1. Purpose and Scope of this Privacy Policy.
    1. This privacy policy describes how Houston Chronicle Publishing Company, a division of Hearst Newss, LLC, publisher of Houston Chronicle and its Affiliates (collectively, "News") treat the Personally Identifiable Information that is collected about you when you visit the web sites, mobile-optimized versions of the web sites, and digital applications to which this policy is linked (collectively, "Covered Sites"). For the purposes of this policy, an entity controlling, controlled by, or under common control with another entity shall be deemed to be an "Affiliate", where control means ownership of 15% or more of the voting stock or other ownership interests. For the purposes of this policy, "Personally Identifiable Information" is information that we can use to identify or contact you as an individual, and includes your name, email address, address, telephone number and any other information that we associate with any of the foregoing. By submitting Personally Identifiable Information through any of our Covered Sites, you agree to the terms of this privacy policy and you expressly consent to the collection, use and disclosure of your Personally Identifiable Information in accordance with this privacy policy.
    2. This privacy policy does not apply to information collected about you by anyone except News and only applies to the Covered Sites (defined above). This privacy policy does not apply to News websites which are not linked to this policy and does not apply to non-News websites, including those linked to or advertised on a Covered Site. Any information you provide when you visit websites other than those covered by this policy will be subject to the privacy policies posted on those sites.
    3. We may offer our News through certain third party websites via a subscription page on such third party websites that is linked to this policy. For the avoidance of doubt, such subscription page is a "Covered Site" and this policy applies to information collected through the subscription page, but does not apply to information collected through the third party website.
    4. Except as specified herein, this policy also does not apply to information you may provide to us offline; however please do be aware that if you subscribe offline to our News from time to time we make your postal addresses available to companies for marketing purposes.
    5. Certain features of the Covered Sites may be subject to additional or different privacy provisions, which will be posted on the Covered Site in connection with such features. All such additional or different privacy provisions are incorporated by reference into this privacy policy.
  2. Collection of Information
    1. Information You Provide. News generally collects Personally Identifiable Information that you voluntarily provide. For instance, when you enter a sweepstakes or contest, complete a survey, participate in a reader panel, register for those portions of our Covered Sites that may require registration, make a purchase, participate in our social networking features, subscribe to our News, subscribe to receive newsletters, promotional correspondence, or other electronic services, or send us an email or feedback, you may be asked to provide information such as your e-mail address, name, phone number, shipping address, and billing information, and we will collect such information as well as any other content you provide us in engaging in any of the above activities. Information such as your age, gender, hobbies or interests may also be requested. If you elect to post material to any blogs, forums, participate in our social networking features or other community boards that may be offered on our Covered Sites, then such materials will be collected and may be publicly available for others to view.
    2. Cookies.
      1. News (or third party service providers on our behalf) may set and access cookies and similar technologies on your computer. A cookie is a small amount of data (often including a unique identifier), that is sent to your browser from a web site's computers and stored on your computer's hard drive. Some of our cookies may be local shared objects, also known as Flash cookies. Cookies may be session cookies (which expire once you close your web browser) and persistent cookies (which stay on your computer until you delete them). News uses cookies to understand site usage and to improve the content and offerings on our Covered Sites and in other media. We may use cookies to control the display of ads, to track usage patterns on the sites, to deliver editorial content, to record requests for subscriptions and to personalize information. Our cookies may contain Personally Identifiable Information and such cookies may be shared with others to the same extent indicated in Section 4. News (or third party service providers on our behalf) may also use cookies to collect aggregate information about web site users on an anonymous basis ("Anonymous Information"). We may share aggregate demographic and usage information with our prospective and actual business partners, advertisers and other third parties for any business purpose.
      2. Some of our third party partners (including advertisers and marketing services companies) may set and access cookies and similar technologies on your computer as well, or we may do so on their behalf. We do not have control over how these third parties use such cookies and similar technologies or the information derived therefrom.
      3. If you don't want cookies, most Web browsers include an option that allows you to not accept them. However, if you set your browser to refuse cookies, some portions of our Covered Sites may not function efficiently. Flash cookies may regenerate HTTP cookies that you have affirmatively deleted. Deleting, rejecting, disabling or turning off HTTP cookies as described above will not remove flash cookies. We use flash cookies as an alternative method to HTTP cookies for storing information about your web browsing history across unaffiliated domains, unrelated to the delivery of content through the Flash Player or the performance of the Flash Player in delivering such content. You can manage and delete flash cookies by visiting http://kb2.adobe.com/cps/526/52697ee8.html.
    3. Gifs. We may use "clear GIFs" (aka "web beacons" or "pixel tags") or similar technologies, in the sites and in our communications with you to enable us to know whether you have visited a web page or received a message. A clear GIF is typically a one-pixel, transparent image (although it can be a visible image as well), located on a web page or in an e-mail or other type of message, which is retrieved from a remote site on the Internet enabling the verification of an individual's viewing or receipt of a web page or message. A clear gif may enable us to relate your viewing or receipt of a web page or message to other information about you, including your Personally Identifiable Information.
    4. IP Address. Your Internet Protocol ("IP") address is usually associated with the place from which you enter the Internet, like your Internet Service Provider, your company or your university. Our server may also record the referring page that linked you to us (e.g., another Web site or a search engine); the pages you visit on our Covered Sites, the web sites you visit after this web site; the ads you see; the ads you click on; other information about the type of web browser, computer, platform, related software and settings you are using; any search terms you have entered on this web site or a referral site; and other web usage activity and data logged by our web servers. We may use your IP address to help diagnose problems with our servers, gather broad demographic information, and administer our Covered Sites. We may also link this information with your Personally Identifiable Information when we feel that it is necessary to enforce compliance with our rules and policies or terms of service or to protect our Covered Sites, customers or others.
    5. Location Information. We may, and may enable our advertisers to, collect your location via certain services we provide through digital applications, wireless access protocol services ("WAP Services") or mobile phone service ("Mobile Services"). We, or the service provider, will inform you of such collection at the time you use the service. By using such service, you hereby consent to our collection, use and disclosure of your location information as described.
    6. Third Parties. We may receive information from third parties, including demographic information from your mobile carrier, and information from third parties that solicit subscriptions to ourNews. Those third parties have privacy policies that differ from this Privacy Policy.
    7. Tracking Requests. News does not act on Do Not Track requests from your browser. For more information click here
    8. Effect of Tracking Requests. News does not act on Do Not Track requests from your browser because, this way, we are able to personalize your experience on our sites and tailor content to your interests.
  3. Use of Information.
    1. News uses information we collect from you in part to provide you with the service you have requested. If you subscribe to our News, we may also use your e-mail address to send you a confirmation notice and your mailing address to send you the News. Similarly, if you enter online sweepstakes, we will also use this information to notify you if you are a winner. We also use your information to register you, identify you as a user, improve our Covered Sites and services, send you administrative notifications, and respond to your inquiries. We might also send out e-mails to users and sweepstakes/contest entrants to announce special offers, services and announcements from our Covered Sites, our partners and/or our advertisers. We also use information in connection with advertising and to serve other content, as described in section 4(d) below.
    2. We may combine and use any and all information we collect on you either online or otherwise, including from third parties, for marketing purposes.
    3. Certain areas on our Covered Sites require registration, and in those areas, you will be asked to establish your own user name and password ("User Registration"). You may elect to change your User Registration at any time by logging in and editing your User Registration (each of our Covered Sites will contain log-in information). You may also log-in to cancel any User Registration. You may request deletion of your Personally Identifiable Information by us, but please note that we may be required to keep this information and not delete it (or to keep this information for a certain time, in which case we will comply with your deletion request only after we have fulfilled such requirements). When we delete any information, it will be deleted from the active database, but may remain in our archives. We may retain your information for fraud or similar purposes.
    4. In addition, we may use information you provide us through emails, Q&A, blogs, forums, in response to polls, or through any other user generated submission for editorial purposes, and may use your name and any stories you provide us in articles published online and in our News. If you provide us with personal anecdotes, they may be attributed to you. News can edit, rewrite, use, and reuse the content, including your name, likeness, photograph, and biographical information you provide, with or without attribution, including publication in the News, and in trade media, and advertising.
    5. We may create Anonymous Information from Personally Identifiable Information by excluding information (such as your name) that make the data personally identifiable to you. We use this Anonymous Information for any purpose and disclose Anonymous Information to third parties in our sole discretion.