SMEGOT

Privacy & Cookies

The short version

SMEGOT is free and requires no account. Everything the site remembers about you lives in your own browser. We show no ads. The only third-party service is Google Analytics, which we use to measure visits and how the site is used, anonymously, and it loads only if you tap “Accept” on the cookie banner. Tap “Reject” and no analytics ever run and no cookies are set. You can change your mind anytime via “Cookie settings” in the footer.

What we store (in your browser only)

These live in your browser's localStorage, never leave your device, and are erased when you clear your browser data:

  • Watched history: videos you open are remembered (up to the most recent 2,000) so we can show a “watched” badge.
  • Theme choice: whether you picked day or night mode.
  • DREAD FLIP saves: your current board, settings, and colors on the DREAD FLIP page, so a game survives a refresh.
  • Daily game progress: your guesses, results, and streaks for the daily games (SMOSHDLE, BOXMAN, Who Said It?, SMOJI, MORE OR LESS, and THUMBLE), so a puzzle survives a refresh and your streak carries over, plus your game settings (reduced motion, colorblind mode). Replaying archived puzzles stores nothing at all, and the “Clear game data” button in the games' settings erases every one of these entries in one tap.
  • Poll votes: which option you picked on this month's poll and your answer to this week's Try Not To Laugh challenge, so we can show you results instead of the ballot. Only the current month's and week's picks are kept; clearing them just means you could vote again (both are honor-system by design).
  • Cookie choice: whether you accepted or rejected analytics, so we don't ask again on every visit. Clearing it just brings the banner back.

What our server sees

  • Your searches are sent to our server to fetch results, then forgotten. There are no accounts, so nothing is tied to you or used to build a profile.
  • Voting on the monthly poll or the weekly Try Not To Laugh challenge sends only the option you picked, which bumps an anonymous counter. No identifier of any kind is stored with a vote, so it can never be traced back to you, which is also why we couldn't undo one if you asked.
  • Finishing a daily game sends only whether that day's puzzle was solved, which bumps the same kind of anonymous counter (that's how we show “X% of today's players solved it”). Your guesses and streaks never leave your browser.
  • Like nearly every website, the server writes plain technical logs (the page or search requested, a timestamp, and the requesting IP address). We use them only to keep the site running and debug problems. They are never sold, shared, or fed into analytics.

Analytics (Google Analytics)

  • We use Google Analytics (GA4) to understand how many people visit and which pages are popular, so we know what to improve. We look at aggregate trends, not individuals, and it's the only third-party script on the site.
  • If you accept, we also send Google Analytics a few anonymous events about how the site is used, so we can make it better: the words you search for, which filters you apply, and other interactions — such as sorting results, rolling a random video, generating a Sleepover playlist, opening a video, voting in the poll or weekly challenge, finishing a daily game, or clicking a Ko-fi or affiliate link. These are aggregate, counted events with no account or identifier attached, and none of it is sent at all unless you accept analytics.
  • Analytics does not load and no cookies are set until you tap “Accept” on our cookie banner. Tap “Reject” and Google Analytics never runs at all. We ask everyone, everywhere, not only where the law requires it, and your choice is remembered in your browser so we don't ask again. Change it anytime with “Cookie settings” in the footer.
  • If you accept, read how Google uses data from sites that use its services at policies.google.com/technologies/partner-sites.

Content loaded from other sites

  • Videos are never embedded or hosted here. Links open on YouTube in a new tab, where YouTube's own policies apply.
  • Video thumbnails are loaded straight from YouTube's image server (i.ytimg.com), and cast photos from the Fandom wiki's image host. As with any image on the web, those servers see your IP address when your browser fetches them; SMEGOT sends them nothing else about you.
  • Video metadata comes from the community-run Smosh Wiki (smosh.fandom.com), used with Fandom's permission and shared under CC BY-SA 3.0. Our server does that crawling; your browser never talks to the wiki itself.
  • Affiliate link: every video page shows a clearly disclosed Amazon banner linking to a search for Smosh merch with our Associates tag appended. It is a plain link, with no Amazon scripts on our pages. As an Amazon Associate, SMEGOT earns from qualifying purchases at no extra cost to you; Amazon's own cookies and policies apply on their site.
  • Ko-fi links (in the header and the supporter banners) open ko-fi.com in a new tab, where Ko-fi's policies apply.

How SMEGOT is funded

For full transparency, the site's only sources of revenue are:

  • Donations: voluntary tips through Ko-fi. Payments happen entirely on ko-fi.com; SMEGOT never sees or stores payment details.
  • Amazon affiliate link: the Smosh merch search banner described above. We earn a small commission on qualifying purchases at no extra cost to you.

Revenue goes toward hosting costs. SMEGOT never sells data, runs sponsored search results, or accepts payment to rank videos.

Your choices & rights

  • Analytics: accept or reject it on the cookie banner, and change your mind anytime with “Cookie settings” in the footer.
  • Everything stored on your device (watched history, theme, game progress, poll votes, your cookie choice) clears when you clear your browser's site data, or for game data, with the “Clear game data” button in the games' settings.
  • Because we hold no accounts and store nothing that identifies you on our server, there is no personal profile to export or delete. If you accepted analytics and want the data Google holds about your visits removed, email us and we'll action a Google Analytics deletion request. Questions about your data under laws like the GDPR or CCPA are welcome at the address below.

Contact

Questions? Reach out by email, or through the Ko-fi page linked in the header. SMEGOT is a fan project and is not affiliated with Smosh.

contact@smegot.com