Privacy Policy | Taciturn Studios

1. Who We Are

Taciturn Studios LLC ("we", "us", or "our") operates the website taciturnstudios.com. We are an independent digital publishing company. This Privacy Policy explains how we collect, use, disclose, and safeguard your information when you visit our website.

For questions about this policy, please use our contact form.

2. Information We Collect

We may collect the following types of information:

Account information: If you create an account, we collect your name and email address via our OAuth login provider.
Purchase information: When you buy an ebook, payment is processed by Stripe. We do not store full card details. We receive a transaction reference and your email to fulfil your order.
Contact form submissions: Name, email address, and message content when you contact us.
Usage data: Pages visited, time on site, referring URLs, browser type, and device type, collected via our analytics provider (Umami — privacy-friendly, no cross-site tracking).
Cookies: See Section 6 for full details.

3. How We Use Your Information

To process and fulfil ebook purchases.
To respond to contact form submissions.
To send transactional emails (order confirmations, download links).
To send our newsletter, if you have opted in (you may unsubscribe at any time).
To improve our website and content through aggregated analytics.
To serve relevant advertisements via Google AdSense (see Section 5).
To comply with legal obligations.

4. Legal Basis for Processing (GDPR)

For visitors in the European Economic Area (EEA), we process your data under the following legal bases:

Contract performance: Processing necessary to fulfil your purchase.
Legitimate interests: Analytics to improve our site, fraud prevention.
Consent: Newsletter subscription, advertising cookies. You may withdraw consent at any time.
Legal obligation: Where required by applicable law.

5. Third-Party Services

We use the following third-party services that may process your data:

Google AdSense — serves advertisements on our site. Google may use cookies to show personalised ads based on your browsing history. See Google's Privacy Policy.
Stripe — payment processing. See Stripe's Privacy Policy.
Amazon Associates — we participate in the Amazon affiliate programme. Clicking affiliate links may set Amazon cookies. See Amazon's Privacy Notice.
Umami Analytics — privacy-friendly analytics with no cross-site tracking and no personal data sold to third parties.
Resend / MailerLite — email delivery for transactional and newsletter emails.

6. Cookies

We use the following categories of cookies:

Strictly necessary: Session authentication cookies required for login and checkout. These cannot be disabled.
Analytics: Umami analytics (privacy-friendly, no personal identifiers).
Advertising: Google AdSense cookies for ad personalisation. These are only set with your consent.

You can manage your cookie preferences at any time via the cookie consent banner or your browser settings. Withdrawing consent for advertising cookies will switch AdSense to non-personalised ads mode.

7. Data Retention

We retain personal data only as long as necessary for the purpose it was collected. Account data is retained while your account is active. Purchase records are retained for seven years for tax and legal compliance. Contact form submissions are retained for up to two years.

8. Your Rights

Under GDPR and applicable privacy laws, you have the right to:

Access the personal data we hold about you.
Request correction of inaccurate data.
Request deletion of your data ("right to be forgotten").
Object to or restrict processing of your data.
Data portability — receive your data in a machine-readable format.
Withdraw consent at any time (where processing is based on consent).
Lodge a complaint with your local data protection authority.

To exercise any of these rights, please use our contact form.

9. Children's Privacy

Our website is not directed at children under the age of 13. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children. If you believe a child has provided us with personal data, please contact us and we will delete it promptly.

10. Changes to This Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. Changes will be posted on this page with an updated "Last updated" date. We encourage you to review this policy periodically.