Privacy Policy

Last updated: September 25, 2026

SpecDevShip ("SpecDevShip," "we," "us," or "our") respects your privacy. This Privacy Policy explains what information we collect when you visit our website or purchase our products, how we use it, and the choices you have.

1. Information We Collect

Information you provide directly:

• Email address — when you sign up for the free Field Guide or otherwise join our mailing list.
• Name (optional) — if you provide it when signing up or at checkout.
• Payment and order information — when you purchase the Skill Pack, checkout is handled by Polar, our merchant of record, which collects your payment details and the billing information needed to calculate tax. We receive a record of your order — such as your name, email address, the amounts paid, any discount or referral code used, and the order date — but never your full payment card details.
• Your GitHub account — the Skill Pack is delivered as access to a private GitHub repository, so your GitHub username is shared with us, Polar, and GitHub to grant that access, and it's visible to us as a collaborator on the repository.
• Contact form messages — your name, email address, and message when you use the contact form on our website.
• Anything you send us directly — for example, if you email us with a support request or refund request.
• A record of your signup — when you join our mailing list, we keep the date and time, the form you used, and the wording you agreed to, as a record of your consent.

Information collected automatically:

• Basic usage and analytics data — such as pages visited, referring source and campaign, device/browser type, approximate location (derived from IP address), and which buttons and forms are used (for example, whether a signup succeeded). We collect this with Umami, a privacy-focused analytics tool that doesn't use cookies, doesn't track you across other websites, and doesn't receive your name or email address. If your browser sends a Do Not Track signal, your visit isn't recorded.
• Bot-protection signals — when you use our contact form, Cloudflare Turnstile checks that the request comes from a person rather than an automated program. To do this, Cloudflare processes information about your browser and device, including your IP address.
• Referral codes — if you arrive through a link containing a discount or referral code, that code is stored in your browser's local storage for up to 30 days so it can be applied at checkout.
• Cookies and similar technologies — we don't use cookies for analytics or advertising. Some services that help run the site, such as our bot protection, may use cookies or similar browser storage that are necessary for them to work. You can disable cookies through your browser settings; doing so may affect some site functionality.

We do not knowingly collect any special categories of sensitive personal data (such as health, financial account, or biometric data) beyond what's needed to process a standard payment transaction, which is handled by our payment processor.

2. How We Use Your Information

We use the information we collect to:

• Deliver the products you've requested or purchased (for example, emailing you the Field Guide, or granting your GitHub account access to the Skill Pack);
• Credit sales to the discount or referral codes used, for example to reward partners who referred you;
• Send you the email sequence associated with signing up for the Field Guide, including occasional promotional messages about the Skill Pack and other SpecDevShip updates;
• Respond to support requests, refund requests, contact form messages, and other communications you send us;
• Keep a record of your consent to receive our emails;
• Process payments and maintain records required for accounting, tax, and legal compliance;
• Understand, in aggregate, how our website and emails are performing, so we can improve them;
• Detect, prevent, and address fraud, abuse, spam, or security issues, including protecting our forms from automated submissions.

We do not sell your personal information to third parties.

3. Email Communications

If you sign up for the Field Guide or otherwise join our list, you'll receive a series of emails, including product information and occasional promotional offers, via our email service provider. Every email we send includes an unsubscribe link, and you may opt out of marketing emails at any time. Opting out of marketing emails does not affect transactional emails necessary to deliver a product you've purchased (for example, a purchase receipt or delivery link).

4. Third-Party Service Providers

We rely on third-party service providers to operate our business, including:

• Email marketing platform (currently Kit, formerly ConvertKit) — to manage our mailing list and send emails;
• Transactional email provider (currently Resend) — to deliver messages sent through our contact form to us;
• Database provider (currently Neon) — to store our mailing list records and contact form messages;
• Website hosting (currently Vercel) — to host our website and run the services behind its forms;
• Bot protection (currently Cloudflare Turnstile) — to protect our contact form from spam and automated abuse;
• Merchant of record (currently Polar) — to sell the Skill Pack: checkout, payment processing, sales tax and VAT, receipts, and granting access to the product;
• Code hosting (currently GitHub) — to deliver the Skill Pack through a private repository;
• Analytics provider (currently Umami) — to understand aggregate traffic to our site, without cookies.

Each of these providers processes your information under their own privacy policies and security practices. We choose providers that maintain reasonable data protection standards, but we encourage you to review their respective privacy policies as well.

5. Data Retention

We retain your personal information for as long as necessary to provide our products and services, comply with our legal obligations (such as tax and accounting records), resolve disputes, and enforce our agreements. If you unsubscribe from our mailing list, we retain a minimal record of your unsubscribe status to ensure we don't email you again, along with other data we're legally required to keep (e.g., purchase and payment records). We keep contact form messages for as long as needed to respond to you and handle any follow-up.

6. Your Rights and Choices

Depending on where you live, you may have rights under applicable data protection law (such as the GDPR in the European Economic Area/UK, or the CCPA/CPRA in California), including the right to:

• Access the personal information we hold about you;
• Correct inaccurate information;
• Request deletion of your information, subject to our legitimate need to retain certain records (e.g., for tax or legal compliance);
• Object to or restrict certain processing;
• Withdraw consent for marketing emails at any time (via the unsubscribe link or by contacting us directly);
• Request a copy of your data in a portable format.

To exercise any of these rights, contact us at [email address hidden; enable JavaScript to see it]. We will respond within the timeframe required by applicable law.

7. Children's Privacy

Our products and website are not directed to children under 16, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from children. If you believe a child has provided us with personal information, please contact us so we can delete it.

8. Data Security

We take reasonable technical and organizational measures to protect your personal information from unauthorized access, loss, misuse, or alteration. However, no method of transmission or storage over the internet is 100% secure, and we cannot guarantee absolute security.

9. International Data Transfers

Our service providers may process and store information in countries other than your own, including the United States. Where required by applicable law, we take steps intended to ensure your information receives an adequate level of protection in the jurisdictions in which we process it.

10. Changes to This Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. If we make material changes, we will update the "Last updated" date above and, where appropriate, notify you by email or via a notice on our website. Continued use of our products or website after changes take effect constitutes acceptance of the revised policy.

11. Contact Us

If you have questions about this Privacy Policy or how we handle your information, contact us at [email address hidden; enable JavaScript to see it].