Cookies
Effective: 8/19/26
The short version
Cookies are small files a website asks your browser to store. This site uses very few of them, and none for advertising.
- No advertising or retargeting cookies. No ad networks operate here. Nothing follows you off this site.
- Essential cookies only, unless you say otherwise. If you’re in the UK or EU, analytics stay off until you agree.
- You can say no and lose nothing. Every page works with analytics declined.
- The biggest cookie source on this site isn’t me it’s embedded podcast and video players. Section 5 explains that.
- Changed your mind? Clear cookies in your browser.
1. What cookies are, briefly
A cookie is a small text file stored by your browser when you visit a site. It lets the site remember something — that you dismissed a banner, or that this visit and your last one came from the same browser.
Related technologies do similar jobs: local storage (data kept in your browser rather than sent back with each request), pixels (a tiny image whose loading signals that you opened something), and device fingerprinting (identifying a browser by its configuration). I use local storage for preferences. I do not use fingerprinting, and I don’t permit vendors to fingerprint you here.
Throughout this page, “cookies” covers all of these.
2. How consent works here
If you’re in the UK, EU, or another region requiring prior consent: non-essential cookies are not set until you choose them. The banner appears on your first visit, refusing is as easy as accepting, and no pre-ticked boxes. Your choice is remembered for [6–12 months], after which you’ll be asked again. You can change it at any time.
If you’re elsewhere, including the US: analytics may run by default, and you can opt out at any time through the cookie settings or your browser. I honor Global Privacy Control (GPC) signals if your browser sends one, non-essential cookies are treated as declined.
Essential cookies don’t require consent and can’t be switched off, because without them the site doesn’t function.
3. What this site actually uses
| Category | What it does | Set by | Can you refuse? |
|---|---|---|---|
| Essential | Security, load balancing, remembering your cookie choice, making forms submit | [HOSTING PLATFORM] and me | No, the site won’t work without them |
| Analytics | Counts visits and shows which pages get read | [ANALYTICS PROVIDER] | Yes |
| Functional | Remembers preferences such as [dark mode / text size / dismissed notices] | Me | Yes |
| Embedded media | Set by third-party players when you load or play them | [YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, etc.] | Yes, see section 5 |
| Advertising | Not used | – | Not applicable |
The specific cookies
Fill this in from your own site — regulators increasingly expect named cookies, not just categories. Your consent-banner tool will generate the list by scanning the site.
| Name | Purpose | Type | Expires |
|---|---|---|---|
| [cookie_consent] | Stores your banner choice | Essential | 12 months |
| [__cf_bm or host session cookie] | Bot protection and security | Essential | 30 minutes |
| [_ga / analytics id] | Distinguishes one browser from another for visit counts | Analytics | 13 months |
| [preference key] | Remembers a display setting | Functional | 12 months |
4. Analytics, and why there’s so little of it
I want to know which posts get read. I don’t need to know who read them.
My analytics are configured to anonymize IP addresses, and I don’t use them to build profiles, follow individuals across sites, or feed advertising. I look at totals: page views, referrers, rough geography at country level.
5. Embedded players, social posts, and links
This is the part most cookie policies bury, so here it is plainly.
When a page includes an embedded podcast episode, a video, or a social media post, that content is loaded from someone else’s servers. Those companies can set their own cookies as soon as the embed loads, sometimes before you click play and I have no control over what they collect or how long they keep it.
Where I can, I use privacy-enhanced embeds and load players only after you click. Where I can’t, the honest answer is that interacting with an embedded player puts you under that company’s policy, not mine.
The same is true of every outbound link on this site, including links to booksellers, my publisher, and ShieldPerception.com. Once you leave, their rules apply.
6. Email
My newsletter isn’t a website, but it uses similar technology: my email platform records whether a message was opened and whether links were clicked. Blocking images in your email client stops open tracking, and unsubscribing stops all of it. There’s more detail in the Privacy Policy.
7. How to control cookies yourself
Beyond the settings on this site, your browser gives you full control. You can block all cookies, block third-party cookies only, delete what’s already stored, or browse privately. Look under Settings, then Privacy, in Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge.
Two things worth knowing:
- Blocking all cookies breaks a great many sites, including the ability of this one to remember that you declined analytics so the banner may reappear on every visit.
- Deleting cookies deletes your recorded preference along with them, which is why the banner returns after a clear-out. That’s the mechanism working correctly, not a dark pattern.
8. Changes
If I add a cookie or change providers, I’ll update this page and the date at the top, and where consent is required ask again rather than assume the old consent still covers it.
9. Questions
If something on this page doesn’t match what you’re actually seeing in your browser, I want to know; that’s a bug worth fixing.