This site collects no more data about you than most other websites.

Comments, trackbacks, and pingbacks may be published, and except in very limited circumstances, will be a permanent part of this site. If you decide to comment, link, or pingback to a post or article, you must keep this in mind.

This privacy policy will be reviewed, and may be revised, from time to time. You may wish to revisit it regularly.

Public data and publishing Browsing this site doesn’t reveal your identity publicly, though see Private Logging later in this document for more information.

Author identification When posting a comment or other information, a name and email address may be required. You do not have to select your real name. Your email address will not be published.

Comments, trackbacks, and pingbacks will be identified by your IP address. These numbers could potentially be traceable to identifying information about you, whether it is your home ISP or the University or Work account where the IP address is registered. Your IP address could potentially be used in conjunction with other data to identify you.

If you are concerned about attempts to match your IP address to your identity, you may wish to use an anonymous browsing service or attempt some means to obfuscate your real IP address.

Cookies for commenters and authors This site uses cookies to aid contributors with remaining logged in. Additionally, ShieldsGroup works with third parties that may be placing and reading cookies on your users’ browser, or using web beacons to collect information, in the course of ads being served on your website.

You may wish to clear these cookies and the browser cache if you wish to refrain from revealing any identifying information, especially if you are using a public or shared computer.

Private logging Any time you visit a page on the internet, you send quite a bit of information to the server. The webservers that host this site maintain access logs with the information that you send. This information is used to provide site statistics and to get an idea of popular pages and what sites link here. We do not intend to use these logs to identify legitimate users.

The data logged may be used by us to solve technical problems with the site and, in cases of abuse of this site, to investigate the abuse.

Data release policy Our policy is to only release the data we collect in the following circumstances:

• As required by law, such as in response to a valid request from law enforcement.
• To designated third parties to resolve or investigate abuse complaints.
• When the information is related to spiders or bots, usually when investigating technical issues.
• For abusive users, we may release information to assist in attempting to block the abusive user or to complain to that user’s Internet Service Provider.
• If necessary to defend legal claims against us by third parties.
• When we deem it necessary to protect the property or rights of the user community, or this website.

No selling of information We will not sell information collected via this site, such as your email address, to third parties.

Information security We make no guarantee that the information that you provide us will be secure.

(This document was adapted from one placed in the public domain by Jordan Hatcher at opencontentlawyer.com, with the warning that, while Jordan is a lawyer, he’s not your lawyer. The standard OwnTerms disclaimer applies: OWNTERMS IS NOT A LAW FIRM AND DOES NOT PROVIDE LEGAL SERVICES. DISTRIBUTION OF THESE DOCUMENTS DOES NOT CREATE AN ATTORNEY-CLIENT RELATIONSHIP. OWNTERMS PROVIDES THIS INFORMATION ON AN “AS-IS” BASIS. OWNTERMS MAKES NO WARRANTIES REGARDING THE INFORMATION PROVIDED, AND DISCLAIMS LIABILITY FOR DAMAGES RESULTING FROM ITS USE.)

We use third-party advertising companies to serve ads when you visit our website. These companies may use information (not including your name, address, email address, or telephone number) about your visits to this and other websites in order to provide advertisements about goods and services of interest to you. If you would like more information about this practice and to know your choices about not having this information used by these companies, click here.