Privacy Policy

Under the Baobab is a small, independent project. This page explains, plainly, what information we collect when you use it, why, and what we do (and don’t do) with it.

What you can do without giving us anything

You can browse every proverb, search or filter by culture, and read in English or French without creating an account or giving us any personal information at all.

What we collect, and why

If you create an account (Google sign-in or email sign-in link), we receive your email address, and your name and profile picture if you use Google. This is used only to identify your account: sign-in itself is handled by our authentication provider, Supabase; we never see or store a password.

If you save favorites, we store which proverbs you’ve favorited, tied to your account, so they’re there next time you sign in.

If you set a reading theme (light, dark, or one of the color themes) while signed in, we store that choice on your account so it follows you across devices. If you’re not signed in, it’s remembered only in your browser’s local storage, on that device.

If you submit a proverb, we store what you submit (the proverb, its translations, meaning, and how you know it) along with your account, so we can review it. This is never published automatically: a real person reviews every submission before anything is added to the collection. You can optionally choose to be credited by name if your submission is published; by default, submissions stay uncredited.

If you send feedback, report a bug, or request a feature, we store your message and, if you choose to give one, a contact email, whether or not you’re signed in. We use this only to read and, where useful, respond to what you sent.

If you subscribe to the newsletter, we store your email address, your language preference, and your name if you give one, so we can send you the weekly proverb. You don’t need an account to subscribe. You can unsubscribe from any issue, and we never share the list.

What we don’t do

• We don’t run advertising or ad-tracking of any kind.
• We don’t sell, rent, or trade your information to anyone.
• We don’t use analytics that profile or track you across other sites.
• We don’t use cookies for advertising. Sign-in relies on your browser’s local storage rather than tracking cookies.

Who else sees it

We use a small number of service providers to run Under the Baobab, and your data passes through them as part of that:

• Supabase: our database and authentication provider. All account data, favorites, submissions, and feedback are stored here.
• Vercel: hosts the app itself.
• Google: only if you choose Google sign-in, to verify your identity. We don’t receive anything beyond your basic profile (name, email, picture).
• Sentry: error monitoring, so we can find and fix bugs. This captures technical details about what went wrong (like a stack trace and browser/device info), not the content of what you were reading or typing.

None of these providers are permitted to use your data for their own purposes. They process it only to provide their service to us. Depending on where these providers operate, your data may be stored or processed outside your own country.

The “Support this project” link opens Ko-fi, a third-party donation platform with its own privacy policy and terms. Anything you do there is between you and Ko-fi; we don’t receive personal or payment information about donations.

How long we keep it

We keep account data for as long as your account exists. Feedback and submissions are kept so we have a record of what was reported or proposed, even after review.

Your choices

There isn’t yet a self-serve “delete my account” button. If you’d like your account and associated data deleted, or want to know what we hold about you, reach out through the Feedback & contact link in the app (reachable from the footer without needing to sign in) and we’ll handle it directly.

Children

Under the Baobab isn’t directed at children, and we don’t knowingly collect information from anyone under 13.

Changes to this policy

If this changes, we’ll update the date at the top of this page. For anything material, we’ll look for a reasonable way to let signed-in users know.

Questions

Use the Feedback & contact link in the app for anything about this policy or your data.