Privacy Policy
Note to users in the EU (May 24, 2018): We are committed to GDPR compliance, but like most other websites in the world, we are still learning about what that means and requires. Our privacy policy will be updated as more information and guidance is made available about GDPR.
We take privacy very seriously, and if you are reading this, you probably do as well. First of all, you should know that except for the trusted services that we use for hosting our site, processing payments, publishing ads (Google), analyzing traffic (Google Analytics/Histats/Statcounter), and filtering comment spam (Automattic.com), no outside party will have access to your personal information unless you publish it yourself by adding it to a blog comment, review, etc. We do not share personal information or email lists with third parties beyond those specifically named and for the purposes described herein.
We owns and runs this website, so when we say “we”, “us”, or “our” we mean this site as well as the associates, employees, partners, and affiliates who help run this website and deliver the Content to you. If you have objections to this Privacy Policy, you should not access or use this site. On this page we will explain :
- What personal information is collected (or not collected)
- How the information is used
- Who has access to the information
- Our email newsletter opt-in and opt-out policy
- Guidelines for children’s privacy
Cookies
Our site uses ‘cookies’ to manage your session on our site. Cookies are an industry standard and most major web sites use them. A cookie is a small text file stored on your computer, but is not stored on our website. Cookies help to save your personal preferences from one visit to the next (such as remaining logged into a website), make advertising more relevant, prevent pop-ups from being displayed too often, etc. Learn more about cookies used by Google.
Cookies on our site are used for Advertising and Web Analytics (see these sections below for more information). We also uses cookies for logging into our blog, but only authors and administrators can log in. Cookies may also be required for viewing the videos that we have embedded from youtube.com.
You can remove or clear cookies from your computer via your browser (typically accessed via your browser’s settings or tools menu). You can also disable all cookies via your browser, but this might cause this and other websites to stop working (such as not being able to log in, embedded videos not working, etc.).
Advertising
We use third-party advertising companies (Google) to serve ads when you visit our website. We use advertising to fund this website. These advertisers may use technology such as cookies when they advertise on our site, which will also send these advertisers information including your web request, IP address, browser type, browser language, the date and time of your request, and the browser you used to visit our site.
This information is generally used for geotargeting purposes (showing San Diego real estate ads to someone in San Diego, for example) or showing certain ads based on specific sites visited (such as showing car ads to someone who frequents car sites) or changing the amount of ads displayed.
Google AdSense Ads: Google uses cookies to serve ads on our website. Google’s use of the DoubleClick cookie enables it and its partners to serve ads on this site based on your visit to our site and other sites on the internet. To learn how Google manages cookies and data in its ads products, click here.
We use the non-personalized ads setting in Google AdSense so that non-personalized ads are shown to users in the EEA. This makes the ads context-only for these users.
You may opt out of the use of the DoubleClick cookie by visiting the Google Advertising Privacy Policy.
Web Analytics
We measure visitors to our website using Google Analytics, a service that transmits website traffic data to Google servers in the Unites States. Google Analytics does not identify individual users or associate your IP address with any other data held by Google. We use reports provided by Google Analytics to help us understand website usage trends and to make improvements to our site.
Website traffic data includes information such as the number of times a link was clicked, IP addresses, browser types, access times, how people arrived at our site and so on. For example, if you find our site through a search engine, the logs will show that a visitor clicked through to our site from that search engine. General aggregate site statistics may be provided to potential advertisers and link partners (such as number of visitors per month from the US). These statistics cannot be used to identify an individual, since they do not include any personal information.
You can learn more about Google Analytics, or you may opt-out of using Google Analytics cookies by using the Google Analytics Opt-Out Add-on for your browser.
We use the ‘Anonymize IP’ setting in Google Analytics (click here for more info).
Public Comments
Our blog allows comments to be added by users. Comments are not anonymous. Information that you include in these comments becomes public information (including the name and comment you provide) and you should exercise caution when deciding to disclose any personal information. Submitting a comment requires providing your name and email address. WordPress also stores your IP address. The IP address is stored because our anti-spam plugin uses the IP address to help identify spam comments. The email address is not displayed, but the email address and IP address is stored with your comment in the WordPress database.
We use the Akismet Anti-Spam plugin by Automattic.com to filter comment spam. This service uses the information you provide in your comment to detect and identify spam. See the Automattic.com privacy policy.
You may contact us if you wish to have your comment(s) removed for any reason. Please provide us with enough information to identify your comment(s) for removal.
Email You Send Us
When you send us email, it is stored in our mail server and the Google email accounts we use for communication. We keep records of emails to aid in communication, legal purposes, tax purposes, etc.
If you do not want us to store your email message or you do not want your email stored on Google servers, you should avoid contacting us, or request that we delete your message after reading it. We will normally happily comply to such a request, but if we feel there is an important reason to maintain a record of the message, we will not be obligated to remove it unless required to by law.
We treat all communication from customers regarding orders or technical assistance as private and confidential.
If you send us unsolicited email, we are under no obligation to keep the information confidential or private. If you specifically want us to keep email communication confidential, you should include a clear confidentiality notice with your email. However, unless we have previously signed a non-disclosure agreement, we may not be legally obligated to maintain confidentiality.
Information Used to Improve User Experience
In some cases, we may collect information to help improve the experience of users on our site. This might include completing anonymous polls or surveys, rating pages or content that you like, sharing content via social media, or submitting a search.
The surveys we use do not contain or request information that we could use or recognize as personally identifiable information from end users. Demographic information might include age, profession, interests, favorites, etc. This information would be used to help us know how best to tailor our content to the interests of our users.
Information from anonymous surveys might be shared or published, but only on an aggregate basis (meaning statistics like 65% of our users are female). This information cannot be used to identify you.
We do not collect sensitive personal information such as race, religion, or political affiliations. We do not collect sensitive information such as social security numbers and birth dates.
Children’s Guidelines
Children’s privacy is a major concern to us.
We do not knowingly collect personal information from children under the age of 13. If we learn that we have personal information on a child under the age of 13, we will delete that information from our systems. We encourage parents to go online with their kids. Here are a few tips to help make a child’s online experience safer:
- Teach kids never to give personal information, unless supervised by a parent or responsible adult. This includes name, address, phone, school, etc.
- Know the sites your kids are visiting and which sites are appropriate.
- Look for Web site privacy policies.
- Know how your child’s information is treated.
Check out the FTC’s site for more tips on protecting children’s privacy online.
External Links
We link to many other websites, but we are not responsible for the privacy policies on other websites.
Privacy Policy Revisions
We may occasionally revise this policy by updating this page. We encourage you to visit this page periodically to see how this website is protecting your privacy.
Contacting Us
If you have any questions or comments about our privacy policy, we can be reached via contact form.
