Privacy

Sidewing is run by Anthony Errington, trading as Sidewing, in Oxford, UK. That makes him the controller of your personal data. If a company takes Sidewing over, this notice will be updated to say so.

There's one exception. The details a troupe keeps about its own people (who's in it, who can make which dates, casting, and who played in each show) are the troupe's records: the troupe decides what to keep and why, so the troupe is the controller and we look after them on its behalf. If your question is about a troupe's records, ask the troupe first. We'll help them answer.

Contact: hello@getsidewing.com.

You sign in with an emailed code or with Google. There are no passwords. Our sign-in provider, Clerk, holds your name and email address, and sends the codes. Our database keeps your name, your email address and an internal id, plus which troupes or spaces you belong to and your roles in them.

Everyone gets a personal space named after them. People who manage a troupe can see the names and email addresses of its members.

We use this to provide the service you've signed up for (in data protection terms, the lawful basis is contract).

A troupe can add you to its list of people without you having an account: your name, any other names you go by, the parts you usually play, and whether you're a regular. Only the troupe can see this.

If your troupe asks whether you can make a date, we keep your answer (Yes, Maybe or No), the parts you could play, any note you add, when you answered, and each change you make. We also keep a random number stored on the phone you answered from (in its local storage, not a cookie), so the page remembers which name is yours.

Anyone with your troupe's link can see who has answered and how, by first name only. Notes are only seen by the people planning the shows. The link isn't password-protected, so keep it within the troupe.

The people planning a show can keep draft casts and notes, and see how often each person has been cast before. A cast stays private until they share it. Show records note who was on stage in each game.

The troupe relies on its legitimate interest in organising its shows.

Set lists, session plans, notes and show records are kept for you and the people you share them with. They can include names you type yourself, such as who's hosting or playing. Please only add other people's names where they'd expect it.

When you use Play now, we keep a record of the practice and what came up, so the same games and suggestions don't keep coming back.

If you invite someone, we store their email address, who invited them, their roles and whether they've joined. If you create a link for a helper on show night, we store the label you give it, what it allows, and when it expires. We never store the link itself, only a scrambled version used to check it.

You don't need an account. We store your suggestion, which box it went in, when you sent it, and a random number kept on your phone (in its local storage, not a cookie). The random number only lets us limit how fast one phone can send, so a show can't be flooded, and lets the show's moderator mute a phone that's spoiling things. We don't store your IP address or details of your device.

Some shows ask for your name. That's optional, and it may appear on the big screen with your suggestion.

When the group running the show wraps up, the suggestions waiting to be used and the phone numbers are deleted. The group keeps a record of the night with the suggestions that were approved, including any names given, and can save suggestion texts, without names, to its own collection for future shows.

We rely on legitimate interests here: letting audiences take part, and keeping shows free of spam. Adding your name is your choice.

suggestionmachine.com's One Big Button needs no account and sets no cookies. Your settings are kept on your own device. improv.run only forwards you: to a show's suggestion form, or to your troupe's availability page.

The public suggestion bank is a mix of suggestions written for it and real suggestions from past Awkward Actors shows, tidied up, with names, living people and in-jokes removed. Some were written with the help of AI, offline, before being added. Nothing you send is passed to an AI.

getsidewing.com sets no cookies, sends nothing you type anywhere, has no analytics, and loads nothing from other companies. Its fonts are served from our own site. Like any website, our hosting provider handles your IP address briefly to deliver pages and protect the site from attacks.

The only cookies are Clerk's sign-in cookies, which keep you signed in to the app. They're strictly necessary, so we don't ask for consent, and they're only used on the app's own pages, never on audience pages, suggestionmachine.com or improv.run.

We also keep a few small items in your browser's local storage: the audience phone number and the availability number described above, settings for One Big Button, and, on devices used to run a show, which device it is and any helper links it holds. You can clear these at any time in your browser.

Clerk handles sign-in. Convex hosts the app's database. Cloudflare hosts the app and this site, and forwards email sent to our address. Each only uses your data to provide their service to us.

Some of these providers store data outside the UK, including in the US. Where that happens, we rely on the safeguards the law allows, such as the UK–US data bridge or the UK's international data transfer agreements. Convex's data region and Clerk's data location (to confirm).

We don't sell your data, share it for advertising, or use AI on what you put into Sidewing.

Your account and what you've created: for as long as you use Sidewing. If you ask us to close your account, we delete it within 30 days (to confirm).

Audience suggestions and phone numbers: until the show is wrapped up. A show that's never wrapped up is cleared automatically after 30 days (to confirm). The app doesn't do this yet.

Show records, including any audience names and who was on stage: kept as the group's history until the group deletes them or asks us to (to confirm).

Availability answers and casts: kept with the troupe's calendar until the troupe deletes them. Past dates are archived automatically (to confirm).

Invitations: deleted 90 days after they're accepted or expire (to confirm). The app doesn't do this yet.

Records from the old Suggestion Machine app, moved across in October 2026: kept as above. The old app's copies are deleted when it closes in November 2026 (to confirm).

You can ask us for a copy of your data, to correct it, to delete it, to limit how we use it, to object to how we use it, or to have it in a form you can take elsewhere. Email hello@getsidewing.com. There's no charge, and we'll reply within a month.

There isn't a delete-my-account button in the app yet, so for now email us and we'll do it by hand.

If you sent a suggestion with your name and want it removed from a show's record, tell us which show and roughly when, and we'll work with the group to remove it.

If you're in a troupe's records without an account, ask the troupe. You can also email us, and we'll pass it on and help.

Accounts are for people aged 13 or over (to confirm). Audience members of any age can send suggestions without an account, and we ask for as little as possible: just the suggestion, and a name only if the show asks for one.

If you're unhappy with how we've handled your data, please tell us first. You can also complain to the Information Commissioner's Office: ico.org.uk, or 0303 123 1113.

When something changes, we'll update this page and the date at the top. If it's a big change, we'll tell account holders by email.