Legal

Purpose of website

This website exists to publicise and promote the physics research of Tom Lawrence (me). It explains the concepts involved in this research to a variety of audiences and allows the public to access my research and to contact me.

Image sources and copyright

Banner images taken from/modified from image from Pixabay, free for commercial use.

Image of temperature map from NOAA Climate.gov.

Image of dynamo from Wikipedia, Public Domain.

Image of solar system from Pixabay, free for commercial use.

Photograph of Albert Einstein from The Why Files – by Lucien Chavan, Albert-Einstein-Archiv, Jerusalem.

Portraits and photos of other scientists, other than those including Tom Lawrence, are public domain images from Wikipedia; specifically:

All other images from Tom Lawrence’s own collection.

All other items shown in this website have been created solely by me. For any queries regarding any copyright issues, please contact me using the Contact page.

Cookies, analytics and data collection

Cookies

This website uses files known as cookies. A cookie is a small text file of letters and numbers that gets put onto your computer when you visit a website. This allows the site to distinguish you from other users.

A cookie isn’t a computer program, can’t read files on your computer, can’t carry viruses and can’t install malware onto your computer.

Most web browsers allow some control of most cookies through the browser settings. To find out more about cookies, including how to see what cookies have been set and how to manage and delete them, visit www.aboutcookies.org or www.allaboutcookies.org.

Analytics

I care about your privacy and handling your data with sensitivity and respect. I try to ensure that I keep data collection and analysis to a minimum. This site uses Google Analytics. This tool collects a variety of information about visitors to the site, as described below. It uses cookies (see above), as described here. The way in which it collects data is described here.

To opt out of being tracked by Google Analytics across all websites, visit http://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout. Other methods of opting out may be available for your particular browser.

This data is analysed by the Google Analytics tool and the results are viewable to me in the form of series of dashboards.

The data I collect with Google Analytics is NOT shared with Google. Specifically, the tool contains toggles for setting the circumstances under which data is shared with Google and I have opted to switch all of these to OFF:

  • I do not give Google marketing specialists and Google sales specialists access to my Google Analytics data for purposes such as optimization and improving account configuration;
  • I do not give all Google sales experts access to my data for enhanced analysis and product recommendations;
  • I do not contribute data to enable features like benchmarking and publications;
  • I do not share Google Analytics data with Google to help improve Google’s products and services;
  • I do not let Google technical support representatives access my Google Analytics data.

I do not share any data collected by Google Analytics with any third parties.

Data collected that I am able to view (but do not necessarily view – see below) includes:

  • Number of visits to each page;
  • Estimated visits which are from new users and from returning users;
  • Duration each page is viewed;
  • Landing and exit pages;
  • Visitors who have clicked through to the site from social media;
  • Time of day;
  • Country (I am also informed of the number of visitors from particular cities when traffic is particularly high from that city);
  • Type of device (desktop/tablet/mobile);
  • Browser;
  • Operating system;
  • Service provider;
  • Screen resolution for mobiles.

I view this data very irregularly, to:

  • Gauge the impact of particular actions by me or others in publicising this website and my research;
  • Get a sense of how much interest there is in particular research items, and how this varies over time;
  • See whether interest in my research is stronger in particular parts of the world, and how this varies over time;

and for similar purposes.

Some correlations between the above data sets are provided automatically by Google Analytics, but I do not view detailed information about individual visits. Furthermore, where detailed analysis is provided for a group of visitors with particular characteristics, I have a policy of not viewing this. For example, I may view the number of visitors from each country, but I do not view the average number of pages per session or duration of visits from a particular city or network provider. Similarly, I have a policy of not viewing data relating to visitors’ devices (browser, operating system and screen resolution), apart from in exceptional circumstances for the purpose of diagnosing faults with the site.

Google Analytics collects your IP address but I do not view this directly – I only see a summary of the estimated locations of visitors, as set out above. You can mask your IP address by using a Virtual Private Network (VPN).

I do not carry out any analysis of user demographics or users’ interests.

Data collected and processed by Google Analytics is automatically deleted 26 months after your last visit to the site. It is kept securely and confidentially: details about how this data is safeguarded can be found here.

Embedded content from other websites

Articles on this site may include embedded content (e.g. videos, images, articles, etc.) from other websites.

These websites may collect data about you, use cookies, embed additional third-party tracking, and monitor your interaction with that embedded content.

Data sent by email and using the contact form

Messages sent through the contact form and emails sent to me will be checked through at least one automated spam detection service. They are stored securely with appropriate security measures taken.

If you share information with me in one of these ways, I will only share it with a third party if I honestly believe you would want me to share it in this way, based on the content of this email or message and other contact I have had with you.

If you send me a message through the contact form or send me an email, the comment and its metadata are retained indefinitely. If you wish me to delete any email or message you have sent me, please let me know.

Other

I do not receive any other information about visitors to this website from any other sites or providers.