What are cookies and how do we use them
Cookies are small text files that are placed on your computer by websites that you visit. They are widely used in order to make websites work, or work more efficiently, as well as to provide information to the owners of the site.
There are broadly two types of cookie: “persistent” and “sessional”.
Sessional cookies are normally deleted automatically by your browser when you close it: they only remain during a single browsing session.
Persistent cookies are not deleted automatically unless you have adjusted your browser to do so; they remain until they expire, which could be quite a long time (a year or more). Persistent cookies hold information which is passed back to servers and are widely used to track user behaviour.
In general, cookies are used to retain user preferences, store information for things like shopping carts, and provide anonymised tracking data to third party applications like Google Analytics. As a rule, cookies will make your browsing experience better. However, you may prefer to disable cookies on this site and on others. The most effective way to do this is to disable cookies in your browser. We suggest consulting the Help section of your browser or taking a look at the About Cookies website which offers guidance for all modern browsers.
Cookies of both kinds can be set by the website you are browsing, in which case they are “first party” cookies; but they can also be set by other domains which are linked to the site you are browsing, for example through advertising or embedded content such as videos or social media feeds. These are “third party” cookies and most modern browsers allow you to choose to block third-party cookies, which are often used for tracking.
Cookies are actually just one example of a much wider and rapidly developing area of the web, web storage (also known as DOM storage). Cookies can only hold a tiny amount of information, but web storage (which can be sessional or persistent) allows for much more data to be stored on your computer (up to 1000 times more). When data is stored on your computer it is often called “local storage”.
You can manage web storage through your browser settings or through “extensions” which are available to add to many browsers. Like cookies, web storage can be a positive thing, giving users real benefits, but there are also genuine concerns about things which are effectively happening “behind your back” and without any explanation or consent.
This site does not currently make any first party use of persistent web storage.
The table below explains the cookies we use and why.
| Cookie | Name | Purpose | More information |
| Google Analytics | _ga
_gat |
This cookie is used to distinguish users and records the IP address of the user’s computer.
This cookie is used to throttle requests.
|
Read Google’s overview of privacy and safeguarding data
To opt out of being tracked by Google Analytics across all websites, visit http://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout |
Cookies set by this site
This site does not set cookies to collect information about how visitors use our site. We do not carry advertising or directly or indirectly gather or share marketing information or any other data about site users.
The site does set sessional cookies (DYNSRV) which help our hosting server work efficiently, and help the site operate effectively. These cookies do not record personal or identifying information and will be deleted from your computer when you close your browser.
When you first visit this site you are informed that we use cookies and invited to consent to cookies being set if necessary to record your preferences and make the site work properly and efficiently for you: we use a persistent cookie to record your decision even if you decide not to accept cookies (ironically it’s the only way we can do this at the moment!). This is the “civicCookieControl” cookie which will expire after three months: if you delete this cookie you will see the cookie banner appear every time you visit this site. This is currently the only cookie we use to record preferences.
Third Party Cookies
Third party cookies are issued by web services other than the website you’re browsing at the time, and can allow those web services to track you as you browse from site to site. Facebook and Google do this routinely, as do a number of other advertising networks. In the same way third parties may make some use of web storage. This site includes embedded material from other sites which will or may place cookies on your computer and may make use of web storage, but only if you actively engage with them (for example by watching a video or listening to an audio recording). Third party cookies will not be set if you simply navigate to a page which contains third party embedded material.
Currently these sites are YouTube, Twitter, Instagram and Facebook. Some of these cookies will be persistent: in other words they will remain on your computer even when you leave this site and even when you have closed your browser and switched the computer off (they will expire after a period of time, but this may be as long as a year or more). These same sites may also set tracking cookies and cookies which will be used to target you with advertising as you browse other sites you visit.
YouTube
We embed in this site videos from Malcolm Inman’s channel. When you visit pages with embedded videos Google and YouTube may set both sessional and persistent cookies if you watch a video. If you prevent these cookies being set, our site will work perfectly well. YouTube is part of Google and you can find full information about Google’s overall policies, as well as specific information about how YouTube and Google+ work, and how you can manage your privacy when interacting with Google products, by following the icon link above or:
Google’s cookie policy
Twitter makes extensive use of cookies and may also use “pixels” (tiny graphics with a unique identifier used to learn whether you’ve interacted with certain web content). If you make use of Twitter buttons and widgets (“Tweet” and “Follow” buttons), or simply visit a page which includes them, Twitter will place a number of both sessional and persistent cookies on your computer. You can control or limit how Twitter and their partners use these cookies either within your Twitter account, if you have one, or by changing the settings in your browser (see more below). Twitter’s own policy statement can be found by following this link.
Facebook, like Twitter, makes extensive use of cookies and pixels for security purposes and to deliver products, services and advertisements, as well as to understand how these products, services and advertisements are used. Facebook will set both sessional and persistent cookies unless you prevent them (see below). You can find out more about Facebook’s cookie and privacy policies by following this link.
Changes to our use of cookies
Any changes to our use of cookies for this website will be posted here and, if necessary, signposted from our web pages highlighting any changes.
Contact Information
If you have any queries in relation to this notice or our use of cookies, please contact us by email at HaveringConcertOrchestra@gmail.com.
You can find out more information about how we process personal data in our Privacy Policy
Last updated December 2018