Privacy Policy

1. Who runs this

Battle of the Bands is an independent project run by Lee Harrold in Indianapolis, Indiana, United States. There is no company behind it and no advertising business attached to it. For anything in this policy, including a request to see or delete your data, write to support@battleofthebands.app.

2. What we collect

Your account. An email address, a display name, and a password, which is stored hashed and is never visible to us. You can also play as a guest, which creates an account with no email attached. If you later upgrade a guest account, your existing bands and battles carry over.

How you play. The bands you build, battles you play and their results, cards you find in the catalog, the region you unlock, your matchmaking rating, and your friend handle and friend list. Your handle is visible to other players you battle or add.

What you send us. Feedback you submit in the app, and, if you are an artist using an intake link, your profile text, links, photos, and audio.

Collected automatically. Your IP address, device and browser type, and diagnostic events when something breaks. If you turn on notifications, a push token for your device.

3. How we use it

To run the game: sign you in, keep your bands and battles across devices, match you against other players, deliver notifications you asked for, show you artists from your scene, and find and fix bugs. We do not sell your personal information, and we do not run ads or share your data with advertisers or data brokers.

4. Crash reports and session replays

When the app hits an error, we send a crash report to Sentry, our error-monitoring provider. That report includes your IP address and your account identifier so we can tell whether a bug hit one person or everyone.

An error report also includes a replay of that session: a reconstruction of what happened on screen in the moments before the error, so we can see the bug rather than guess at it. Text content and images are masked out automatically, so the replay shows the shape of the screen and what you tapped, not what you typed. We only record when there is an error. We do not record ordinary sessions.

We also send performance traces from our servers to Honeycomb, which record which requests ran and how long they took.

5. Camera

The app asks for camera access for one thing: scanning a QR code off a sticker or another player's screen. The scan happens entirely on your device. No photo or video is uploaded, stored, or seen by us. The app only ever reads the code itself.

6. Email

We send transactional email, meaning messages the app owes you, like an intake link or a receipt for audio you uploaded. Separately, we send occasional news about the game and local shows, and that is strictly opt-in: you get nothing unless you turn it on in Settings, and every one of those has an unsubscribe link.

7. Who else touches your data

We use a small set of providers to run the Service. They only process what they need to do their job, and none of them get your data for their own purposes:

Vercel hosts the site and app. Neon hosts the database where your account and gameplay live. Vercel Blob stores images and audio. Sentry receives crash reports and session replays (see section 4). Honeycomb receives server performance traces. Resend sends our email. Apple delivers push notifications to iPhones.

8. Artists and likeness

Musicians appear in this game because they agreed to. Artist photos, audio, and profiles come in through an intake link the artist controls, under the terms of our Artist Grant. The whole point of the project is to promote these people, so if you are an artist and you want your likeness, audio, or profile changed or taken down, write to support@battleofthebands.app and we will do it. You do not need a reason.

9. Cookies and local storage

We use a session cookie to keep you signed in, and your browser's local storage for things like your sound and display preferences. We do not use advertising or cross-site tracking cookies.

10. Keeping it, and deleting it

We keep your account data for as long as your account exists. You can delete your account yourself, at any time, in Settings under Danger Zone. Deleting is immediate and permanent: it removes your account and the bands, battles, and catalog finds attached to it. There is no undo. Crash reports and server traces age out on their own within 90 days. We may keep a limited record where the law requires it.

11. Your rights

Wherever you live, you can ask us what we hold about you, ask for a copy, ask us to correct it, or ask us to delete it. Depending on your location, for example the EU, UK, or California, you may have these rights by law, but we will honor the request either way. Email support@battleofthebands.app and we will respond within 30 days. You will never be charged or penalized for asking.

12. Children

The Service is not directed to children under 13, and we do not knowingly collect their personal information. If you believe a child under 13 has made an account, email support@battleofthebands.app and we will delete it.

13. Changes

If we change what we collect or who we send it to, we will update this page and the date at the top. If the change is significant, we will say so in the app rather than hope you notice.

14. Contact

Questions, requests, or complaints go to support@battleofthebands.app. You can also use the Feedback widget in the app, though email is better for anything involving your data. See also our Terms of Use and our Support page.