Privacy policy

Hatch is operated by Simon Dowdles New Media Holdings (Pty) Ltd, 5 Heron Avenue, Van Riebeekstrand, Cape Town, 7441, South Africa (“we”). We are the responsible party under the Protection of Personal Information Act 4 of 2013 (POPIA) and the controller under the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). Our Information Officer is Simon Dowdles. You can contact us at [email protected].

This notice covers the waitlist on hatchpost.app.

What we collect and why

On this waitlist page we collect your email address, an optional answer about what you post about, a record of your consent, and limited technical data (such as a shortened IP address and request logs) to keep the form secure. When you submit the form we also run an invisible Cloudflare Turnstile check so we can tell people from automated submissions. Cloudflare receives that check token and your IP address for that purpose only. We use your email only to confirm your sign-up and to tell you when Hatch opens. We do not use your details for anything else and we do not sell them.

Your consent

We only add you to the waitlist if you tick the consent box and confirm by clicking the link in the email we send you. You can withdraw your consent at any time using the unsubscribe or delete link in any email from us, or by writing to [email protected]. Withdrawing consent does not affect processing that happened before you withdrew.

Your rights

Under POPIA and the GDPR you have the right to: ask whether we hold personal information about you and to see it; ask us to correct or delete it; object to our processing of it; withdraw consent; receive a copy of your information in a common format; and not be subject to a decision based solely on automated processing that significantly affects you (we make no such decisions on the waitlist, and when Hatch launches, AI-written drafts are always reviewed and approved by you before anything is posted). We respond within 30 days, or sooner where the law requires. We may need to confirm your identity first.

Complaints

If you are unhappy with how we handle your information, please contact us first so we can try to put it right. You may also complain to the Information Regulator (South Africa): JD House, 27 Stiemens Street, Braamfontein, Johannesburg, 2001; [email protected]; inforegulator.org.za. If you are in the European Economic Area, you may complain to your local data protection authority.

Operators and transfers

We use service providers (operators) to run Hatch: Google Workspace for email, Cloudflare for network security, delivery and the Turnstile bot check, and Vultr for hosting. They process information only on our instructions and under written agreements. Some are outside South Africa and the EEA, including the United States. Where that happens we rely on safeguards such as adequacy decisions, standard contractual clauses or binding agreements that provide a comparable level of protection, as POPIA section 72 and the GDPR require.

See the current list on our sub-processors page.

Security and retention

We protect personal information with encryption in transit, access controls and regular backups. Waitlist emails are stored encrypted and looked up with a keyed hash. Confirmation, unsubscribe and delete links are bound to that address so they cannot be used against someone else. We keep waitlist details until Hatch launches plus 12 months, unless you ask us to delete them sooner. If a security incident affects your information, we will notify the Information Regulator and you, as the law requires.

Cookies

This page sets no cookies of its own and uses no advertising or tracking cookies. See our cookie page for details. We do not use open or click tracking in emails.

Children

Hatch is not intended for people under 18. We do not knowingly collect information from children.

Changes

We will update this policy when our practices change, show the date of the latest version at the top, and list material changes below.

Change log

• 28 October 2026 — first published for the waitlist; Turnstile bot check on the form.