Privacy

Third parties that run on this site

Up to three companies run code in your browser. Each one is here for a different reason, and each one can see something different. The first two run on every page of this site; the third runs on some. The one exception is the embeddable foliage map at /foliage/embed, which other sites place in a frame of their own: it loads none of the three.

PostHog — product analytics

PostHog records which pages are viewed and which links are clicked, along with the browser and device making the request and an approximate location derived from the IP address. So that it can tell one visit from another, it stores an identifier on your device — in your browser's local storage and in a first-party cookie of its own. It is what tells us which guides people actually read. Where consent is required, PostHog loads only after it is given, and not before.

Google AdSense — advertising, and the consent banner

Ads on this site are served by Google AdSense, which sets its own cookies and uses them to choose and measure ads. The consent banner is also Google's: it is a Google-certified consent management platform, and the choice you make in it is the signal the rest of this page refers to.

GetYourGuide — affiliate links

Some pages carry a GetYourGuide widget listing tours and activities: guides, place pages, collections and destination hubs about a place GetYourGuide covers. If you book through one, Ethos earns a commission at no extra cost to you, and GetYourGuide sets cookies to attribute the booking. Where consent is required, the widget loads only after it is given.

Cookies Ethos sets itself

Two, set by the site itself rather than by any of the third parties above, and neither used for advertising.

• A session cookie, which carries the flash messages you see after an action and, if you are signed in, the token identifying you. It is cleared when you log out.
• A remember me cookie, valid for 60 days, which keeps you signed in between visits. It is set only if you ask for it while logging in, and only for accounts. A reader who never signs in never receives one.

What the site records on its own servers

Each guide keeps a count of how many times it has been read. It is a single number on the guide, not a record of who read it.

If you make an account, Ethos stores the email address and username you give it and your password, hashed — the password itself is never stored and cannot be read back. It also stores what you do with the account: the guides you write, the comments and suggestions you leave, and the thumbs up and thumbs down you give, each recorded against your account. It also records any badges you have earned — for each, the badge's name and the date it was awarded. Deleting an account or its contents is a request to the site owner.

Changing your mind

The consent banner can be reopened, and the choice you make in it replaces the one before. Refusing after having accepted stops the scripts loading on your next page view; it does not reach back and delete what was already collected.

Every cookie described here, first-party and third-party alike, can be cleared in your browser's settings, and your browser can be told to refuse them.

Contact

For a question about any of this, or to ask what is held about you, contact the site owner.