TERMS OF USE, DISCLAIMER, DISCLOSURE, AND PRIVACY POLICY
House Gone Sane legally owns and operates this website housegonesane.com and any reference to terms in our Terms of Use or other policies posted on this website, such as ‘we,’ ‘our,’ ‘us,’ ‘I’, ‘our blog,’ or ‘our website’ refer to House Gone Sane. The term ‘you’ refers to anyone who uses, visits, reads, and/or accesses our website in any way.
The current address for House Gone Sane is 2061 South Park Ave #872, Buffalo, NY 14220.
Please thoroughly read our Terms of Use, Disclaimer, Disclosure, and Privacy Policy prior to using our website. By using our website, you show you agree with our policies as laid out here, regardless of whether you actually read them. If you disagree with any of these policies or aren’t going to follow them, please refrain from accessing our website in any way.
TERMS OF USE
Please thoroughly read our Terms of Use before using our website. If you do not accept and comply with our policies as outlined here, you are not allowed to use our website in any way. Please note that our Disclaimer, Disclosure, and Privacy Policy that are listed on this page are also extensions of our Terms of Use and website policies, and if you do not agree to the terms in any of these policies, you may not access this website. All of these rules apply to anyone accessing our website, regardless of the reason they do so. By using/accessing our website you are indicating that you are in agreement with our Terms of Use and all of our policies on this page, even if you haven’t read them.
Intellectual Property | Copyrights
All content on this website including photos and articles/posts are property of House Gone Sane and may not be used outside of housegonesane.com without our prior written permission.
We allow you to link to active webpages on our website, such as blog posts, using a regular link or hyperlink, so long as you indicate the link is from our website, and we are credited; you may not be deceptive about what/where the link leads to. Please note that we may at times take down articles or content without notice, or change where information on our website is located.
We do not agree to any of our content- in whole or in part, including (but not limited to) written test, posts, images, logos, graphics, photos, audio files, video files, podcasts, and/or recipe instructions being reprinted or posted elsewhere without our prior written permission even if credit and/or a link was provided that led to our website/article. By using our website you agree that all content on housegonesane.com is our property, that you may only copy it for your personal use- not to share with others- and that you will otherwise not try to copy, steal, duplicate, reprint, or electronically post our content in any way. No part of housegonesane.com may be stored, reproduced, or transmitted in any form or by any means, mechanical, electronic, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise, except as allowed under Section 107 or 108 of the 1976 United States Copyright Act, without prior written permission from House Gone Sane. Please note that any information we send via email is also our ‘property’ and for your personal use only.
We reserve the right to take legal action against anyone violating our copyrights policies. We may or may not give prior warning before doing so. Our actions to correct matters could (but won’t always) include and are not limited to: a lawsuit, pressing charges, contacting the business or individual responsible for the violation to give them an opportunity to stop what they’re doing, and/or contacting search engines, social media, website hosts, and/or other internet platforms to make them aware of a specific individual or company webpage or account that provides access to our stolen property- this would be in an effort to have access blocked to our stolen property through these means and could hurt your online accounts’ status.
We respect others’ ideas and copyrights and would never intentionally do anything to take away credit from them.
Purchases through Links
At this time we don’t allow purchases directly on our website. If you decide to sign up for a product or service through an affiliate link or advertisement on our website, you will be directed to a third-party website to make the purchase. Please note that if you make purchases through links, you will be subject to the privacy policy, terms of use, and purchasing/refund policies on the third-party site you purchase through. You may only make purchases you are legally entitled to make with your own funds, unless you have prior permission from another individual to use their funds for payment, which you/they must also be legally entitled to use.
We only form business/affiliate relationships with companies we trust to protect your information, however, we make no guarantees, and are not liable if your privacy/security is compromised as a result of a purchase you make. Even reputable companies/stores can fall victim to security/privacy issues. This is a risk you take whether you are shopping online or in-store. Additionally it is possible someone could steal online purchase information by hacking your computer/records.
Limited Liability
We aren’t responsible for any type of damage or loss as a result of someone acting or failing to act on information from our website, regardless of what format that information is in. We are not responsible/liable for anything that happens to you, your computer, your family, your belongings, your business etc., while you are on our website or from use of our website. We are not responsible or liable for anything negative that happens to you as a result of signing up for or purchasing a product or service mentioned on our website or linked from our website. We are not liable for computer glitches or issues.
Please make good choices and only use our website safely, responsibly, and ethically. You are 100% responsible for how you use the internet, including our website; we are not accountable for your personal decisions. If you choose to use our website or act based on our website’s content, this is at your own risk and by using our website you are agreeing not to hold us liable in any way. If you disagree with our policies on liability (or any of our policies), you are prohibited from using or accessing our website in any way.
Governing Law
These Terms of Use are governed by the state of NY and the United States. In the event that any part of these Terms (or any of our policies on this page) are considered invalid or cannot be enforced legally, those portions of the Terms are to be disregarded, and the remaining applicable portions will remain in full effect. Additionally, if you live in another region, any local laws that apply to your use of the internet where you live should be followed, in addition to our policies and the regional laws this website is governed by.
Minors/Children
While we intend to keep our website appropriate for all ages, our website is meant for adults only, not for children/minors. Parents, if you let your children view our website, please monitor them. If they are under the age of 16 you must supervise them at all times on our website.
We will often have links to other sites where purchases can be made and we are not responsible for any unauthorized purchases children of any age make through links on our site.
Some of our articles, if followed by a child, such as recipe instructions, could result in harm if they were to attempt to follow them, such as using a knife, hot stove/oven, etc. If you don’t supervise your child and something happens, we are not liable, even if they act off of an idea from our website. Any child age 16 and older that is still a minor should have parent/guardian permission to be on our website, and should be supervised as their parent/guardian sees fit.
Warranties | Human/Computer Errors
We wouldn’t intentionally provide inaccurate information, but as the website owner and users are not perfect, there may at times be incorrect or outdated information on our site, as well as grammatical and/or spelling errors/typos. We make no assurances that any statements on our website are fully accurate, complete, or without error. We make no warranties either stated or implied as to this website or its content.
There may be computer/technical issues with our website at times, or a combination of computer and human error at the same time. We try to prevent and fix any issues to the best of our ability, but despite our best efforts, there may still be problems at times.
Third Party Opinions/Views
We are not responsible for views expressed by individuals commenting on our website or in links anywhere on our website. Although we may use certain companies’ products or services and promote them, this doesn’t mean we agree with the company’s views on other matters, products, or services.
Links to Other Websites
This website will sometimes contain links to other websites that are owned by third-parties and not by us. Once you leave our website to go to another website, you are subject to that site’s Terms of Use, Privacy Statement, and any other policies they have. We are not responsible or liable for anything on other websites; when you visit them it is at your own risk. It is solely your decision which links and websites you click on and visit.
If any links on our website leading to other websites have legitimate copyright violations, we will remove the links if we are made aware of them and have seen sufficient evidence of the violation. If you have a legitimate concern about any link on our site, please contact us at [email protected] (our email.) We would never intentionally promote plagiarized content.
Product Recalls
If you notice we have a specific product mentioned, advertised, or linked that has been recalled, please let us know, and we will contact the manufacturer and remove the link if the recall is still in effect for that specific product. We will never intentionally link or advertise items that are currently recalled, and we are not responsible for any bad effects of recalled products, were someone to purchase or use one that we mention or link to.
Email Policies
We appreciate when our privacy and contact information is respected and we will also respect yours. We will never intentionally spam our email subscribers or website visitors with loads of unwanted messages, or purposely provide information to someone else so they could do so.
The main purpose of our having email subscribers is to communicate with our readers, which includes letting them know when we have information we feel they’ll find valuable. We may at times send promotional emails with certain products or services we think our subscribers would appreciate, and it’s solely up to them whether or not they decide to purchase them. We may also ask for feedback to improve our business and blog topics.
When you sign up for our email subscription, regardless of the reason, you are consenting to us contacting you by email, which may include both automated and manually sent emails. You consent to continue to receive our automated emails unless and until you unsubscribe.
If you sign up for our email subscription, you must be at least 18 years old, and you must use your real first name and actual email address. You may not sign up with someone else’s or with fake information. By subscribing to our emails you agree to these and the other terms mentioned in this section.
You sign up at your own risk, and we are not liable for any losses, damages, or problems as a result. Any information we send through emails should be taken as is and for informational purposes only. We make no warranties or guarantees regarding any emailed content. You may unsubscribe from our email service at any time, if you choose to.
Please note we are not responsible for someone else impersonating you and using your information to sign up as a subscriber, to comment on our site, contact us, etc. If you believe someone has misused your information, and are receiving emails from us but didn’t sign up for them and don’t wish to receive them, please unsubscribe and we will remove you from our email list. You are also welcome to contact us via email directly at [email protected] with any concerns.
Any information we send via email should be viewed as supplemental info in addition to information on our website, and an extension of our website and business. This being said, our disclaimer as outlined on this page also applies to any emails we send. We are not responsible for you acting or failing to act on information on our website, or through our emails, including any information contained in supplemental worksheets/printables, audio files, or content in any other format we attach or include within emails. Any information we email you is for informational purposes only. See our full disclaimer policy on this page, which applies to emails as well.
At this time, the main method we use to contact website visitors is through email. We don’t make a habit of contacting people via phone, text message, physical address, etc. In rare situations we may choose to do so, if an individual is agreeable and if we feel some special circumstance would make it appropriate, or if it involved one of our business relationships.
We use ConvertKit for email subscriptions. Note that they also collect location data on subscribers which may include the city and country you are accessing the internet in.
If you decide to unsubscribe from our email service, please allow us at least 2 weeks (we say this as a precaution, but it hopefully won’t take that long) to be completely unsubscribed. If for some reason you are getting subscriber emails from us after you have been unsubscribed for at least 2 weeks, please directly email us at [email protected] and let us know, as well as if you notice any other issues connected with our emails.
Sometimes computers have glitches or issues, and if there is something wrong with our website or email service, we want to know so it can be fixed. If our physical address doesn’t show up at the bottom of our emails, please let us know. It should read: 2061 South Park Ave #872, Buffalo, NY 14220. This is the updated address we can legally conduct business from in the state of NY. Our email: [email protected]
Email Forwarding
You may not forward any emails we send you to anyone else. By contacting us via email, or giving us your email in connection with making comments or as a subscriber, you agree you will not send any information we email you to anyone else. If you feel someone else would enjoy subscribing to our website, please allow them to sign up for themselves.
Comments
Any comments made on our website by users/visitors should be truthful, respectful, and completely topic related to the article they’re posted under. Comments need to be made manually by a real person (not automated, through use of bots, etc.,) and shouldn’t be intended to spam either us or website viewers. Comments should never be made with the intent of offering/selling products or services, trying to funnel viewers to a different website, or be misleading in any way.
Comments should not contain profanity, religious or patriotic remarks, anything sexual in nature (including subtle jokes or double-meanings,) or anything that could be considered aggressive, offensive, or discriminatory toward any individual or group of people, including the website owner and admin.
If comments are made with an opinion that disagrees with views expressed by us or others who comment, they need to be expressed respectfully. If we notice comments are expressed in a way that is clearly disrespectful or aggressive towards others, we reserve the right to remove them.
Want Us to Remove a Comment You Made?
If you posted a comment you wish to be removed, please email us at [email protected] and we can do this. We will notify you by email once it is removed. Please allow up to 30 days for us to process this request. We may ask you to verify the email you used to make the comment (if you use a different one to email us the request) so we can verify you were the individual who made the comment. We may in addition, send a notification email to the email address used to make the comment initially as well if it is a different address than the email address we received the request from.
Links in Comments
Any links provided in comments should be to relevant to the article they are posted for, and links should only be to web pages that are legal and appropriate for a general audience. Links should not be provided that lead to plagiarized articles or web pages, web pages religious or patriotic in nature, or to web pages that include any sort of content or media that is sexual, obscene, or vulgar in nature, including if there is profanity in the linked article itself. No affiliate links, advertising links, or links that appear as ‘spam’ are permitted through website visitors’ comments.
As the website owner, we want all content on our website, including links, to be appropriate for our target audience and in line with our brand. If someone links to a web page that is not appropriate or relevant to our readers and brand, we reserve the right to remove the comment.
Personal Info in Comments
Comments should not violate the privacy of others in any way and shouldn’t display personal information, such as full names of an individual other than the commenter, the personal email address of anyone including the person commenting (we may collect this, but we don’t want it published,) employer information, physical addresses, phone numbers, social security numbers or other private legal info of anyone, and/or any other identifying information about others.
Profile Pictures for Comments
We reserve the right to ask anyone who comments to change their profile picture if we feel it is inappropriate for our website in any way. We may restrict an individual’s access to comments because of this, or delete comments. Individuals commenting may only use profile pictures for comments that they have a legal right to use and/or legal ownership of. If a photo, graphic, or image belongs to someone else, it may not be used on our website without the owner’s prior written permission.
At this time, if you have an online Avatar associated with your email address/Wordpress account that is rated as suitable for general audiences, it will show up when you comment.
Email Addresses Used for Comments
You may not use a false email address when signing up to comment or impersonate someone else. We reserve the right to report any cases of suspected fraud, harassment, or other legal issues that we may come across on our website, including from comments.
Review of Comments by Website Owner
The owner/operator of housegonesane.com reserves the right to monitor and respond to any and all comments. Comments are often held in moderation until we manually approved them. Please note that we do not respond instantaneously; we don’t always see comments at the exact time they’re made. This being said, there may at times be questions that go temporarily unanswered. Additionally, were someone to post an inappropriate comment that wasn’t moderated, it will be on our website temporarily until we have the opportunity to review and remove it. We reserve the right to remove any comments, and block comments from certain individuals or IP addresses for any reason and/or without giving a reason or notice.
We may contact you via email regarding a comment you made, such as if we found a reason it needed to be removed, if we need clarification on a question asked, or to notify you we responded to and/or approve your comment. By signing up to comment, you are consenting to us contacting you regarding your comments. If you don’t agree with this, please don’t comment/sign up to comment. Our contacting you via email regarding one or more comments doesn’t mean we have subscribed you to any of our automated email lists. We prefer to let you sign up yourself if this is something you want to be a part of.
Comments by Minors
We request comments be made only by adults or under direct parent/guardian supervision if the child is age 16 or older. Children under the age of 16 are not permitted to comment on our website. Please note that any additional governing laws where you live that pertain to minors and internet usage should be followed.
Info on Minors
House Gone Sane does not knowingly collect any personally identifiable information from children under the age of 16. If you are a parent or guardian of a child under the age of 16 and have reason to believe there is personally identifiable information of your child anywhere on our website, including in comments made by website visitors, please contact us immediately via email at [email protected] and we will do our best to promptly remove such information from our website, if that is the case.
Generated Content
Generated content directly on this website (such as comments on blog posts) or connected with this website (such as social media reposts/pins/comments) are made available for other public users/readers to access and view. You own the rights to any original content/comments you have posted on housegonesane.com or in connection with our website, but you agree to give us an unlimited license to share such content in other areas of the website or in emails to our subscribers. By sharing this content, you agree we may mention the contents of your generated content and we may mention the name you commented under so we can properly credit the individual it originated from. We may decide to mention certain comments and the name of the commenter within blog articles and/or other places on our website, or in emails to our subscribers.
You are only permitted to share generated content that belongs to you. You may not violate anyone’s copyrights, whether ours or that of another individual or company. You should also be aware that any comments you make on public platforms we use (such as Pinterest or social media) will be available for the general public to view.
Security
We strive to maintain strong security measures for our website, communications, and any personal information we collect. This includes our use of passwords, restricted access, and a firewall service. However, you use this website and communicate with us at your own risk, and you must acknowledge and agree that we are not liable for security breaches. If you do not agree to using our website at your own risk, please don’t use it.
General Conduct
By using our website, and/or contributing to comments or other generated content, you acknowledge that you are solely responsible for the way you use our website and for any electronic communication you make concerning us or our content. The general conduct/actions of anyone using housegonesane.com should be appropriate and legal.
Individuals who don’t have user/admin accounts are prohibited from trying to log in and/or attempt to hack our website, or to try to obtain website user or viewer information they are not entitled to. We reserve the right to block certain IP addresses and report any unlawful attempts on our website and business. IP addresses that try to hack us will be documented by our firewall service.
We reserve the right to report and take legal action against any individuals or groups of individuals that harass or threaten users of this website in any way, that send inappropriate messages, or display inappropriate behavior when communicating with us or website visitors.
Contacting Us
When contacting the website owner/users, it should be related to the website, and shouldn’t be with the intention of spamming or scamming those running the website. We are not accepting any email offers of services in connection with running our website/building our website/marketing/logo or graphic design, etc. We reserve the right to not respond to these types of messages, or any message for any reason, unless we are legally obligated to do so. We may also block messages from email addresses and people who send these types of messages.
Please note that by contacting us, you consent to us responding by email to your message, and we will respond as we see fit.
Termination
Our website is intended to be used in a legal and ethical way, and if you do not agree to using it as outlined in our Terms of Use and/or are going to use it in an illegal or unethical manner, you are prohibited from using our website in any way, unless and until you agree to our policies and will use our website appropriately. We reserve the right to block or ban anyone from this website for any reason or without giving a reason, as well as restrict access to things such as the ability to comment. If we decide to block or ban someone from our website, we may decide to keep this in effect permanently, even if the individual(s) decides thereafter that they would use our website appropriately.
Terms of Use Updates
We reserve the right to reword, update, and/or change our Terms of Use at any time as we see fit, and without notice, and any updates will be reflected on this page. The last update was on 06/09/2020. Thank you for respecting our policies and for following our Terms of Use, so we can keep our site running as smoothly as possible for all of our visitors, including you.
DISCLAIMER
All content including articles and all forms of media on housegonesane.com are for informational purposes only. No information, regardless of the format on our website/blog or in emails (including supplemental worksheets/printables, audio files, or other content within emails) sent to website visitors/subscribers should be considered as anything other than our personal opinions/views, nor should it be considered a substitute for legitimate professional, legal, financial, nutritional, and/or medical advice. No one is obligated to do things we have done or follow our tips, and we acknowledge that we are not experts. Before making decisions, you should seek information from qualified professionals, and you are also responsible for doing your own independent research.
Recipe/Food Disclaimer
Some of our articles are food related and we post original recipes. I am not a professional cook/baker; this is a hobby. It is up to you to decide what you will make and eat, to prepare your food safely, and to be aware of any allergies and/or health restrictions that would affect anyone consuming your food. Please see our full recipe disclaimer and disclosure policy here, and also note that the rest of our disclaimer and our limited liability policies as noted in our Terms of Use apply to this part of our website/blog.
Pregnancy/Parenting/Kids Disclaimer
I am not a medical professional or expert. Articles touching on parenting, kids, and pregnancy on this website are for informational purposes only, and you are responsible for doing your own medical research, making your own decisions, and consulting with appropriate medical providers/professionals concerning your family/children’s health care. The rest of our disclaimer and our limited liability policies as noted in our Terms of Use also apply to this area of our website/blog.
Disclaimer Policy Updates
We reserve the right to update our Disclaimer policy as we see fit, at any time, without giving prior notice. Changes will be reflected on this page. Last updated: 07/03/2019.
DISCLOSURE
Our website is designed to be monetized, however, you have free access to read any of the articles directly on our blog for as long as they are posted. House Gone Sane has business/financial relationships with certain companies, merchants, and individuals, and as a result we may have affiliate links or ads for ingredients, tools, services, or products used in connection with our articles that we feel are relevant and useful.
We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites.
The affiliate programs listed below are those we currently participate in and we may use their affiliate links:
Amazon Services LLC Associates Program
Moms Make Sense
Bluehost Affiliate Program
You are under no obligation to click on affiliate links or ads, and even if you decide to click on them, you are under no obligation to purchase anything. If you click on or purchase via one of these links, we may receive a small commission or be compensated in some way.
If you decide to click on an affiliate link or ad, the link will direct you to a third party’s web page where you have the option of purchasing a product or service. We periodically check that our links are working, but if you find one that is not leading where it should, we would appreciate you contacting us at [email protected] to let us know.
We may choose to do sponsored posts at times, and will disclose which posts are sponsored. Whichever company/merchant is sponsoring our post will either pay us or give us some other form of compensation by our featuring their product or service. You are under no obligation to read a sponsored post, or to purchase the product or service.
Any reviews we do are honest and based on our own opinions and experience with a product or service. Please note that results may vary, as do opinions. It is your responsibility to fully research products or services prior to purchasing them, and we are not liable or responsible for any negative experiences or disappointments from products or services we recommend, and/or that you buy through our affiliate links or ads. If you have a bad experience with a purchase, please contact the company or manufacturer it was purchased through and relay any issues directly to them.
We only choose to feature sponsored posts and affiliate links for products and services we have used or trust. We will turn down offers to feature products or services that we don’t trust, wouldn’t use ourselves, that don’t offer good quality for the price, and/or don’t coincide with our brand, message, and niche.
We choose affiliate links as our main source of income (versus excessive amounts of intrusive ads) because we find them to be helpful to people who choose to take advantage of them, but not disruptive to our website visitors.
We also use referral programs at times for products and/or services we use, such as the Living Well Planner and the Ibotta app.
We may receive a referral commission, reward, and/or fee if you choose to sign up or purchase through any of our referral links, at no extra cost to you.
We only recommend referral links for products or services we use and/or trust.
We report all of our income on taxes each year, and we strive to form financial/business relationships only with companies and/or individuals that conduct business legally in connection with our business relationship (to our knowledge.) If you have any legitimate concerns when it comes to potential legal issues with our website or companies we work with, please contact us at [email protected] with these concerns.
Disclosure Policy Updates
We reserve the right to update our Disclosure policy as we see fit, at any time, without giving prior notice. Changes will be reflected on this page. Last updated: 07/03/2019.
PRIVACY POLICY
We don’t sell or give out your information unnecessarily. We do collect limited ‘personal’ information and personal identifiable information through our site from visitors. Some of the information we have access to is collected by third parties, both on and off of our website.
Push Notifications:
As of 11/16/18, we have enabled push notifications through OneSignal, a third party company. Anyone who accesses our website on a browser or device that is supported by notifications through OneSignal and our website may choose to allow or block notifications at any time on their computer, mobile phone, or other supported device.
Some of the types of information collected automatically through OneSignal (according to their privacy policy,) that House Gone Sane may also be able to access are as follows:
~Web pages visited and information about those visits (e.g., session duration, time-stamp, referring URLs)
~What push notifications a person has been sent
~IP address, from which geographic location may be inferred, as well as system configuration information
~Email addresses (if OneSignal collects this- they are not needed to enable notifications)
~An End User’s browser info, such as, browser language type, the type and version of operating system (e.g., Android, iOS), network provider, language setting, time zone, device type (e.g., mobile, tablet); mobile browser (e.g. Safari, Chrome, etc.), and network status type (such as WiFi).
~”A unique cookie identifier, which may uniquely identify an End User (such as in de-identified or anonymous form).”
It is our policy that you only allow push notifications from us if you agree to both all of House Gone Sane’s Terms of Use and Privacy Policy and OneSignal’s Terms of Service and Privacy Policy (which you can choose to click on the links in this sentence to read OneSignal’s policies.)
Please note that OneSignal may also collect additional information that House Gone Sane doesn’t have access to, so please read their policies in full, to understand everything they collect and why.
If you want to unsubscribe from OneSignal notifications: Here are the instructions from OneSignal on how to unsubscribe, and note what you need to do may vary depending on your computer, device, or browser, so please follow the directions specific to you.
Cookies:
You have the option of disabling cookies on your browser, but this is not recommended for optimum online performance and may affect your ability to view certain parts of our website or other websites. Please refer to instructions specific for your browser for how to change cookie settings.
Cookies are often needed to track affiliate sales and may be included in automatically tracking other info from the third parties we work with. Some cookies are also necessary for a website to function.
Information Collected Through Our Site:
We collect email addresses and first names for those who willingly subscribe to email and/or comment on our posts/contact us, and general demographic information such as IP addresses and location is collected through servers used by our web-host Bluehost and programs such as ConvertKit, Google Analytics, OneSignal, the Evergreen Countdown Timer Plugin, and Pinterest. It is common for most websites to collect general demographic information as we do.
The Main Types of Information We Collect:
~IP addresses and location data (such as city/state/country)
~Time stamps, the number of website users at a given time/day, the length of sessions, number of pages visited, and bounce rate, specific URLs that were visited and how many visits to each page, traffic sources, (for instance, if someone was referred by Facebook or a search engine or another website,) etc.
~Cookies
~An electronic trail of how someone accessed our website (through what links, pages, or web searches)
~Internet service provider info, browser type, network status type, language setting, time zone,
type of device or mobile phone, specific search engines and search terms used to access our site- (For example, Google Analytics shows what percent of users are on a mobile phone versus computer, etc.)
~What push notifications website users were sent
~Data on clicks- what links/documents were clicked and how many times
~Numbers of social media saves and via individual third party social media platforms or search engines we may be able to access additional information, depending on a user’s privacy settings and what was shared or searched.
~Gender, language, and interests of some users- (This info is available on some users from social media platforms or search engines such as Pinterest- we don’t purposely get this data, but it is something we could access if you’ve given this info to a third party that shares it.)
The above types of data just mentioned are the main types of information we collect either directly through our site or that we have access to indirectly from third parties we integrate with or have business relationships with, and any types of info collected should fall under these categories. The different types of information discussed in this privacy policy that our website collects is to the best of our knowledge all the types of data we collect and/or access. However, as we are not technological experts, there may be additional technical data we are unaware that we have access to. In the event you become aware of any information collected by us or through third parties that we have access to, that we unknowingly failed to mention in this privacy policy, please contact us via email at [email protected] to make us aware so we can update our privacy policy.
Please note that just because we have access to certain types of information doesn’t mean that we use and access all the information we could. We are also not technological experts and don’t always know how to access some of the information we can. And as some info is collected automatically by third parties, we do not always need or use personally identifiable information available to us.
Pinterest business accounts for example, will reveal limited demographic info about an account’s audience- language, country and/or metro area where they are located, and gender and will also display pins you’ve saved from websites. By using their platform and depending on how your privacy settings are set, we may be able to access this information about you on our Pinterest account. (For more information on details collected through third-party companies that interact with our site, including other social media platforms, please read their individual privacy statements and terms of use and/or contact the companies mentioned directly with any questions.) Information that is collected in such instances (with the exception of our asking for emails/first names for those who subscribe, comment, or contact us) is often done automatically through these programs/companies/servers, and is not something we usually do on our website manually.
You should be aware that when we work with certain companies/vendors they may have access to some of the information collected through our website, such as our email service provider (ConvertKit,) and companies that we have business relationships with such as for using affiliate links, and they may access certain demographic data if you choose to click on their links. Please see the individual companies/vendors’ privacy statements/policies for more info on what they access. Please note that if you use our contact form, the plugin we currently use for this collects the following data: browser / user agent, referrer, IP address, server, etc. This is for protection against spam and abusive comments.
How We Use Information We Collect
Limited amounts of collected demographic information helps us determine what our readers find valuable on our site, which links are used, and helps us improve our website and business, which also benefits our website visitors. It aids us in tracking our flow of income, such as from affiliate links.
When we use information to make business decisions, we never base this on one person’s information; we look at numbers as a whole, and very rarely, if ever do we try to single out individuals from the overall data. For example, thousands of page views on a post may indicate to us that it’s a relevant topic, but we don’t comb through each website visitor to look at their IP or location.
Email addresses are used to email subscribers, reply to questions or comments, and as a layer of protection against comment spam. Some third parties we work require an email address to use their services or to purchase products.
Information collected from OneSignal’s push notifications allows us to notify users of updates and new posts, without them needing to provide us with an email address. (Please note that OneSignal may collect email addresses on their own.)
IP addresses are collected through a third-party plugin we use called Evergreen Countdown Timer, which allows us to offer a limited time deal with a timer set specifically for each individual that lands on certain pages, (instead of us only being able to do a sale on certain dates, which is more work for us and less convenient for new website visitors.)
We may use information collected to protect ourselves from spam or security threats, such as hacks. (For instance, we may block an IP address from accessing our website or commenting, or we may block entire continents or countries that have a high number of hack attempts on our website.)
We can’t track specific purchase or customer account details from purchases made through affiliate links, (although some of the third parties we integrate with do, they don’t share that with us,) only general and limited demographic information, such as the amount we earn through certain links, the number of clicks links or pages get, conversion rates, and/or the number of visitors to our website. With most of the data collected solely on our website, we wouldn’t be able to personally identify you without additional info, with few exceptions, such as the first name and email address we ask for if you want to subscribe/comment/contact us, which you are not required to do. Although IP addresses are considered personally identifiable information, we have never use someone’s IP address for the purpose of tracking down their personal name or personal identity, (although it does provide limited location info.)
Circumstances Where We Would be Obligated to Share Personal Information Collected
The only exceptions where we would give out personal information from our website visitors without their permission is if we were legally required to do so, if we needed to divulge someone’s info in order to take legal action against someone for violating our rights or the rights of other website visitors/users, if we had good reason to believe there were issues with copyright violations, and/or to protect someone’s safety including our own. In any of these cases, it is possible we would also reach out to a third party we work with to ask them to provide additional details to us or to authorities if necessary.
Request to Remove Personal Information from Our Site/Business
If you want personal identifying info removed from our site or any aspect of our business, which could include but is not limited to: an email address, comments, your first name, and/or a testimonial, please email us at [email protected] and we will process this request within 30 days and respond to you by email.
There may be some circumstances where someone requests that we remove data that they would need to contact a third party to remove (such as a social media platform,) or someone may request that we remove info we can’t, such as due to security or legal reasons.
Obtaining Contact Info
We never purchase personal contact information from other companies or individuals; (some businesses do this as a means of obtaining things such as personal phone numbers or email addresses.) If we don’t get your contact information directly from you or via a third party we work with that is openly connected with our business, we don’t want to use it.
Privacy Policy Updates
We reserve the right to update our Privacy Policy as we see fit, at any time, and without giving prior notice. Changes will be reflected on this page. Last updated: 06/09/2020.
QUESTIONS | CONTACT US
If you have any questions about our Terms of Use, Disclaimer, Disclosure, Privacy Policy, or need to contact us for any other reason, please use [email protected] to email us. Thank you.