WCM’s Statement Regarding Cookies and Other Tracking Technologies

We and our service providers use cookies to collect information. A cookie is a string of characters that can be written to a file on the user’s computer or device when the user visits a site, application, platform or service.

We use the following types of cookies for the purposes set out below:

Essential Cookies

These cookies are essential to provide you with services available through the WCM Services and to enable you to use some of their features. For example, these cookies allow WCM to remember your registration information while you are logged in. Local station customization, the WCM Shop, and other interactive features also use cookies. Without these cookies, the services that you have asked for cannot be provided, and we only use these cookies to provide you with those services.

Functionality Cookies

These cookies allow our Services to remember choices you make when you use them, such as remembering your Member station preferences and remembering your account details. The purpose of these cookies is to provide you with a more personal experience and to avoid you having to re-enter your preferences every time you visit the WCM Services.

Analytics and Performance Cookies

These cookies are used to collect information about traffic to our Services and how users interact with the WCM Services. The information collected includes the number of visitors to the WCM Services, the websites that referred visitors to the WCM Services, the pages that they visited on the WCM Services, what time of day they visited the WCM Services, whether they have visited the WCM Services before, and other similar information. We use this information to help operate the WCM Services more efficiently, to gather broad demographic information and to monitor the level of activity on the WCM Services.

Targeted and Sponsor Cookies

These cookies track your browsing habits or other information, such as location, to enable us to show sponsorship credits which are more likely to be of interest to you. These cookies use information about your browsing history to group you with other users who have similar interests. Based on that information, and with our permission, we and our sponsors can place cookies to enable us or our sponsors to show sponsorship credits and other messages that we think will be relevant to your interests while you are using third-party services.

Social Networking Service Cookies

These cookies are used when you share information using a social media sharing button or you link your account or engage with our content on or through a social networking service such as Facebook, Twitter or Google+. The social networking service will record that you have done this.

Third-Party Cookies

Third-party service providers that measure and analyze the use of the WCM Services for WCM and serve sponsorship credits and other messages onto the WCM Services also use their own cookies. For example, WCM’s third-party analytics service providers use cookies across multiple sites to collect visitor data (such as data related to age, gender and visitor interests). In addition, WCM works with third-party service providers that may serve sponsorship credits or other messages to you on other websites after you visit the WCM Services. These third-party service providers use their own cookies to recognize you as an WCM Services visitor and to serve you sponsorship credits or other messages on other websites that they believe you will find most relevant. This Privacy Policy does not cover the cookies used by these third-party service providers.

Additionally, we use these technologies:

Metadata tags

WCM, its sponsors and content producers may use ID3 tags or other metadata containers embedded in podcasts and other media files to collect listening data when these files are played using a compatible Internet-connected media player platform.

Pixel tags

WCM and its service providers also may use pixel tags, alone or in conjunction with cookies. A pixel tag, also known as a web beacon or clear GIF, is an electronic image that can be used to recognize certain information on your device, such as cookies, the time and date a web page is viewed, or a description of where API content is placed. Cookies and these other tracking technologies enable us to assign a unique number to a user’s device, and relate information about a user’s use of the WCM Services to other information about the user, including personal information. These technologies also enable WCM and its service providers to recognize you when you access the WCM Services using different computers, devices or browsers.

Flash technology

We also may use Flash cookies (which are also known as Flash LSOs) on the WCM Services to collect and store information about your use of the WCM Services. Unlike other cookies, Flash cookies cannot be removed or rejected via your browser settings. If you do not want Flash cookies stored on your device, you can adjust the settings of your Flash player to block Flash LSO storage using the tools contained in the Website Storage Settings Panel. You can also control Flash LSOs by going to the Global Storage Settings Panel and following the instructions. Please note that setting the Flash Player to restrict or limit acceptance of Flash LSOs may reduce or impede the functionality of some Flash applications, including, potentially, Flash applications used in connection with certain of the WCM Services.