Cookies

This site uses cookies in many ways. All of these uses are normal and benign, and are used in many ways, to improve your experience of the website.

They are also used for other normal business activities such as tracking performance of ads for Bounce Metronome in Google search results or youtube, facebook etc, and to credit affiliates for any sales they generate for Bounce Metronome. 

Introduction to cookies

In case you don't know what they are, cookies are small files generated by your browser that remain on your computer. The cookies themselves never leave your computer. However they can be used to transform the web pages that are presented to you, and the links you click on in the web pages.

Cookies are used to make things persist e.g. contents of your shopping basket

They ensure that items on the web site can persist for you - for instance that if you add something to a shopping cart, then return to the site later you will find that it is still in your cart - this is the way such things are normally done.

They also preserve your preferences for the site, For instance, there is a special version of each page on the Bounce Metronome website optimised for blind visitors (accessed through a link that's only visible to screen readers). If you choose to view this version of any of the pages on the site, your preference is remembered throughout the website. This is achieved by use of a cookie.

Analytics tracking to improve the content of the website

I also use cookies for analytics tracking. This is used to find out which pages are most useful to visitors, and how they find them. It's also used to track the flow of visitors through the website, which helps with improving the navigation and turns up issues with the navigation system and content.

The analytics also show which pages on the website are found through Google search phrases - this is used for "Search Engine Optimisation" (SEO) - to help make sure the relevant  Bounce Metronome pages can be found easily when you search for appropriate phrases. See How does Google use Cookies for Google Analytics.

Analytics tracking for ads for Bounce Metronome

Cookies may also be used in a similar way to track the performance of ads I show for Bounce Metronome on Google search results etc.

The way this works is that Google Analytics shows how many visits to a particular page or how many sales are the direct result of a particular ad campaign. This can be used to help assess whether it is worth my while to make payments to third parties to advertise the product, and to find out if some ads perform better than others. For details see How does Google use cookies for other conversion tracking

Affiliate tracking to allow affiliates to be credited for sales

I also sometimes use cookies for affiliate tracking. The way this works is that if you come to this site via a link from a software download site, the cookie makes it possible for the affiliate to be credited for the sale.

The usual way this is done is that the cookie is used to create a special url when you go to buy the product, for instance, it might append the affiliate id to the url. This makes it possible to pay the affiliate an agreed fraction of the price of the product for every sale that results from their referral, in a fully automated system.

Again this is a normal and benign use of cookies.

Actually I don't have any affiliate system in place yet for Bounce Metronome but may do so in the future.

How to disable cookies in your browser

It's easy to opt out of google analytics tracking, get the Google Analytics Opt Out plugin

For the other cookies, you need to adjust the settings in your web browser, as cookies are set by the browser

What you can do depends on the browser. You may have options to disable some cookies and leave the ones that are essential for reasonable web browsing experience. 

Warning - if you disable all cookies, then you might find you have to continually re-enter login details on every page of a website. You might also lose all the items from your shopping basket before you can complete your purchase, and encounter many other inconveniences.

In Chrome type this url into your address bar (it won't let you go to it just by clicking on the link) chrome://settings/content

In IE, see the instructions here: Block or Allow Cookies

In Firefox, see the instructions here: Enable or disable cookies in Firefox

For Opera, see these Cookie Tips

How this relates to the new EU law on cookies.

As a website for a business in the EU, I am required to follow the EU directive on cookies.

However, I am also based in the UK and a special new last minute directive for the UK makes it possible to assume "implied consent " for cookies. It recognised that use of cookies is now a normal part of businesses online. So, as best I can tell, the current website complies with the directive - all the ways I use cookies fall within the normal business practices for which you can assume implied consent.

See Cookies law changed at 11th hour to introduce 'implied consent'