Bipolarist is a magazine, not a data business. We don’t sell, share, broker, or build profiles from reader behavior. What we collect is enough to know which essays land and which don’t—nothing beyond that.
Google Analytics 4
We use Google Analytics 4 (GA4) to track aggregate site usage: which pages you visited, how long you stayed, what device you’re on, and which country you connected from. IP addresses are anonymized before they reach GA4. GA4 sets cookies named _ga and _ga_* that expire after 13 months.
For visitors connecting from the EEA, the UK, or Switzerland, GA4 loads only if you click Accept on the cookie banner. If you decline, GA4 never loads and no analytics cookies are set. Elsewhere, GA4 loads by default. A stored choice in your browser’s localStorage always wins on later visits, and the banner won’t reappear once you’ve decided.
What we collect without a cookie choice
Cloudflare Web Analytics runs at our content delivery layer regardless of consent. It is privacy-friendly by design—no cookies, no fingerprinting. Cloudflare collects aggregate request data (pageviews, country, browser family) for security and performance purposes. We have no way to opt this off short of moving off Cloudflare entirely.
Our server (Opalstack) keeps standard access logs for ~30 days: timestamp, requested URL, response code, originating IP, and user-agent string. These are used only for debugging and security—not for analytics, profiling, or advertising.
What we don’t do
- We don’t sell, rent, or share your data with third parties
- We don’t serve display ads or work with ad networks
- We don’t build behavioral profiles or cross-site tracking
- We don’t use session replay, heatmaps, or scroll recording tools
- We don’t run pixel trackers for Meta, X, TikTok, LinkedIn, or any other ad platform
Newsletter and contact
Bipolarist publishes a newsletter on Substack. Subscribing means giving Substack your email address; their privacy policy governs what happens to it. We can’t see who subscribes by name through Substack’s dashboard except in aggregate.
The contact form sends your message to [email protected] and stores nothing on the server beyond the time it takes to send. We use simple spam protection (honeypot fields, basic rate limiting) but no third-party CAPTCHA that profiles you.
Opting out of GA4 after-the-fact
If you accepted earlier (or GA loaded by default outside the consent region) and want to opt out now, set localStorage.cookie_consent to denied for www.bipolarist.com, or clear that key so the banner returns on your next visit from a consent region and you can choose Decline. Or install Google’s browser opt-out extension for site-wide GA4 opt-out.
EEA / UK / Switzerland readers
Under GDPR and the UK GDPR, you have the right to access, rectify, or delete data we hold about you. Since we don’t identify visitors individually, “data we hold about you” for most readers is limited to aggregate GA4 records that cannot be tied back to a specific person. If you contacted us directly and want your email and message deleted, write to [email protected] and we’ll comply within 30 days.
California readers
We do not sell personal information under the CCPA definition. We do not knowingly collect personal information from California residents under 16.
Changes to this policy
Material changes will be reflected in the “Last updated” date at the top of this page and in our editorial policy. We don’t silently rewrite privacy terms.