Privacy Policy

In effect since September 20, 2020. First version, see attribution notice.

We do not sell or rent your Personal Information, nor do we give it to others to sell you anything. We use it to figure out how to make KnowledgePicker more engaging and accessible, to see which ideas work, and to make learning and contributing more fun. Put simply: we use this information to make KnowledgePicker better for you.

For the protection of KnowledgePicker and other users, if you do not agree with this Privacy Policy, you may not use our Services.

Contents

Types of Information We Receive From You & How We Get It

Your Public Contributions

When you make a contribution to KnowledgePicker, including on forum pages, you are creating a permanent, public record of every piece of content added, removed, or altered by you. The page history will show when your contribution or deletion was made, as well as your username. We may use your public contributions, either aggregated with the public contributions of others or individually, to create new features or data-related products for you or to learn more about how our services are used.

Account Information & Registration

Want to create an account? Great! Don't want to create an account? No problem! You are not required to create an account to read KnowledgePicker. However, if you want to contribute to KnowledgePicker by adding and editing content, commenting or rating, or if you want to follow others and keep bookmarks, you have to create an account.

To create an account, you can either use a third party login or create an autonomous KnowledgePicker account. We only require username, verified email address and password.

Your username will be publicly visible, so please be careful about using your real name as your username. Your password is only used to verify that the account is yours. Your verified email address is also required, and we store it to help prevent abuse. No other personal information is required: no name, no date of birth, no credit card information.

Once created, user accounts can be removed entirely at any time through KnowledgePicker account page. By deleting your KnowledgePicker account all your information will be lost. Your account will no longer be associated with any edit request changes or comments. However, the data itself will persist and will stay linked to our ghost account.

Location Information

When you visit any KnowledgePicker site, we automatically receive the IP address of the device (or your proxy server) you are using to access the Internet, which could be used to infer your geographical location.

Information Related to Your Use of KnowledgePicker

We want to make our Services better for you by learning more about how you use them. Examples of this might include how often you visit KnowledgePicker, what you like, what you find helpful, how you get to KnowledgePicker, and whether you would use a helpful feature more if we explained it differently. We also want this Policy and our practices to reflect our community's values. For this reason, we keep information related to your use of our Services confidential, except as provided in this Policy.

Information We Receive Automatically

Because of how browsers work, we receive some information automatically when you visit KnowledgePicker. This information includes the type of device you are using (possibly including unique device identification numbers), the type and version of your browser, your browser's language preference, the type and version of your device's operating system, in some cases the name of your Internet service provider or mobile carrier, the website that referred you to KnowledgePicker, which pages you request and visit, and the date and time of each request you make to KnowledgePicker.

Put simply, we use this information to enhance your experience with our Services. For example, we use this information to administer the site, provide greater security, and fight vandalism; customize content and set user preferences, test features to see what works, and improve performance; understand how users interact with KnowledgePicker, track and study use of various features, gain understanding about the demographics of the KnowledgePicker site, and analyze trends.

Information We Collect

We actively collect some types of information with a variety of commonly-used technologies. These generally include JavaScript and a variety of "locally stored data" technologies, such as cookies and local storage. We realize that some of these technologies do not have the best reputation in town and can be used for less-than-noble purposes. So we want to be as clear as we can about why we use these methods and the type of information we collect with them.

Depending on which technology we use, locally stored data can be anything from text, pictures, and whole articles (as we explain further below) to Personal Information (like your IP address) and information about your use of KnowledgePicker (like your username or the time of your visit).

We use this information to make your experience with KnowledgePicker safer and better, to gain a greater understanding of user preferences and their interaction with KnowledgePicker, and to generally improve our services. We will never use third-party cookies, unless we get your permission to do so. If you ever come across a third-party data collection tool that has not been authorized by you (such as one that may have been mistakenly placed by another user or administrator), please report it to us at privacy@knowledgepicker.com.

More on Locally Stored Data

Locally stored data and JavaScript help us do things like:

We believe this data collection helps improve your user experience, but you may remove or disable some or all locally stored data through your browser settings, depending on your browser. While locally stored data may not be necessary to use our sites, some features will not function properly if you disable locally stored data.

While the examples above concerning information about you collected through the use of data collection tools are kept confidential in accordance with this Policy, please note that some information about the actions taken by your username is made publicly available through public logs alongside actions taken by other users. For example, a public log may include the date your account was created on KnowledgePicker along with the dates that other accounts were created on KnowledgePicker.

How We Use Information We Receive From You

We and our service providers use your information for the legitimate purpose of pursuing our mission, including:

Operating KnowledgePicker, sharing your contributions and administering our Services.

We engage in these activities to manage our relationship with you, because we have a legitimate interest and/or to comply with our legal obligations.

Providing customized Services.

We will customize the Services, in some instances, at your direction; in all instances, in keeping with our legitimate purpose of pursuing our mission.

Sending emails with updates you have subscribed to.

We will send these types of emails to you only with your consent. We do not sell, rent, or use your email address to advertise third-party products or services to you. You can manage what kinds of notifications you receive and how often you receive them by going to your Notifications Preferences.

Improving KnowledgePicker and making your user experience safer and better.

We engage in these activities to further our legitimate purpose and/or to comply with our legal obligations.

Other

As stated above, we automatically receive the IP address of the device (or your proxy server) you are using to access the Internet, which could be used to infer your geographical location. We keep IP addresses confidential, except as provided in this Policy.

We use this location information to make your experience with KnowledgePicker safer and better, to gain a greater understanding of user preferences and their interaction with KnowledgePicker, and to generally improve our services. We also use Personal Information in the manner described in the sections of this Policy titled "For Legal Reasons" and "To Protect You, Ourselves & Others."

When May We Share Your Information?

For Legal Reasons

We will access, use, preserve, and/or disclose your Personal Information if we reasonably believe it necessary to satisfy a valid and legally enforceable warrant, subpoena, court order, law or regulation, or other judicial or administrative order.

We are committed to notifying you via email at least ten (10) calendar days, when possible, before we disclose your Personal Information in response to a legal demand. However, we may only provide notice if we are not legally restrained from contacting you and there is no credible threat to life or limb that is created or increased by disclosing the request.

Nothing in this Privacy Policy is intended to limit any legal objections or defenses you may have to a third party's request (whether it be civil, criminal, or governmental) to disclose your information.

To Protect You, Ourselves & Others

We may need to share your Personal Information if it is reasonably believed to be necessary to enforce or investigate potential violations of our Terms of Use or this Privacy Policy. We may also need to access and share information to investigate and defend ourselves against legal threats or actions.

We hope that this never comes up, but we may disclose your Personal Information if we believe that it's reasonably necessary to prevent imminent and serious bodily harm or death to a person, or to protect our organization, contractors, users, or the public. We may also disclose your Personal Information if we reasonably believe it necessary to detect, prevent, or otherwise assess and address potential spam, malware, fraud, abuse, unlawful activity, and security or technical concerns.

To Our Service Providers

As hard as we may try, we can't do it all. So sometimes we use third-party service providers or contractors who help run KnowledgePicker for you and other users. We give access to your Personal Information to these providers or contractors as needed to perform their services for us or to use their tools and services. We put requirements in place to help ensure that these service providers treat your information consistently with, and no less protective of your privacy than, the principles of this Policy.

Because You Made It Public

Any information you post publicly on KnowledgePicker is just that – public. For example, if you put your email address in your bio, that is public, and not protected by this Policy. Please think carefully about your desired level of anonymity before you disclose Personal Information on your user page or elsewhere.

How Do We Protect Your Data?

We strive to protect your information from unauthorized access, use, or disclosure. We use a variety of physical and technical measures, policies, and procedures (such as access control procedures, network firewalls, and physical security) designed to protect our systems and your Personal Information. Unfortunately, there's no such thing as completely secure data transmission or storage, so we can't guarantee that our security will not be breached (by technical measures or through violation of our policies and procedures).

We will never ask for your password by email (but may send you a temporary password via email if you have requested a password reset).

How Long Do We Keep Your Data?

Once we receive Personal Information from you, we keep it for the shortest possible time that is consistent with the maintenance, understanding, and improvement of our Services, and our obligations under applicable laws. Non-personal information may be retained indefinitely.

Please remember that any public contributions to KnowledgePicker, is archived and displayed indefinitely by design; the transparency of contributions and revision histories is critical to their efficacy and trustworthiness.

Where is KnowledgePicker & What Does That Mean for Me?

Our servers and data centers do not have to be located in your country. You understand that your Personal Information will be collected, transferred, stored, processed, disclosed and otherwise used as described in this Privacy Policy and that your information may be transferred to other countries, which may have different or less stringent data protection laws than your country, in connection with providing services to you.

Our Response to Do Not Track (DNT) signals

We are strongly committed to not sharing nonpublic information and Personal Information with third parties. In particular, we do not allow tracking by third-party websites you have not visited (including analytics services, advertising networks, and social platforms), nor do we share your Personal Information with any third parties for marketing purposes. Under this Policy, we may share your information only under particular situations, which you can learn more about in the “When May We Share Your Information” section of this Privacy Policy.

Because we protect all users in this manner, we do not change our behavior in response to a web browser's "do not track" signal.

Changes to This Privacy Policy

Because things naturally change over time and we want to ensure our Privacy Policy accurately reflects our practices and the law, it may be necessary to modify this Privacy Policy from time to time. We reserve the right to do so and will announce any such changes on our forum with sufficient notice.

We ask that you please review the most up-to-date version of our Privacy Policy. Your continued use of our Services after the first version or any subsequent version of this Privacy Policy becomes effective, following notice as outlined above, constitutes acceptance of this Privacy Policy on your part.

Contact Us

If you have questions or suggestions about this Privacy Policy, or the information collected under this Privacy Policy, please email us at privacy@knowledgepicker.com.

Thank You

We appreciate your taking the time to read this Privacy Policy, and we are very happy to have you contributing to KnowledgePicker and using our services. Through your contributions, you are helping to build a catalog of knowledge, an important collection of collaboratively picked and rated resources to help everyone learn from the best possible sources.

Attribution

This Privacy Policy is a modified version of Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. Privacy Policy available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License. As such these Terms are available under the same license.