What this site keeps

What’s counted

When you open a page, your browser sends this site a short note: which page it is, the page or site you came from (just a site’s name, such as google.com, or, if the link you followed says where it was shared, such as “?from=youtube”, that name instead; a link sent with this site’s Share button says “?from=shared”, and the icon on a home screen says “?from=home-screen”), whether you’re on a phone, tablet or computer, and the country Cloudflare reports for your connection.

Your browser also sends a note when you do any of these:

• playing a section’s narration, and whether it plays to the end, or opening its transcript
• opening a question on the Questions page, or following the “New to AA?” link
• how far into the film you get
• following a link to another site (which site and page)
• opening the contact form from a link, such as “Something wrong here?”, and sending it (only that it was sent, and which kind of message it was)
• pressing a Print button (only whether it was one page or a whole piece, or, on the daily pages, which part of the day was showing)
• pressing a Share button (only whether it was on a deep dive’s part or its first page, or, on the daily pages, which part of the day was showing; never who you sent it to or how)
• on a phone, opening the steps for putting the daily pages on your home screen, or tapping Add where your browser offers it and whether you went ahead, and, where the phone tells the site (Android does, iPhones don’t), adding it there
• choosing a text size with the Aa button (only which size you settle on)
• searching the site (only that you searched, whether anything was found and whether a card was shown above the results, and whether you opened a result or a card, never the words you searched for)
• opening a book on the Bookshelf (which book)
• opening a word’s card, in a deep dive or on What’s what (which word)
• opening the card that says where a quotation comes from (only that it was opened, never which quotation)
• on the home page, following “Pick up where you left off” or one of the Where to start suggestions, pressing Clear, or pressing Show all (only which one, never what you’ve read)
• on the daily pages, pressing one of the buttons that choose what a day shows, arriving from another site by a link that chooses it, or picking a thread on their calendar (only which one, never which days you’ve read), and opening today’s page from its card on the home page

If you reach an address that doesn’t exist on the site, the note includes that address, so broken links can be fixed.

The notes go to this site and nowhere else, and they’re added up as they arrive. The site keeps counts for each day, not a log of visits: no times and no IDs. I see how many visits there were, which pages were read and where readers stopped.

What’s never collected

The counting uses no cookies, no account and no ID that follows you from page to page or from day to day. The site doesn’t record your IP address, the details of your browser, or anything you write or search for. There’s no Google Analytics or other tracking service, and there are no ads.

What your browser keeps

To tell a new reader from a returning one without knowing who anyone is, your browser remembers the date of its last visit here. A page view says only whether it’s your first today, this week, this month or this year, and whether you’ve been here before. The date itself never leaves your browser. When the A Daily Reprieve address takes you straight to today’s page, your browser holds where you came from for a moment, so that page can count it, then forgets it.

The film on the home page also remembers where you stopped and whether the narration is on, so it can pick up where you left off.

As you read the deep dives, your browser remembers which parts you’ve read and the last part you opened, so each piece’s contents can tick off the parts you’ve read and the home page can offer to pick up where you left off. That list stays in your browser and is never sent to the site. Clear, beside “Pick up where you left off” on the home page, forgets it.

The daily pages work the same way: your browser remembers which days you’ve read, so their calendar can tick them. That list is never sent either, and the calendar’s “Forget which days I’ve read” forgets it.

If you choose a bigger text size with the Aa button, your browser remembers it, so every page here opens at that size. Choosing Standard forgets it.

If you put the site on an iPhone’s or iPad’s home screen, the icon keeps its own copy of all of this, apart from Safari’s, so the parts and days you’ve read in Safari don’t show as read there.

Clearing this site’s data in your browser removes all of it. A private window starts fresh and keeps nothing afterward.

Messages you send

The contact form emails your message to me. It isn’t kept on the site or shown anywhere, and your email address is included only if you choose to give one.

To keep out spam, the form uses Cloudflare Turnstile. It looks at your browser and connection to tell a person from a program, and Cloudflare handles that under its own privacy policy.

If the form can’t send a message, or the spam check turns one away, the site adds one to that day’s count, so I can tell the form is working. Nothing from the message is kept.

Who sees the numbers

Only me. The daily counts are kept in the site’s account at Cloudflare, which hosts the site, and a summary of each week’s counts comes to the site’s email. Like any web host, Cloudflare handles your connection to deliver the pages; this site doesn’t keep a record of it.

Questions about any of this? Write to me.

Updated November 6, 2026.