Because if it says so on their website (especially if it also says that it's binding), then they have it in writing and you can use that as evidence. Otherwise everyone could just make and sign contracts and go back to them claiming that their lawyers were mistaken in their interpretations of them, no?
The operative issue is likely that there is no agreement here. Hashicorp did not provide those statements as part of the agreement, and you were not presented those terms as part of the agreement, so why would they be construed as part of the agreement?
Just as a corollary, do you think it would still be actually binding if Hashicorp put punitive clauses in there? E.g. "violations of any of these terms will be subject to a 10% of revenue penalty". Are you still bound by that, even though it wasn't part of the agreement?
> Otherwise everyone could just make and sign contracts and go back to them claiming that their lawyers were mistaken in their interpretations of them, no?
That's kind of the point of the formal agreements. By putting it in the agreement, their lawyers are saying "this text says what we intend" and by agreeing to it you're saying "the terms in this text are acceptable", and then the whole thing is immutable unless both parties come to an agreement again.
That's the special space contracts enable. Everyone knows that they're proposing or agreeing to legally binding obligations and can treat it thusly. Slapping random bits of text around and saying they're legally binding is a mess because who knows if you've seen it, or when they'll change it, and whether you'll see any updates to it before you agree to another contract.
It's either in the contract and binding, or not in the contract and not legally binding. Hashicorp can choose to bind themselves however they want, but the only entity enforcing those terms is Hashicorp itself.
