Who we are
My name is R. Eric Reuss. I make board games (among other things) and post information about them and the boardgame industry (among other things) at https://rericreuss.com.
Formally, this website is owned and operated by Lightning Heart Games LLC, my sole-member game design company. At the moment, I’m the only person maintaining it, but I might get some help with that someday.
What personal data we collect and why we collect it
This site is primarily about publication, not conversation. At the moment I’m writing this (December 2020), the only personal data I collect is if you sign up for occasional emails from me.
However, it’s possible that someday I might enable comments, image uploads, logins, or other features. I’m including privacy information for those features at the bottom of this page, just in case, while putting the more immediately relevant bits here up top.
Email list
If you sign up for emails, your email address, name (optional), and types of emails you’d like to receive are stored with / processed by Mailchimp, a mailing-list and marketing provider. You can read more about Mailchimp’s privacy practices here.
We won’t sell or trade your email address, and every email sent through Mailchimp will have an unsubscribe link.
This data will be retained indefinitely, for ongoing use in contacting you (or in not contacting you, if you have unsubscribed). If unsubscribing is insufficient, you can contact me to delete your info from Mailchimp altogether.
Embedded content from other websites
Articles on this site might include embedded content (e.g. videos, images, articles, etc.). If so, that embedded content is not under my control, and will behave the same way as if you visited the other website. They might collect data about you, use cookies, embed 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.
Our Contact information
For a full rundown of how to get in touch with me online, visit the Contact page.
My mailing address is: Lightning Heart Games LLC; PO Box 1342; East Arlington, MA 02474. Note that until the Covid-19 pandemic is past, I will be picking up mail infrequently – please be patient, and reach out online if you need a quick reply.
Hosting
This site runs on a server hosted by GreenGeeks, who are based out of California in the USA.
And now, for the more hypothetical items:
Comments
If you leave a comment, we collect the data shown in the comments form, and also your 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 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.
Cookies
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 visit our login page (assuming site logins are ever enabled), 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.
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.
- An anonymized hash of your email address may be provided to the Gravatar service to see if you are using it; see “Comments” above.
- If you sign up for email updates, your email, name (if provided), and what you’re interested in being emailed about will be sent to and processed by Mailchimp, see “Email List” above.
Hosting and Security
This site runs on a server hosted by GreenGeeks, who are based out of California in the USA. Their Data Processing Agreement covers how they handle Customer Personal Data. I’m not a lawyer, but to me the bits that seem most relevant (plus my non-lawyerly summary) are:
- 3A/3J (they’ll only access data in order to provide services / do what I request them to do)
- 3B (their employees are to maintain confidentiality)
- 3C (company-level GDPR compliance)
- 3F (if I stop running this site, they won’t retain its data)
- 3H (they may use 3rd-party / 3rd-country subcontractors, so long as they ensure privacy laws are followed).
Aspects of the site under my control follow good security practices, such as requiring HTTPS connections and using strong passwords. My hosting credentials are not shared with anyone. (Except in the event of my death, disappearance, or incapacitation, in which case my wife will gain access. She’s a sysadmin, and taught me half of what I know about computer security.)
Data breaches
If I become aware of a data breach, I will try to email affected people as soon as reasonably possible. However, I’m a one-person show, so if my personal life is in crisis for some reason I may be slow about it, and if I run into obstacles (eg: database corruption) I may not have the wherewithal or resources to overcome them.