Privacy & Cookies

Last updated: 26 October 2026

Site operator: Dmytro Gladush. For privacy questions, use the contact form.

This notice explains how the Matter As Machine website handles information when you browse, sign in through Patreon, or contact the project.

Patreon login and access

Public articles can be read without an account. When you sign in, we receive your Patreon user ID, display name and membership information for this project. We store your account creation and login times, membership tier and status, access-check and validity dates, and any manual access grants.

Patreon access and refresh tokens are kept in protected server-side session storage so we can verify your membership. They are not sent to browser JavaScript or stored in the membership table. We do not receive your Patreon password or card details, and our login does not request your email address.

We use this information to provide sign-in, membership access and account administration. Payments, subscription changes and refunds are handled by Patreon, not by this website.

Messages and attachments

If you use Messages, we store your messages, any article link you include, uploaded attachments, replies, timestamps and read status. These conversations are available to you and the site administrator, not published as public comments. Please do not include sensitive information you do not need to share.

The public contact form also works without a Patreon account. It stores your message, chosen subject, time sent, and any name or reply email you voluntarily provide. These submissions are visible only to the administrator, who can mark them as read or delete them. They are retained until removed by the administrator; deleting a Patreon-linked website account does not automatically identify or delete separately submitted public-form messages.

To limit spam, the form checks a session token, submission timing and a hidden bot-trap field. Rate limits use a keyed daily hash of your network address rather than storing the raw address in the contact database. Obsolete rate counters are removed after two days. This does not remove IP addresses from ordinary hosting access logs.

Membership events and technical logs

We retain a limited history of authenticated Patreon callbacks to investigate membership and payment-access problems. It contains the event type, receipt and completion times, reported membership/payment status, a link to an existing site account, saved access levels before and after processing, and a processing result.

We do not store the complete webhook payload, signatures or credentials in this history. Account deletion clears the event’s link to your account, while the technical event record remains. Hosting access logs may contain IP addresses, request paths, browser information and timestamps for operating and securing the site.

Cookies

This is a first-party session identifier, not an advertising cookie. It also protects the public contact form against forged submissions. The session data is stored on the server. The production cookie uses HttpOnly, Secure and SameSite=Lax protections. You can remove or block it in your browser, but signing in, account features and the contact form may stop working.

Analytics and service providers

The homepage includes a live Manifold prediction-market embed that loads automatically. Visiting the homepage sends requests from your browser to Manifold and its service providers, revealing your network address and browser information. Manifold may use its own cookies, browser storage and analytics. The embed is hosted separately from this website and does not receive your website account or Patreon credentials from us. See Manifold’s privacy policy.

Some pages load Cloudflare Web Analytics to measure visits and page performance. Cloudflare states that this service does not use cookies or localStorage for analytics and does not track visitors over time using IP addresses or fingerprinting. Loading the analytics script still involves requests to Cloudflare; see its service description and privacy policy.

Our infrastructure is hosted with DigitalOcean. Patreon handles authentication and membership payments. These providers may process information in countries other than yours under their respective arrangements and policies. See DigitalOcean’s privacy policy and Patreon’s privacy policy. Links to X, YouTube and Patreon take you to services with their own privacy practices.

The website does not currently include advertising pixels or advertising cookies. We do not sell your personal information.

Retention and deletion

Account and conversation records are retained while your account exists. You can request account deletion from your profile after reauthorising with Patreon. Deletion removes the live website account, conversations and related attachments, and clears the account link in retained membership-event records. Limited technical records and older backup copies may remain after deletion.

Deleting the website account does not delete your Patreon account, cancel your subscription or issue a refund. You must manage those separately on Patreon.

Your choices and contact

Depending on the law that applies to you, you may have rights to access, correct, obtain a copy of, delete, restrict or object to the use of your personal information, and to contact a data-protection authority.

For privacy questions or requests, use the public contact form. No website or Patreon account is required. If you want a reply, provide an email address in the optional reply field; it is not displayed publicly. Signed-in users can also use private messages. We may need to verify your identity before handling an account-specific request.