Website Privacy Policy and Data Protection Guide

Last updated: 12 June 2024

About This Privacy Policy

John Marks Records publishes this website to share recordings, artist features, and writing on audio engineering and classical music. This policy explains what happens to data when you visit jmrcds, why we handle it, and the choices you keep over it.

We wrote it to be read, not skimmed past. If a section raises a question, the Contact Us page is the fastest route to a human answer.

This policy covers only this website. When you follow a link to a streaming platform or an external store, that provider's own terms take over.

Information We Collect

Most of what reaches our servers is ordinary technical housekeeping. The rest you hand over deliberately.

Log data

Like nearly every website, ours records standard log information when a page loads: your IP address, browser type and version, the pages you viewed, and the time of the request. This data keeps the site running and helps us spot a broken page before a visitor has to report it.

Contact form data

If you write to us through a form, we receive the name, email address, and message you choose to send. We use that information to reply — nothing more.

Newsletter and research subscriptions

Should you sign up for an occasional newsletter or a research mailing on audiophile recordings, we store the email address you provide until you ask us to stop. Every message includes an unsubscribe link.

How We Use Your Information

The guiding rule is narrow purpose. We use what we collect for three things, and we resist the temptation to find a fourth.

• Improving the experience. Knowing which articles readers actually reach helps us decide what to write next and where the navigation trips people up.
• Performance monitoring. Aggregate analytics show us load times and error rates, so a slow page in a particular browser doesn't go unnoticed.
• Communication. When you provide contact details, we use them to respond to you or to send the mailings you requested — and only those.

We do not sell personal data. We have never built a business around it, and we have no plans to start.

Cookies and Tracking

Cookies are small text files a website stores in your browser. Ours fall into three groups, and you control all of them.

Strictly necessary cookies

These remember your consent choices and keep a session working as you move between pages. Without them, basic functions break, so they cannot be switched off from within the site.

Analytics cookies

These record visit patterns and performance figures in aggregate — which pages draw attention, how quickly they render. They help us improve the site rather than identify you personally.

Advertising cookies

We do not run advertising today. If that changes, advertising cookies used for personalization would be introduced only with clear notice and consent, and this policy would be updated to describe them.

Third-Party Integrations

A modern website rarely runs on a single machine, and ours is no exception. A handful of trusted providers handle the plumbing.

Analytics vendors

We rely on a third-party analytics service to compile the aggregate figures described above. These providers process technical data under their own privacy terms.

Hosting and infrastructure

Our pages are served through a content delivery network and hosting infrastructure that, by design, process IP addresses to route requests and block malicious traffic.

Advertising partners

None at present. Were we to add advertising partners in the future, we would name the relationship here with its scope, rather than leaving it implied.

Because some of this processing happens on systems we don't operate, our control over it is shaped by each provider's own practices — a limit worth naming plainly.

Data Subject Rights and Retention

The data is yours, and the controls reflect that.

Your rights

• Access. You can ask what personal data we hold about you.
• Deletion. You can ask us to erase it, and we will unless a legal obligation requires us to keep a record.
• Opt-out. You can decline analytics tracking through our consent controls or your browser.

To exercise any of these, write to us through the Contact Us page. We aim to respond promptly to every request.

How long we keep data

We hold information only as long as the purpose requires. Server logs rotate out within a short window. Contact messages stay until the conversation is resolved and a reasonable period after. Newsletter addresses remain until you unsubscribe.

When data reaches the end of its useful life, deletion follows our standard procedure: records are removed from active systems, and backups age out on their normal cycle.

Policy Updates and Contact Information

This policy will change as the site does. When we make a meaningful revision, we update the date at the top of this page and, for significant changes, post a notice on the site.

Questions about how we handle your information are always welcome. Reach us through the Contact Us page, and read alongside our Terms of Service for the wider agreement that governs use of this site.