Your place to discover great books. (I might be biased.)

Privacy Policy

Note: This document was written on October 21, 2021. It has been updated on February 7, 2022.

 

Who we are

This website’s address is: https://jeremybursey.com.

Jeremy Bursey is an independent fiction writer and author of short stories, novellas, novels, and blog articles, and this is his official author site. For inquiries about him or his work, this site is the best place to get that information. This site also serves as a central hub for Jeremy’s books, games, photos, and other media showcasing his work throughout the years. In some cases, this site may connect users to external sites for additional information or purchasing opportunities for said books or games. As of this writing, this site does not yet maintain its own commerce and transaction processing, but this may change in the future, as will this notice should that practice be implemented.

Please note that this privacy policy is a simplified version of the activities and practices this site employs to run efficiently and operate as a commercial-minded entity. This document is designed for ease of reading and understanding. For the comprehensive version, please consult this site’s official and live-updated privacy policy, cookie policy, and terms and conditions on the iubenda privacy and cookie solutions platform.

Also note that this site uses the WordPress platform to deliver its content. Therefore, this privacy policy adapts language from the WordPress privacy policy to ensure consistency of use. Additionally, it uses various plugins for design, security, analytics, and marketing, and each service will have its own section of disclosure. Some sections of the plugin information will also use the plugin’s exact language as taken from its own privacy policy language. The official policies hosted on iubenda will also give information and details on these services, including information on how to opt-out of tracking and information sharing if such an action is needed.

To better understand how you, the user, may interact with this site, it is important to understand the difference between anonymous and personally identifiable data.

Anonymous Data is data that cannot identify you specifically by name, address, phone number, gender, or anything physical in nature. Anonymous data is an online-only identifier (IP address, geolocation, device, browser, etc.) and could be anybody, anywhere, even though that anybody is you and your country, device, browser. You may know you’ve visited this site, but this site owner will not know unless you’ve specifically told him. Most data collected on this site is anonymous in nature. Exceptions will be noted wherever needed.

Personally Identifiable Data is data that can identify who you are. This includes data that asks for name and/or email address. Newsletter signups, contact forms, and most forms in general may ask for this information to personalize your service or ensure you get the service. Blog article comments may also use personal identifiers like name or username, email, and avatar image. No other part of this site will ask for personally identifiable information. This site uses personally identifiable data for direct communication only. It collects names, usernames, avatar images, and email address only, and only wherever the user agrees to share it.

Some plugins or services used on this site may require anonymous or personally identifiable data be shared with their servers or databases for the service to work as intended. This may include an email provider storing a user’s email address or a link tracker recording an IP address for analytics. The following sections will explain which services use which data and why. If you, the user, wish not to have your data collected in any form, then it is advisable to disable tracking via the cookie solutions manager at the bottom right of this screen (the white box with the green symbol) or exit this site immediately. Please also note that some plugins, services, or displays may not work as intended if cookies or trackers are disabled.

A Note about Minors: This site and its content are acceptable for users 13 and older. However, because this site links to online retailers like Amazon for book sales, it is recommended that visitors be at least 17 or older. No children under 13 should use this site without responsible adult supervision.

 

Comments

When visitors leave comments on this site, we collect the data shown in the comments form, and also the visitor’s IP address and browser user agent string to help spam detection.

An anonymized string created from your email address (also called a hash) may be provided to the Gravatar service to see if you are using it. The Gravatar service privacy policy is available here: https://automattic.com/privacy/. After approval of your comment, your profile picture is visible to the public in the context of your comment.

 

Media

If you upload images to this website, you should avoid uploading images with embedded location data (EXIF GPS) included. Visitors to the website can download and extract any location data from images on the website. Note: This may only be applicable to commenters and guest bloggers.

 

Cookies

If you leave a comment on this site, you may opt-in to saving your name, email address and website in cookies. These are for your convenience so that you do not have to fill in your details again when you leave another comment. These cookies will last for one year.

If you visit the login page, this site will set a temporary cookie to determine if your browser accepts cookies. This cookie contains no personal data and is discarded when you close your browser.

When you log in, this site will also set up several cookies to save your login information and your screen display choices. Login cookies last for two days, and screen options cookies last for a year. If you select “Remember Me,” your login will persist for two weeks. If you log out of your account, the login cookies will be removed.

If you edit or publish an article, an additional cookie will be saved in your browser. This cookie includes no personal data and simply indicates the post ID of the article you just edited. It expires after 1 day. Note: For bloggers.

For a list of all known cookies and their expected expirations, please consult this site’s cookie policy.

 

Embedded content from other websites

Articles on this site may include embedded content (e.g. videos, images, articles, etc.). Embedded content from other websites behaves in the exact same way as if the visitor has visited the other website.

These websites may collect data about you, use cookies, embed additional third-party tracking, and monitor your interaction with that embedded content, including tracking your interaction with the embedded content if you have an account and are logged in to that website.

Note: This site uses embedded YouTube videos for its video content. By watching a video on this site, you will automatically inform YouTube of your activity.

 

Who we share your data with

If you request a password reset, your IP address will be included in the reset email. Note: This applies to WordPress. Other plugins and services have other data sharing rules and will be explained in their respective sections.

 

How long we retain your data

If you leave a comment, the comment and its metadata are retained indefinitely. This is so we can recognize and approve any follow-up comments automatically instead of holding them in a moderation queue.

For users that register on our website (if any), we also store the personal information they provide in their user profile. All users can see, edit, or delete their personal information at any time (except they cannot change their username). Website administrators can also see and edit that information.

 

What rights you have over your data

If you have an account on this site, or have left comments, you can request to receive an exported file of the personal data we hold about you, including any data you have provided to us. You can also request that we erase any personal data we hold about you. This does not include any data we are obliged to keep for administrative, legal, or security purposes.

 

Where we send your data

Visitor comments may be checked through an automated spam detection service.

Note: The above data policies refer to WordPress and its blogging service and adapt its language. Each plugin and additional service used by this site will have its own set of data rules. Please read through each plugin and service description and be aware of what each item does to better inform you of what data is being shared with other services and how. In the case of plugins or services that do not provide a snapshot, site-friendly explanation for users of their services (site owners), this privacy policy will provide a link to their own. Each service’s privacy policy will provide complete information on how it operates, and this site suggests that any user concerned about privacy and data consult each site’s privacy policy for additional information and guidance on how they may be affected. Each plugin and service understands its usage better than this site can explain, so it is recommended that concerned users view the additional privacy policies provided. Once again, you may opt-out of any data sharing as you wish by visiting the opt-out page on that service’s website.

Additional Note: All external plugins and services will collect user data from this site to better provide the task or service for this site. Therefore, it should be assumed that, unless otherwise noted, all plugins transfer your information out of this site and onto theirs, regardless where they are hosted. This can include IP address, geolocation, and device and browser information, as well as time and date of interaction. Plugins that require names and/or email addresses will be explicit about their request and why they need it. This site does not use any plugin or service that will sell your information for its own marketing purposes. It will collect your information or pass it along to a related service strictly for operational use. Any marketing that may happen will be for the benefit of this site and its products and services, not the benefit of the provider of the plugin or service. Typically, these services market to the site owner, not its users.

Exceptions: This site does not yet use pixels or have an affiliation with any service, but it will do so eventually (and this policy will be updated when that happens).

Pixels work like cookies, in that they will install a line of code onto the user’s device or browser to collect certain data about that user’s site usage. The difference between the cookie and the pixel is that the cookie is used strictly on the site that installs it, for the benefit of improving a user’s experience, but a pixel will follow the user around the Internet as a way to understand which products or services the user wants. This helps site owners who use pixels to build “lookalike audiences” for advertising campaigns. This makes it easier for site owners who attract these users to invite them back to the site and its products through advertising (like Facebook Ads and Google Ads). In this way, the selling of the user’s information through use of these pixels is for the benefit of the site owner creating or maintaining a customer base. Any visitor who wants to remain anonymous will want to turn these pixels off. This site’s cookie solution manager allows users to block installation of the pixel. Click on the iubenda icon (white box, green symbol) in the lower right of the screen to access this feature.

Affiliate links also install a tracking code on the user’s device or browser, but these codes work only on the destination site, and only for a set length of time: example, Amazon.com (for Amazon affiliate links, 24 hours). The purpose of the affiliate link is to reward the link’s host (the site owner) with a small commission on any customer referral that leads to a sale on its site, even if the sale belongs to a non-referred item. For many site owners, this is what keeps the site’s operational costs manageable.

Once this site employs a tracking pixel and affiliate links, it will update this privacy policy.

 

Plugins and Services (Site Health and Performance)

 

Smush: An image compression service. (Policy adapted from Smush’s language.)

Smush sends images to the WPMU DEV servers to optimize them for web use. This includes the transfer of EXIF data. The EXIF data will either be stripped or returned as it is. It is not stored on the WPMU DEV servers.

Smush uses the Stackpath Content Delivery Network (CDN). Stackpath may store web log information of site visitors, including IPs, UA, referrer, Location and ISP info of site visitors for 7 days. Files and images served by the CDN may be stored and served from countries other than your own. Stackpath’s privacy policy can be found here.

Smush uses a third-party email service (Drip) to send informational emails to the site administrator. The administrator’s email address is sent to Drip and a cookie is set by the service. Only administrator information is collected by Drip.

Note: This site does not actively use Smush, but some existing images have been compressed with Smush.

 

WP Compress: An image compression service.

WP Compress is an optimization service that uses device intelligence to present the browser the best version of an image at the lowest required information size. It adapts images according to device and browser settings, and will use this information when serving the image.

It also uses other compression tools, like code minification (eliminating unnecessary spaces from code), to produce the best version of a loaded webpage.

For complete information on how WP Compress impacts user data, as well as how to opt-out of the data it uses, please visit its privacy policy here.

 

LiteSpeed Cache: A caching service for faster page loading. (Policy adapted from LiteSpeed’s language.)

This site utilizes caching in order to facilitate a faster response time and better user experience. Caching potentially stores a duplicate copy of every web page that is on display on this site. All cache files are temporary, and are never accessed by any third party, except as necessary to obtain technical support from the cache plugin vendor. Cache files expire on a schedule set by the site administrator, but may easily be purged by the admin before their natural expiration, if necessary. We may use QUIC.cloud services to process & cache your data temporarily. Please see https://quic.cloud/privacy-policy/ for more details.

 

Akismet: An anti-spam service. (Policy adapted from Akismet’s language.)

We collect information about visitors who comment on Sites that use our Akismet anti-spam service. The information we collect depends on how the User sets up Akismet for the Site, but typically includes the commenter’s IP address, user agent, referrer, and Site URL (along with other information directly provided by the commenter such as their name, username, email address, and the comment itself).

 

Wordfence: Site security.

To prevent hacking attempts, this site uses Wordfence to block malicious IP addresses and brute force attacks, as well as other necessary security measures to protect the integrity of this site. Although this service markets to site owners, it also employs cookies to better do its job at protecting sites. For a complete list of cookies used and when they expire, please consult Wordfence’s privacy policy and view its cookie chart. You may also consult its privacy policy to see if and how it affects the site user’s (your) personal data.

 

-Cloudflare: Site performance and security.

Cloudflare is the owner of this site’s SSL Certificate. It monitors incoming IP addresses and country geolocation for statistical and security purposes. It attempts to block any IP with malicious intent. It also reports bandwidth usage. Cloudflare may also use network and optimization tools to lower the size of delivered content to reduce bandwidth and improve site speed. The security and optimization data records it produces stays on the site owner’s Cloudflare dashboard. Statistics last for up to 30 days. For more information, please consult its privacy policy here.

 

Hide My WP Ghost: Site security.

This service provides added protection against brute force attacks, including login safeguards. It also allows for “ghosting” of common URLs related to this site’s theme provider. It collects IP data to determine who the attackers are and where they are coming from. It allows the ability to block these IPs from accessing this site.

 

WP Umbrella: PHP and site health monitoring service.

WP Umbrella is a monitoring service that looks for broken PHP scripts in the site’s code, including code used by its plugins, to better identify site problems. It also monitors site uptime and downtime, as well as plugins that need updates. Its use-case is designed entirely for the site owner’s information, but because it reads PHP information, it is worth noting its presence in this privacy policy. For more information on how WP Umbrella operates, please consult its own privacy policy.

 

Jetpack: Site charts and analytics.

Jetpack is a WordPress staple (by Automattic) that records link interaction, informing site owners which pages or links are popular. It will record IP address and geolocation information, as well as referral traffic sources for analytics. It will compile this information into charts and graphs for the site owner’s dashboard visualization. For a complete breakdown of what Jetpack (and other services by Automattic) collects from Users of this site (you), please consult its privacy page dedicated to “Visitors to Our Users’ Sites.” It includes information from all of its services, including Akismet (listed above).

 

Divi Builder: Site theme and page builder.

This site uses the Divi Builder for page design and theme editing. Even though Divi is based on the WordPress platform, it still relies on basic user data like IP addresses, geolocation, and device information to operate properly. Specifically, this information will determine how a page is displayed in the user’s browser, including those used by tablets and mobile phones. Certain items may also display or remain hidden depending on the user’s location or subscription status (if applicable) or A/B testing parameters. For a complete explanation of the data Divi and its host company, Elegant Themes, uses, as well as how to opt-out of the data it collects, please consult its privacy policy here.

Note: The Divi Builder uses Google Fonts for text display and style. Google Fonts uses an external platform for hosting and may install traffic cookies on your browser to optimize performance and viewing, as well as to permit this site to display it. Divi may also use Font Awesome for icon displays. Font Awesome also uses an external platform for hosting and may use traffic cookies for performance and optimization. Opting-out of cookies may, therefore, impact the way this site displays its pages, text, and icons, so be advised if you choose to block cookies on this site.

 

Plugins and Services (Information and Messaging)

 

Contact Form: Direct communication with site owner.

If a user needs to contact the site owner, he or she will likely use the contact form. This form will ask for name and email address, as well as confirmation of submission. On submission, the form will send the user’s name and email address to the site owner’s web account, provided by this site’s host, Hostinger, as well as the subject and content listed on the form. The anti-spam confirmation uses a math equation to ensure the user’s authenticity. The information sent to the site owner’s inbox will remain until deleted. Unless otherwise requested, to maintain records of communication, the site owner may keep the email message indefinitely. Exceptions will be made for junk mail, which will be deleted immediately.

 

SendFox: Email list collection for delivering newsletter information, product updates, and direct marketing to approved audiences.

Note: To prevent confusion, any previous reference to “site owner” will be changed to “list owner” in this section for the purpose of clarity.

This site offers a newsletter signup to visitors who are interested in receiving product and update information via email. That signup will put users’ email addresses on a list hosted by email list provider SendFox. In some cases, depending on the form used, the user may also be asked to include a first and last name. The information provided will then be stored on the list owner’s personal SendFox account, where only the list owner (the owner of this site, Jeremy Bursey) may access it.

The purpose of this email list is to provide opted-in subscribers with special information and offers via email. Subscribers (users) may unsubscribe at any time via a link inside of every email sent. Unsubscribing will remove users from receiving email from this list owner, but their name and email will remain on SendFox’s “unsubscribed” list for the list owner until manually removed. This prevents further email from being sent to the unsubscribed user by this list owner (unless the user specifically asks to re-subscribe). The continued existence of the user’s email on SendFox’s “unsubscribed” list until manual deletion is part of SendFox’s policies.

Within SendFox’s dashboard, the list owner may track which emails are opened, which ones are clicked (via internal buttons), and which ones result in an unsubscribed account. Each sent email will also have a record of which email accounts have interacted with the outgoing message.

Users who sign up to this list owner’s account with SendFox’s landing page (sendfox.com/zippywings) may be asked for both their names and emails, as well as a checkbox confirming the subscription. Users who sign up via the newsletter’s landing page on this site (to be covered more in the section for “Optinly”) may be asked only for an email address and confirmation checkbox. In either case, the new subscriber will receive a confirmation email requiring consent (via internal button click) before additional emails will be sent. This step is required as a condition for GDPR privacy rules and anti-spam regulations. New subscribers who fail to open this inaugural email or click on the confirmation button inside (this practice is called “double opt-in”) will not receive this site’s newsletter, but their names and email addresses will remain on the list owner’s contact list unless or until deleted.

 

Optinly: Pop-up manager, for signup forms and internal marketing.

This site uses templates for its various forms, including the form used for newsletter signups. In the case of newsletter signups, this site uses a pop-up service called Optinly to display the custom form. Users who subscribe to this site’s newsletter via this form will have their email addresses and marketing preference “yes” or “no,” as well as the subscription date and campaign name (a designation for which emailing sequence the subscriber will receive at signup) listed on the list owner’s (Jeremy Bursey) Optinly dashboard. Therefore, Optinly collects the email address and marketing approval and passes it along to SendFox, the list owner’s mailing list provider. Like SendFox, the subscriber’s email and marketing preferences will be stored on the list owner’s Optinly dashboard until manually deleted. To prevent double sign-ups, this information will be deleted only by the subscriber’s request or of an entity representing the subscriber’s interests (like a guardian or power of attorney).

Note: In the case of both SendFox and Optinly, email addresses may also be deleted from the list if the newsletter has too many unsubscribed or inactive users at a time when the service’s subscriber limit reaches near capacity.

Optinly also counts how many emails are opened, clicked, and responded to, but these values are stored on the list owner’s dashboard and do not report which email accounts have interacted with which emails. It just reports the statistics.

Email statistics for both SendFox and Optinly are important for tracking campaign and message effectiveness. Without it, the list owner may not know whether he is sending subscribers quality newsletters.

Regarding internal marketing, this site may also use pop-ups to direct site visitors toward certain promotions or points of interest. These are simply navigational tools, but they may also contain clickable buttons that will record link interaction and various data like IP and geolocation that goes standard with link interactions.

Note: This site actually uses two types of pop-ups: informative and promotional. Informative pop-ups require manual button-clicks to activate and are designated by the site’s “yellow buttons.” These pop-ups are easily identified by their gray backgrounds and site branding. They are implemented using a Divi third-party module called Divi Plus, which extends Divi’s usefulness as a page builder. Promotional pop-ups, on the other hand, may display depending on how far down the user scrolls on a page or when the user decides to leave the site. These pop-ups are managed by Optinly, and they rely on a user’s mouse position on the website.

For more information about what data Optinly collects, please consult its privacy policy. Note that this policy applies mainly to visitors and users of its own site and products, but it may contain information on how it collects data from users who interact with its service via third parties.

 

-LoopedIn: Roadmaps, updates, communication, and upvoting.

This site uses an embedded app called LoopedIn to display content information for upcoming or in-development projects via “workspaces,” which are essentially display tables of information. The host app, loopedin.io, keeps the workspaces on its site, but it also allows site owners to embed the workspaces and update widgets on their own site to maintain branding and easier reference for visitors. Each page that embeds a LoopedIn workspace on this site will also provide an external link to the source for easier reading and interaction.

Interacting with the embedded workspace is the same as interacting with the hosted workspace, and requires adherence to LoopedIn’s privacy policy and terms of service to use.

LoopedIn may collect user information, including name, email, and browser cookies to work effectively, as well as device information for proper displays. Any user who leaves a comment or subscribes to updates will be asked for name and email, and may also be asked to confirm registration. It should be assumed that giving LoopedIn this information will mean putting this information on its database for confirmation and subscription records. But even if the user does not leave a comment, an IP Address tracking cookie may still be installed to monitor sources for upvotes, preventing users from double-voting for the same item. LoopedIn may also record geolocation for audience reports.

Users who leave comments or responses agree to have their messages displayed to the public. These messages will remain visible unless or until the user removes it or asks for its removal. Users who subscribe to updates will offer their names and email addresses to LoopedIn, the facilitator of each workspace, not to this site or its owner. But this site owner will still be able to view subscriber information, including name and email addresses. Note: LoopedIn will not market to workspace subscribers. It will only email updates that the workspace operator (this site owner) posts to the updates board. It may also send comments or responses to any discussion the user subscribes to.

 

Gravitec: Push notifications.

This site allows for browser-based push notifications, which a visitor must double-opt-in to use. Gravitec will identify a user’s browser information upon visitation to determine whether to provide him or her a new invite for notifications (for those who do not accept or reject the invite) or a passive bell icon for those who interact with the invitation (by accepting or rejecting the invite). Users who accept the invite will “subscribe” to the push notification system, which will send information to the subscriber’s browser via “push notifications” whenever the site owner schedules to send it out. Subscribers are stored on the site owner’s Gravitec account indefinitely when active or for up to a month when inactive. Users who do not want push notifications can reject notifications or block them via their browser settings. Subscriber information is based on location, browser, and operating system. Locations can drill down to nearest big city.

For more information, please visit Gravitec’s privacy policy.

 

Plugins and Services (Traffic, Analytics, Sales, and Advertising)

 

Note: This section outlines the plugins and services that help this site improve its user interface, user experience, and its market and sales outreach, as well as monitor its most popular items and pages. Because this site is designed for the purpose of building its owner’s (Jeremy Bursey’s) author career, it uses these plugins and services to help further that goal.

Additional Note: Some plugins or services may be used temporarily to monitor trends in site usage or product interaction. Once the required information is gathered, these selected plugins or services will be disabled. Please consult the “Site Disclaimers” button at the top of the homepage to check the status of these temporary services before proceeding further into the site or its pages if you wish to remain hidden.

 

Google Analytics: Site analytics.

Google Analytics is the all-purpose analytics service that helps site owners determine audience engagement, audience types, campaign tracking, browser-to-buyer conversion, and any data that helps the site owners understand how users find, use, or interact with their sites.

The data it tracks include, in bulk, new user acquisition numbers, return visitor numbers, average time and duration of all visits, demographics of visitors, how users find the site (direct, referral, or organic), visitor geographic locations by country, visitor trends and events, popular pages by volume, and other information useful in determining site attractiveness to new and returning visitors, as well as referrals to site.

This site uses Google Analytics to identify visitor volumes and popular pages. It is concerned mainly with traffic size.

Note: Google seems to collect IP addresses to determine visitation categories (like new and returning visitor counts), but it does not pass that information along to this site’s analytics page. The information this site receives is based strictly on volumes. That said, if you’d rather Google Analytics not track you, you can download an opt-out browser add-on here.

 

Putler: Advanced e-commerce reporting and forecasting.

Putler works as a filtering and display device for sensible customer reports and e-commerce data. It reads existing data from visitor and transaction history and relays information in a user-friendly format, including graphs and projected customer growth. It also categorizes customer and product information for better reporting and segmentation. It connects primarily with payment centers (Stripe, PayPal, etc.) and Google Analytics for its data sourcing. The data it collects include customer-supplied information like name and email address, as well as product-centered transaction information, both for purchases and refunds. It essentially works as a master dashboard for multiple payment and customer information sources.

Note: This tool is not yet connected to this site. The site owner is waiting for compatibility with Google Analytics 4 and Amazon reports before that will happen. Once this site sells products directly, the site owner will also use it with Stripe payment information for better recordkeeping and sales forecasting information.

 

Linkjoy: Link shortener, biolink, and analytics tool.

Note: For the purpose of clarity, this description will refer to the “site owner” as the “link owner” and the “user” as the “link visitor.”

Linkjoy is a versatile service that makes link sharing easier for the link owner and link visitor. Source links are added to the link owner’s Linkjoy dashboard (on the Linkjoy product site) and assigned custom link names for easier identification or easier social sharing. The link owner chooses the custom name and can assign analytics tags, UTM tags, custom hover displays, GDPR consent requests, A/B rotation, and tracking pixels to any custom link he chooses for the purpose of tracking link popularity and audience interest. Linkjoy will collect the link visitor’s IP address, geolocation, and device and browser information for trend analytics and send it to the link owner’s dashboard for visualization. It will also record how many times a link is accessed.

The link owner may use Linkjoy-powered shortlinks on this website, or his social media and blogging channels, or in his books for easier sharing and/or monitoring the popularity of his recommendations. He may also use Linkjoy’s biolink designer for easier sharing of his digital portfolio. For more information on how Linkjoy operates, please consult its privacy policy.

 

-Switchy: Link shortener, biolink, and analytics tool.

Switchy does everything Linkjoy does, but has a better dashboard for organization and analytics display, and will therefore replace most, if not all of this site’s Linkjoy links moving forward.

Note: Linkjoy links have the lnkj.in shortlink, while Switchy links have the swiy.io shortlink.

 

-Jetpack: Site analytics.

For information on how this site uses this plugin’s analytics data, see Jetpack’s privacy information above.

 

-TruConversion: Heat-mapping, session recording, funnel, and feedback manager.

TruConversion helps this site’s owner understand how users interact with this site’s pages and links through visual analytics, “over the shoulder” feedback, and surveys. The service is installed via a script in the site’s header, and can therefore be blocked at the user’s choosing. Users can also choose to opt-out of TruConversion tracking across all websites that use it for additional privacy. TruConversion’s various services may require that it collects the following data from users of this site: IP address, geolocation, device used, browser used, operating system used, site referral, and date and time of interaction. All information collected from this site remains with TruConversion and is shared only with this site owner via the site owner’s TruConversion dashboard. Data is deleted from TruConversion’s servers once it is no longer needed or when new data replaces it.

Session recordings produce a screen capture video of user sessions that include mouse path tracing and scroll distance. The purpose of session recording is to identify drop-off trends and unpopular page locations to give the site owner an understanding what users like and do not like about the site. This information helps the site owner decide which pages to keep and which ones to modify to improve user experience. Recordings are stored on the site owner’s TruConversion dashboard for up to a year or until manually deleted (up to 1000 recordings). TruConversion records IP address, geolocation, device, browser, and operating system information, and date and time of session for analytics. These analytics may be compiled to show user trends to the site owner. No information from this service is shared outside of TruConversion or this site owner’s TruConversion account. It is intended for internal use only. Please consult TruConversion’s feature description for more information on how this works.

Note: Session recordings are a temporary measure for monitoring site use. Once enough information is gathered to identify a trend, the session recording feature will be disabled. This site’s “Site Disclaimers” pop-up screen at the top of the homepage will alert users when the recording feature is active or inactive. Also note that session recording may be reactivated whenever this site’s owner makes a change to the site and needs new feedback.

Heatmaps deliver trend reports statically by recording mouse hover timing, mouse clicks, and scroll distances, then compiling the data into a visualization chart that color-codes the resultant information. When activated, TruConversion will track mouse and scroll movement of a predetermined number of page visitors (from 100-100,000) on a predefined page or page series and compile the visualized information as a heatmap to this site’s owner’s dashboard. TruConversion will also generate a statistical report noting how many visitors are new and how many are returning. It will also note referral addresses. TruConversion may track IP address, geolocation, site, device, and operating system, date and time to produce more accurate heatmaps and trend reports. The site owner will be able to view an image of the page’s “heat,” which shows where mouse and scroll activity is most and least common on the page via “dots” and color gradation. These dots may reveal information about the source, including the abovementioned data points. Heatmaps will actively collect information until the limits are reached and the designated page campaign ends. Other heatmaps may be generated when new pages are created. Completed heatmaps may be archived or downloaded to the site owner’s personal device for historical reference.

Note: Heatmaps are page-specific, not site-specific. They are generated via HTML snapshots, which TruConversion copies onto its servers once the first visitor loads the page. Consult TruConversion’s feature description for more information on how this works.

Surveys and microsurveys may be used on certain pages for visitor feedback. Surveys will collect the user’s answers to posted questions for feedback purposes. Surveys may display to visitors depending on select parameters, including whether the visitor has answered the survey before. Any time a user hits “send” on a survey or microsurvey, the information will be saved on TruConversion’s servers, which will then be shared with this site owner via the site owner’s TruConversion dashboard.

Note: TruConversion provides an extra service to site owners called “Form Analytics.” This service uses a JavaScript enabled timer to track how long a user fills out the survey or labors over a particular answer. This feature is designed to help site owners understand how easily understood their forms are for users. Consult TruConversion’s feature description for more information on how this works.

For more information about how TruConversion works, how it uses your data, and how you can control your data, please consult its privacy policy here.

 

Content Camel: File hosting and downloads.

Content Camel is an independent content sharing service designed for internal company usage and feedback with the option to share files with external clients. This site uses Content Camel to share zip files with interested parties, including those containing Scrivener templates, Excel spreadsheets, and other helpful documents. Content Camel may also host some PDFs that would benefit from its flipbook feature. It counts views, likes, and downloads, but it provides no identifiable information outside of registered users (internal users only). Note: Some PDFs are hosted directly on this site and displayed through a native document viewer. The difference between native PDFs and those hosted on Content Camel is the flipbook feature.

 

-External Links and Backlinks: Connecting this site to other sites.

This site does not yet offer internal sales through its own storefront, but it does link to online book retailers, including Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Apple iBooks, and others via Universal Book Link (owned by Books2Read, using geolocation for accurate destinations) or direct linking for information, promotional, and sales purposes. These links may also use external shortening services for additional analytics or affiliate codes for referral commissions. When a user clicks on these links, it is understood that he or she agrees to the privacy policy, cookie policy, and terms of service of the destination site. It is also understood that this site is not bound to the policies of the destination site. Therefore, users who click on an external link do so at their own risk. To make click decisions easier for the user, this site employs a link color-coding system for easy identification, where red links lead to external sources and green links remain within this site. In a case where color-coding is not implemented, evidenced by a native “blue text link” that can be seen all over this privacy policy page, the user should read the destination link at the bottom left of the page for more information about where it leads.

 

reCAPTCHA v2

To prevent bots from abusing this site, certain forms may require a reCAPTCHA V2 submission. This cookie confirms the authenticity and humanity of its user, as well as confirm intention, and is therefore necessary for compliance. It may record the user’s IP address, geolocation, and user keystroke patterns to work properly. For more information on how it works and how it affects your privacy, please consult this page.

 

GDPR and CCPA

This site and its owner understands the importance of privacy and the user’s right to remain anonymous and forgotten. Even though only certain jurisdictions enforce privacy rights, this site owner believes that all users, regardless of location, should have that same right. So, this site employs a privacy and cookie policy that all users may access at will. By clicking on the iubenda icon at the bottom right of the screen (the white box with the green symbol), the user can customize his or her tracking experience, including the ability to disable all tracking on this site. Likewise, this site uses the iubenda service to store consent records, and users may request their data be removed from the site at any time.

The data collected on this site is used for delivering content appropriate to users, in its best form, including responsive content according to device settings. Therefore, it is recommended that users do not disable cookies if they wish to receive the best experience this site and its products or services have to offer. However, users who want to remain invisible still have the right to stay invisible, so users may disable cookies, trackers, pixels, etc. at will via the cookie settings box at the bottom right of the screen. This site has also provided the privacy policies of any plugin or service it believes the user may want more information about, regarding which data is tracked and how to opt-out of that service’s tracking ability if needed.

For more information on how cookies are used on this site, please consult this site’s cookie policy. Because these cookies are part of the services this site uses, this site’s owner may not know exactly how each one works, so it is advisable to reach out to the developers of these services for the best answer if any cookie creates a question. This site’s owner uses Google’s developer tools to find out which cookies are in use and reports what Google reveals. If in doubt, please disable cookies via the cookie solution manager in the bottom right of the screen (white box, green symbol).

 

Site and Data Security

This site uses several security measures to ensure its protection from malicious attacks. However, in the event of an unpreventable data breach, this site’s owner is obligated to inform its users. Because users are anonymous, it is impossible for the site owner to reach out to them individually, so he will alert site and newsletter subscribers via email, as well as post an alert to all visitors on his site of the problem. In the event that the site is compromised, the site’s owner will also close off user access to the main site until further notice. This may result in the site displaying a construction page on access with a note explaining the problem. This construction page will be generic and will neither collect nor contain user data, and it will remain in place until the problem is fixed.

 

Inquiries and Requests

Jeremy Bursey is the sole operator of this site; therefore, all inquiries and requests will be directed at him. You may contact him by site email:

jeremy@jeremybursey.com

or by personal email (for emergencies only):

zippywings@hotmail.com

or by regular mail (when all else fails):

3911 Melaleuca Lane
Lake Worth, FL 33461

 

A Note from the Site Owner (Jeremy Bursey):

Thank you for visiting my site. As a writer, I’m so focused on creating books that I don’t often get to flex my web design skills. So, I hope I’ve built a site that you enjoy visiting. It hasn’t been the easiest thing I’ve ever done, nor the quickest, but I’m glad I can finally share it with you and other readers like you. Thank you for stopping by and checking it out.

If you have any questions or feel I’ve left something important off this page, please don’t hesitate to reach out and let me know. I want to make this place as friendly and welcoming as possible, and your feedback can certainly help me make it better.

Thanks again.

 

–Jeremy Bursey