Privacy

The email forms

When you put your email address into a form on this site, I keep that address and a note of which form you used (for example, the book form or the weekly email). That is all the forms ask for. I use it to send you Built by Talking, my weekly email, and to tell you when the book is out.

Who handles it

The newsletter runs on beehiiv, which stores your address and sends the emails for me. beehiiv is my processor: it handles your address on my behalf and under my instructions. You can read beehiiv’s privacy policy.

This site also keeps its own copy of your address, the form you used and when you signed up, in a database hosted by Railway. That copy means a signup isn’t lost if beehiiv is briefly unavailable.

Leaving

Every email has an unsubscribe link. Or email me and I’ll remove you from beehiiv and from this site’s copy.

Analytics

I use DataFast to understand how the site is used: which pages are read, where visitors came from, and the kind of device. It isn’t used for advertising, and I don’t sell or share your data.

The site also runs my own simple analytics, which counts visits without cookies and never stores your IP address.

Spam protection

To stop automated sign-ups, the site briefly keeps a one-way scrambled version (a hash) of the IP address a form was sent from, never the address itself, and deletes it within a day.

Your rights and contact

You can ask what I hold about you, ask for a copy, or ask me to correct or delete it. Email me@neilstephenson.com. I’m Neil Stephenson, based in South London, and I’m responsible for this site.

Last updated 22 October 2026.