I am creating this Privacy Policy in an attempt to appease the EU GDPR gods who have NO authority over me as a citizen of the United States of America, but who believe they have the right to disrupt the life of every small time blogger in America and instill fear and apprehension.
The information available to small time bloggers is so difficult to understand and contradictory that no one can possibly cut through all the garbage and understand half of it.
This Privacy Policy is my attempt to cover my behind and not get sued.
So below I am going to paste in something offered by MailerLite, my email subscription service provider, try to fill in the details, and hope that this will appease the overreaching EU bureaucracy WHO HAS NO AUTHORITY OVER ME AS A U.S. CITIZEN in the off chance someone decides that some homeschooling mom in the Midwest needs to be sued for $20 million.
And I also added a cookie acceptance plugin that now shows up at the bottom of my site.
The Really Big Stuff to Get Out of the Way
First, the most important disclaimers. I know they are important because fancy lawyers always make sure these are included everywhere.
The information on this blog is meant for the sole viewership of friends and acquaintances of Sallie Ann Borrink. Batteries not included. Your actual mileage may vary. Not recommended for children under the age of 3. Part of a complete breakfast. Store at room temperature. Do not attempt this at home. May contain an occasional pit. Tag may only be removed by consumer. Some assembly required. Do not use if seal is broken or missing. Taxes and destination charges not included. Use only as directed. Keep out of the reach of children. Must take delivery from dealer stock by June 30. Duplicate entries will not be honored. Subject to dealer participation. Do not use while operating heavy machinery. Some restrictions may apply. Choking hazard: contains small parts. Winners must sign affidavit of eligibility. Void where prohibited. Not redeemable for cash. May cause irritation – consult your doctor. If you are pregnant or nursing a baby, you do not need to seek the advice of a health professional before using this product. Not for resale. Activation charges may apply. Not responsible for items left in vehicle. The Surgeon General has determined that laboratory rats are born with cancer. Unlimited use per household.
The Important Stuff I’m Going to Include Because MailerLite is in the EU and Has Fancy Lawyers So They Must Know More Than Me, A PROUD CITIZEN OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, with No Budget for Lawyers because I’m Busy Trying to Homeschool My Daughter and Make a Living So I am a Productive Member of Society
Sallie Borrink, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, and my contact form can be found here;
The Information I Collect and How I Use It:
- If you sign up to receive my newsletter, I collect whatever real or fake name you provide and the email address that you provide. I also have access to your IP address and it gets recorded in my system.
- If you sign up to participate in my forum, I collect whatever real or fake name you provide and your email address. I also have access to your IP address and it gets recorded in my system.
- If you purchase something in my printables shop, I collect whatever real or fake name you provide and your email address so I can send you your materials. All payments go through PayPal so I know nothing of your financials. I also have access to your IP address and it gets recorded in my system.
- If you purchase something in my shop, there is a menu of selections regarding how you ended up on my site to purchase the item. I see that piece of information as it comes through in a sale notification email and it makes me happy to know how people got here. That’s it.
- I use your information to send you the newsletters you sign up for, to look for trolls in my forum so I can delete them, and to send you products that you request from me.
- I have a love-hate relationship with advertising on my site. Currently I am not using ads. I suspect at some point that will change (again) and then the advertising company I use will have their own system of tracking in place to show you ads. At that point, I will copy and paste their greatly detailed, EU GRDP privacy policy written by their fancy, exorbitantly paid lawyers so you will know that this is happening.
I’m a reasonable person who respects your privacy. You are free to opt out at any time. Do any of the following.
- Simply unsubscribe from my newsletter using the unsubscribe button on the bottom of every single one.
- If you want me to delete something you’ve written in my forum, let me know.
- If you want me to delete your purchases from my store, let me know.
- You have a right to have your information deleted and I am more than happy to do so if you contact me.
I use several third-party services to keep this site up and running. They all have their ways of storing your data and since they all have a team of lawyers, I’m fairly confident they know what they are doing. These are the ones I can think of off the top of my head. If I can come up with any others, I’ll list them here. If you think I’ve missed one, please contact me.
- Amazon Affiliates
- MailerLite
- GoogleAnalytics
- WordPress
- StatCounter
- UpDraft
- Mozy
More Fancy Wording I Think I Should Include
This privacy policy sets out how SallieBorrink.com uses and protects any information that you give while using www.SallieBorrink.com
Should we ask you to provide certain information by which you can be identified when using this website, you can be assured that it will only be used in accordance with this privacy statement.
Sallie Borrink may change this policy from time to time by updating this page. You should check this page from time to time to ensure that you are happy with any changes. This policy is effective from March 9, 2018.
MailerLite for Email Subscriber Contact
I use MailerLite to manage my email marketing subscriber list and to send emails to my subscribers. MailerLite is a third-party provider, which may process your data using industry standard technologies to help me monitor and improve my newsletter.
MailerLite’s privacy policy is available at https://www.mailerlite.com/privacy-policy.
You can unsubscribe from my newsletter by clicking on the unsubscribe link provided at the end of each newsletter.
Fancy Wording Provided by WordPress
“When visitors leave comments on the 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.
If you upload images to the 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.
If you leave a comment on our 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 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.
If you have an account and you log in to this site, we 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, we 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.
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 tracing your interaction with the embedded content if you have an account and are logged in to that website.
Visitor comments may be checked through an automated spam detection service.
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.”
Amazon Affiliate
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.
Links to Other Websites
Our website may contain links to other websites of interest. However, once you have used these links to leave our site, you should note that we do not have any control over that other website. Therefore, we cannot be responsible for the protection and privacy of any information which you provide whilst visiting such sites and such sites are not governed by this privacy statement. You should exercise caution and look at the privacy statement applicable to the website in question.
That’s All Folks!
That’s all I’ve got. If you think I missed something important, please let me know. If you want more detailed information, please let me know.
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I love this! Thanks for the smile.
You’re welcome! I decided instead of being in a bad mood this morning dealing with it I would have some fun. 🙂
Oh my goodness, I LOVE this! My sentiments exactly as a blogger. You made me belly laugh this afternoon. I needed that!
This is incredible. Best. Privacy. Policy. Ever. 🙌🙌🙌
Love this. My sentiments exactly! Well, to be honest, my sentiments included some bad words. Actually quite a few bad words. This whole GDPR thing is just ridiculous. Thanks for the laugh, I needed it today too!
This is perfection 🙂
As a reader who lives in Europe, I find this disclaimer really insulting and childish. This is not about imposing on your rights as a “Proud US Citizen” but is instead to do with the fact that if you want to do business (i.e. be read by others who then click your affiliate links and make you money through that and adverts) around the world, then you have to comply with the laws of each country. If you don’t want to do that then you can simply fit an app that blocks readers from anywhere outside of the US and not have to deal with these laws.
It’s really sad how some people have reacted to these changes and made it a patriotism issue rather than just a business one.
Personally, I am happy to comply with the laws around the world so that I can blog to as many people as possible. That kind of inclusive lifestyle appeals to me, no matter what country I am proud to live in.
Hi Honour,
Thanks for leaving your comment. A couple of things I would say in response.
One, maybe you missed it but a large part of this was meant to be humor in an attempt to deal with how ridiculously stressful the entire GDPR has been for not just big time corporations, but the little people such as myself. The laws are vague and the apparent stakes are ridiculously high. For small time bloggers such as myself, the entire thing is ridiculous. Lots of people found this page last week and saw the humor in it because I think it expressed what so many people have been thinking and feeling.
Two, although I do not discuss politics on my website I did make a point of emphasizing that I am a US citizen not to be “patriotic” but because I am a believer in the rule of law. If the USA passed a law like this, I would complain loudly about the burden is places on small businesses but I would comply because I live here. If you remember, we did fight a war over principles such as not being ruled by people who give us no say.
I’ve already had to block people in the EU from purchasing my products in my printables shop because I have neither the time nor the inclination to deal with VAT. Again, the EU can do whatever they want, but that doesn’t mean I have to comply. So, yes, I do know what it is like to make a business decision based on what is happening in the EU.
I did not take the step of blocking people in the EU from accessing my site because, again, the guidance on what it means to be “in the EU” has been so contradictory. I’ve read it doesn’t mean an EU “citizen” but only if you are physically present in the EU. Again, it’s very confusing and someone like me does not have the time or resources to deal with this ridiculousness. If they want people to comply, they should make it easier to do so.
I do care deeply about privacy. I recently left Facebook completely. Not solely over the privacy issue, but it certainly made it easier to follow through on my decision to leave for other reasons. I’m not afraid to act on my beliefs.
If you read more of my site, you would quickly see that I am not a fan of bureaucracy. I am not a fan of nameless and faceless bureaucrats making decisions whether it is about education or parenting or any other number of areas of life. My view is that the EU is one of the ultimate examples of this. If I had been able to vote in Brexit, I would have voted Leave for sure.
I hope that helps you understand a little better the reasoning behind this Privacy Policy.
Sallie