Effective date: October 26, 2026
This Privacy Policy explains what information /S (Slash Sarcasm) (“we,” “us”) collects at www.slashsarcasm.com (the “Site”), how we use it, and your choices. The Site is owned and operated by Mark “Doc” Woodworth, an individual, in the United States.
Short version: we collect as little as we can, we don’t sell your personal information for money, and the ads and analytics on this site use cookies that you can control.
1. Information you give us
- Contact form: your name, email address, topic, and message.
- Satire submissions: your name or pen name, email, optional X/social handle, your submission, optional bio, credit preference, and your agreement to our Submission Terms. If we publish your piece, the name/pen name and bio you chose become public. Your email is never published.
- Newsletter: your email address (and name, if you give it) when you subscribe. Our newsletter is delivered by MailerLite, which stores your address and records whether emails are opened or clicked. You can unsubscribe with one click in any email.
- Comments: your name, email, optional website, and comment. WordPress also records your IP address and browser info to help catch spam. All comments are held for review and appear only after Doc approves them. Comments may be checked by an automated spam service (Akismet, operated by Automattic, or Antispam Bee, which runs locally). Your email is never shown publicly. Approved comments stay public until removed; ask us any time to delete yours.
- Support/tips : payments are handled by a third-party payment service such as PayPal, Ko-fi, or Buy Me a Coffee. We never see or store your card number.
2. Information collected automatically
When you visit, our host (Mocha Host) and WordPress automatically log basic technical data such as IP address, browser type, device, pages visited, and the referring site, for security and to keep the Site running.
3. Cookies and similar technologies
Cookies are small files stored by your browser. We and our partners use them to: – Make the site work (e.g., remember your cookie choices, keep spam out of forms); – Measure traffic (Google Analytics); – Show and measure ads (Google AdSense and its partners); and – Track affiliate referrals (e.g., Amazon).
You can block or delete cookies in your browser settings and change your choices any time using the cookie settings link at the bottom of every page. Blocking some cookies may affect how the Site works.
4. Google Analytics (via Google Site Kit)
We use Google Analytics 4 to understand how many people visit, which pages are popular, and where visitors come from. Google collects this data using cookies and similar technology. We do not use it to identify you personally. Learn how Google uses data at policies.google.com/technologies/partner-sites. You can opt out with the Google Analytics Opt-out Browser Add-on.
5. Advertising (Google AdSense)
We use Google AdSense to show ads, which helps keep the Site free. – Third-party vendors, including Google, use cookies to serve ads based on your prior visits to this website or other websites. – Google’s use of advertising cookies enables it and its partners to serve ads to you based on your visit to this site and/or other sites on the Internet. – You may opt out of personalized advertising by visiting Google Ads Settings (or My Ad Center). You can also opt out of some third-party vendors’ use of cookies for personalized advertising at www.aboutads.info/choices and, in the EU/UK, www.youronlinechoices.eu. – Other third-party vendors and ad networks may also serve ads on this Site. – If you opt out, you’ll still see ads; they just won’t be personalized.
6. Affiliate links and Amazon Associates
Some links on the Site (for example, links to Doc’s Books or recommended products) are affiliate links. If you click and buy, we may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. Affiliate partners may use cookies to know the sale came from us.
7. How we use information
To run and secure the Site; answer messages; review, edit, publish, and credit submissions; send the newsletter you asked for; measure traffic; show ads; prevent spam and abuse; and comply with the law.
8. How we share information
We do not sell your personal information for money. We share it only with service providers that help run the Site (our host Mocha Host, MailerLite, Google, Formidable Forms (our form tool), our anti-spam service, and payment providers), when required by law, or to protect the Site and its users. If the Site is ever sold or transferred, information may go with it under this policy.
9. Your US state privacy rights (California, Colorado, Virginia, and others)
Depending on where you live, you may have the right to know what personal information we hold, to get a copy, to correct it, to delete it, and to opt out of “sale” or “sharing” of personal information for targeted (cross-context behavioral) advertising. We do not sell personal information for money. However, advertising and analytics cookies may count as “sharing” or “selling” under some state laws. – Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information: use the cookie settings link in our footer to turn off advertising cookies, or contact us. We honor Global Privacy Control (GPC) browser signals where required. – We will not treat you differently for exercising your rights. We may need to verify your request. You can use an authorized agent.
10. Visitors from the EEA, UK, and Switzerland (GDPR)
If you visit from these regions: our legal bases are consent (non-essential cookies, analytics, personalized ads, newsletter), contract/steps you request (handling your submission), and legitimate interests (security, spam prevention, basic site operation). You can ask to access, correct, delete, restrict, or port your data, object to processing, and withdraw consent at any time; and you can complain to your local data protection authority. Before any non-essential cookies load, you’ll be asked for consent through our consent banner (Google-certified consent management). Your data is processed in the United States; our providers use legally recognized transfer safeguards such as Standard Contractual Clauses.
11. Children
The Site is satire for adults and is not directed to children under 13 (or under 16 in the EEA/UK). We do not knowingly collect their personal information. If you believe a child has sent us information, contact us and we will delete it.
12. How long we keep information
- Comments: approved comments until removed; spam/rejected comments auto-deleted by WordPress within [30] days.
- Contact messages: up to [24] months, then deleted.
- Rejected submissions: deleted within [12] months.
- Published submissions: kept as long as the piece is online, plus records of your license agreement.
- Newsletter: until you unsubscribe (then kept only on a suppression list so we don’t email you again).
- Analytics: per Google Analytics retention setting ([14] months).
- Server logs: per our host’s standard schedule.
13. Security
We use HTTPS, keep software updated, and limit access to the people who run the Site. No website is perfectly secure, so please don’t send sensitive information (like ID numbers or health details) through our forms.
14. Links to other sites
We link to other sites, including X and the sources we satirize. Their privacy practices are their own.
15. Contact
Questions or privacy requests: admin@slashsarcasm.com or our About page.
16. Changes
We may update this policy. We’ll change the effective date above, and for big changes we’ll post a notice on the Site or in the newsletter.
This page is the one thing on the site that isn’t satire.