Your reading.
Your choice.

Who handles your information

On Borrowed Times is an independent journal edited under the name John Elijah. The journal uses its own Google Workspace account for private email and editorial records. The public website is hosted on GitHub Pages.

For a privacy, access, correction or deletion request, contact the editor by email. We may need to verify a request privately before acting on it.

Optional email subscriptions

If you request new-essay emails, we use your email address for that subscription and keep a private record of your consent and preference. A new request becomes active only after you follow the confirmation email and select the confirmation button.

Every newsletter issue includes an unsubscribe link. We do not sell the list, add contributors automatically or include open-tracking pixels in these emails. Reading the site never requires an email address.

Private essay submissions

The author or pen name, private reply email, title, summary, manuscript text or link, sources, disclosures and review declarations you submit go to the editor for private consideration. A private notification email may include the author details and summary; the full submitted text remains in the private editorial record.

Receipt is not acceptance for publication. Submitting grants permission for editorial review only, with publication rights and any exclusivity agreed separately. It does not subscribe you to email. Please avoid sensitive personal information about yourself or others. Manuscript links are stored without being fetched or checked for access by the form.

Storage and service providers

Subscription and editorial records are held in a private Google Sheet, with access limited to the account owner and any specifically authorized editor. Google Apps Script processes the forms, confirmation links and unsubscribe requests; Google Workspace sends the email.

The site does not set advertising cookies or add behavioral analytics, and the form application does not maintain visitor IP profiles. GitHub and Google may process connection and service data under their own terms. See GitHub’s privacy statement and Google’s privacy policy.

Form details are submitted by HTTPS POST. Your browser then opens Google’s form receipt page, which reports the result. The website does not store manuscript text or email addresses in browser storage. Your browser history keeps only a random submission reference and whether that version was sent, to reduce duplicate submissions when you return to the form.

Retention and unsubscribe

Unsubscribing clears the email address from the active subscription record. Limited preference and consent information remains to respect that choice. A message already handed to the email service may still arrive.

Our normal retention periods are seven days for unconfirmed requests, 365 days for minimal inactive preference records and 180 days for unpublished submissions. Accepted work is handled under its publication agreement. Cleanup runs during later intake or owner maintenance, so removal may occur after the stated period rather than at an exact deadline.

Removing an active record does not immediately erase provider backups, Sheet revision history or private correspondence. You can ask the editor to review those remaining copies and any necessary retention.

Your choices

You can read every essay without subscribing, unsubscribe from email, or ask to access, correct or delete information you supplied. Contact the editor with enough context to identify the request; please do not send sensitive documents unless requested privately.

If we change how these forms use information, we will update this notice and its date. A new use requiring your choice will be explained before it is applied.