Privacy notice
Draft for review before launch.
The short version
- You can read Joylet without an account, and Joylet itself sets no cookies for readers.
- We collect what we need to send the newsletter, to review the stories you send us, and to count reading and sharing without knowing who you are.
- We do not sell your information, and we use no advertising trackers.
If you sign up for the newsletter
We keep your email address, whether you have confirmed or unsubscribed, how often you want the email (weekly or daily), where on the site you signed up (for example, the end of a story or the newsletter page), and the dates you signed up, confirmed and left. We also store a random code that makes the confirm and unsubscribe links in your emails work.
We use this only to send you the newsletter and to learn which sign-up spots on the site work.
If you follow a story
We keep your email address, the story you follow, whether you have confirmed or unfollowed, where on the page you pressed Follow, the dates you followed, confirmed and left, and a random code that makes the confirm and unfollow links work. We also record which updates we emailed you, so nobody gets the same update twice.
We use this only to email you when that story has a verified update. Following a story does not sign you up for the newsletter, and unfollowing one story does not affect any other.
If you send an update on a story
We keep what you type into the “Know what happened next?” form: how you are connected to the story, the update, any link, and your name and email address if you give them, with whether we may contact you. Editors use this to check the update. We publish only what an editor has confirmed, credited to the source they confirmed it with, and we never publish your email address.
If you send us a story or a nomination
We keep everything you type into the submission form: the title and the story, who it is about, whether they know and agree, how you know them, any link and photo note, your name and email address, and your answers about credit, children and consent. If the link that brought you to the form carried a campaign tag (such as utm_source=newsletter), we keep that tag too.
Our editors use this to review your story, to check it, and to contact you about it. We publish only what an editor approves, and we never publish your email address. The submission terms cover the rest.
When you read or share a story
When you read a story, your browser tells us which story it was and how far through it you got, in quarters (0, 25, 50, 75 or 100 percent). If you arrived through a shared link, we also note the channel tag in that link, such as whatsapp.
When you press a share button, we record the story, the channel (such as WhatsApp or copy link), where on the page the button was, which wording the button showed, and how far you had read.
These counts carry no cookie, no account and no IP address, and they are not linked to you or to each other.
Your IP address
Every website receives the IP address of the device that visits it. When you sign up, send a story, or when a read or a share is recorded, our server turns your IP address into a one-way hash: a scrambled code made with a secret key. We store that code, with a counter, only to limit how many times one connection can do these things in an hour, so nobody can flood the site. Old counters are deleted automatically within a day.
We do not store your IP address itself, and the code is kept apart from your newsletter, submission, reading and sharing records.
Our hosting provider may keep standard server logs, which include IP addresses, for a short time for security.
Cookies
Joylet sets no cookies for readers. The only cookie we set is a sign-in cookie for our editors, named joylet_admin, which lasts up to 12 hours and is used only in the editing tools.
Videos in stories
Some stories include a video player from YouTube or Vimeo. The player loads from their servers, and they may collect information, including through cookies, under their own privacy policies when it loads or when you press play.
Analytics
We may use Plausible Analytics to count visits. Plausible sets no cookies and stores no personal data. It counts things like page views and which sites sent visitors to us. When it is switched on, its script loads from plausible.io.
We send email through Resend, a company that delivers email for us. Resend handles your email address and the message in order to deliver it: confirmation emails, the newsletter and submission receipts.
Sharing to other services
When you share a story to WhatsApp, Facebook, X or by email, you leave Joylet, and that service’s own privacy policy applies.
How long we keep it
- Newsletter: while you are subscribed. When you unsubscribe, we keep your address marked as unsubscribed so we do not email you by mistake. Ask us and we will delete it completely.
- Submissions: while we review them, and for a published story, as the record of what you agreed to. Ask us and we will delete a submission we have not published.
- Reading and sharing counts: these are anonymous, and we keep them to learn which stories readers value.
Your choices
You can ask us what we hold about you, ask us to correct it, or ask us to delete it. Write to hello@joylet.com from the email address in question.
Children
You must be 16 or over to send us a story. We do not knowingly collect information from children under 16.
Contact
Questions about this notice go to hello@joylet.com. When this notice changes, the new version will appear on this page.