were given in connection with it.

If someone brings a claim against Travelescape because one of these isn't true, you agree to help defend it and to cover the losses that breach directly caused.

Travelescape has no liability for your own use of your work outside travelescape.in.

Governing Law

These terms are governed by the laws of India, and any dispute goes to the courts of Bangalore, Karnataka. If a part of them can't be enforced, the rest still applies.

Changes to These Terms

We may update these terms when the law, technology or the way we work changes; the date at the top of the page shows when. Contributors we are working with hear about any important change by email, and sending work after that means you accept the new terms.

Notes and Photos from the Community

This section is for members of the Travelescape community (the WhatsApp group, the Facebook group and readers of the site) who sign the short agreement for community notes. A note is a tip, a memory or an update from your own travels that you choose to let Travelescape keep. Sections 01, 02 (the licence), 04 ("After publication"), 10, 11 and 12 apply to notes as they do to essays; the rest of these terms is about essays and does not.

How you agree. On the short form at travelescape.in/share-with-te/, or by replying yes to Nilabh's message, in the group or to him directly, that sets out these points: he records the date and keeps your reply, and that is your agreement.
Only what you choose. We keep only the notes you send us yourself, or the messages of yours in the group that you have said we may keep. Nothing is collected from the groups automatically, and nothing is kept from anyone who has not signed.
Your own. Your own words and your own photographs, from your own travels: not forwarded messages and not other people's pictures. Nothing that shows a child's face, names or shows another person without their okay, or gives anyone's phone number or address.
Where it appears. Travelescape may publish your note on travelescape.in, credited to you, and quote it, credited and dated, in the answers of Ask Travelescape, the site's answer box. You keep the copyright, and you may share your note anywhere else at any time: the 90-day window does not apply to notes.
Credit. Your first name, or the name you choose, with your city if you like, and the month and year of your trip. A note is never presented as Travelescape's own advice or as written by Nilabh.
Editing. Only trims and typos; we may leave out a line that breaks these terms. For anything more, we ask you first. We may also decide not to use a note, without giving a reason.
Read by a person. An AI tool reads each note first, to point out phone numbers, prices that date and the like; a person reads every note and decides. No AI rewrites your words or writes in your name.
Taking it down. Ask at any time and a note comes down within 14 days, from the site and from Ask Travelescape. Withdraw your agreement and all your notes come down, the same way.
No fee, either way. Notes are unpaid, and nothing is owed by you or by us.

Children and Safety

This section applies to everything you send Travelescape: essays, photos, notes and replies.

No child identified without consent. No child can be identified in your words or photos (a face, a name, a school, an exact age with a place) unless their parent or guardian has agreed, in writing for an essay, and you can show us that consent if we ask. We may crop, blur, rename or leave out anything that could identify a child, and a parent's or guardian's request to remove it is acted on at once.
Dignity first. No photographs of children in distress, hardship or danger used for effect; where a child's hardship is part of the story, we decide together how to tell it without showing who they are.
Nothing sexual, nothing harmful. No sexual content, and nothing that sexualises, endangers or mocks a child. Anything of the kind is declined, removed and not kept, and reported to the authorities where the law requires it.
Your promise. By sending us a piece, a photo or a note, you confirm it meets this section; we may decline or take down anything that does not.

Questions about contributing?

A pitch? Start with Write for Travelescape: what we publish and how to pitch. A question about these terms, or just hello: write to nilabh@travelescape.in.

Subject line: TE Essay Pitch: [your name] · Nilabh reads every message.