page 3 of 4

Factoid #1: Many cookie programs are not particularly interested in your name, except perhaps for silly messages like "Welcome, Alex". It is not reasonable for most non-commercial sites to require or actually validate a "real" user name. The general rule of thumb should be: is anything of monetary value being exchanged here? For most non-commercial sites that issue cookies, a unique anonymous id number should satisfy most content control issues.

Factoid #2: Commercial sites where money is exchanged for goods or services, in which you are actually transacting business, may require your legal name, but this should only be on a "secure site" (encrypted). Summitlake.com does not transact business and has no need of being a "secure site". If we ever encrypt anything, we'll let you know upfront.

Factoid #3: So far as we know, it is impossible (or least very impractical) to distinguish between a user who has never had a cookie, from a user who rejects them. To get a better idea why, check out the URL listing under "Privacy 4".

When we surf, we may leave much less of an audit trail than the media leads us to believe. This fact, as much as any other, led directly to the "popularity" of cookies among those who run websites.

Privacy 3: Although it is almost impossible to transact business on the internet without cookies or passwords, some people strenuously object to cookies as an invasion of their privacy. This right must be respected.

Privacy 4: To see what information your ISP transmits when your browser requests a web page, please click on the following URL now:

http://www.summitlake.com/cgi-bin/test/env_info.cgi

You should be able to see a display of the entire packet your browser sends when it requests a page. In particular, the variable named REMOTE_USER would give your username if available. You should verify that it lists as Not Defined; very few ISP's will still supply this information any more.

Summitlake.com Privacy Policy: We reserve the right to control and maintain any content posted on this site. Content on this site is generally available for viewing by anyone, unless protected by password or server permissions.

Privileges to add, modify or delete any content on this site will require either (1) user acceptance of "cookies", or (2) a login procedure consisting of a username and password. In many cases, we will make an effort to supply both options.

The simplest option is to set your browser to accept cookies, or notify you before sending or accepting cookies, which is what you and most users have already been doing all along.

If you reject either option, you are still free to browse content that is not otherwise restricted. Or, you may write to: webmaster@summitlake.com. Exceptions to our policy may be denied at our discretion, or, there may be no coding mechanism in place to support such an exception.

It should go without saying that posting of blatantly inappropriate content in update areas of this site is not tolerated, but we're saying it anyway. We call the shots in this regard, and reserve the right to do so.

Summitlake "Open Door" Cookie Coding Standards: Because the widespread use of cookies needs to be taken seriously and to be better understood, we took the unusual step of defining our "cookie policy" guidelines first, and making our standards public, before completing the actual programming code to implement it.

BACK | NEXT