Last updated: 2026-05-15

Beacon Movie Club is a private, invitation-only movie club. This page explains what data we collect from members, how we use it, who can see it, and how you can control or delete it.

What we collect

When you join the club, you provide:

• Email address. Required. Used for magic-link login and transactional emails.
• Display name. Optional. How other members see you in reviews, loan history, and contributions. Falls back to the local part of your email if blank.
• Phone number. Optional. Required only if you opt in to SMS notifications. Stored in E.164 format.
• Pickup location. Optional. Your default address or location label for items you contribute to the collection.

As you use the club, we record:

• Loan history. Which items you've requested, borrowed, and returned, with timestamps.
• Wishlist and recommendations. Items you've saved or recommended.
• Reviews and personal notes. Reviews you've written are visible to other members; personal notes are private to you.
• Activity log. A record of significant actions (item additions, loan requests, collection edits) for the club's audit purposes. Visible to the club owner.

We use an HTTP-only session cookie (beacon_session) to keep you logged in across the club's subdomains. We do not use third-party tracking cookies or behavioral advertising.

We use Vercel Web Analytics on some pages, which is privacy-focused: no cookies, no IP storage, no cross-site tracking.

How we use your data

• Operational. To run the lending operation — show you the catalog, manage your loans, deliver notifications you've opted into, and let other members see your contributions and recommendations.
• Communication. Transactional notifications via email (always) and SMS (only if opted in) about your activity in the club, plus occasional movie-night announcements.
• Security. Session cookies, magic-link tokens, and an audit log of administrative actions.

We do not use your data for marketing, profiling, or to train AI models on. We do not sell, rent, or trade your data with anyone.

Mobile information

No mobile information (your phone number or SMS opt-in consent) will be shared or sold to third parties, affiliates, or lead generators for marketing or promotional purposes at any time. Your phone number is shared only with Twilio, our SMS delivery vendor, and only for the sole purpose of delivering the transactional notifications described in this policy. All other information-sharing exceptions described in this policy do not apply to mobile opt-in data; mobile opt-in consent is never transferred or sold under any circumstance.

Phone numbers are retained only while your SMS notifications opt-in is active. When you opt out of SMS (via Settings or by replying STOP to a message), your phone number is dissociated from the SMS program. If you delete your account, your phone number is permanently removed within 30 days of the deletion request.

Who can see your data

• The club owner can see all member data — that's part of operating the club.
• Other members can see your display name, your reviews, your contributions, and your recommendations. They can also see who currently has a specific item on loan.
• No one outside the club. Beacon is invite-only. There is no public listing of members or activity.

Service providers we use

To run the club we rely on a small set of third-party services. Each receives only the data needed for its specific job, and none of them are authorized to use your data for any purpose beyond delivering their service to us.

• Resend — sends our transactional emails. Receives your email address and the message content.
• Twilio — sends our SMS notifications, if you've opted in. Receives your phone number and the message content. Twilio uses your phone number only to deliver our messages; it is not used by Twilio for any other purpose and is not shared with Twilio's other customers, partners, or affiliates for marketing.
• Cloudflare R2 — stores audio commentaries you upload. Receives the audio files and the access tokens needed to retrieve them.
• TMDB (The Movie Database) — provides film metadata. We send title queries; we do not share member identity with TMDB.
• Anthropic (Claude) — powers AI features like the shelf scanner and collection suggestions. Receives the photos or text inputs you submit, plus catalog metadata. We do not send your name, email, or phone number to Anthropic.
• Railway — hosts the backend service and the Postgres database where your data lives.
• Vercel — hosts the frontend website and the privacy-focused Web Analytics referenced above.

Your rights

• Access and edit your profile data from your account Settings page.
• Delete your data by contacting the club owner. We will remove your account, your reviews, your wishlist, and your private notes within a reasonable time. Loan history may be retained in anonymized form for the club's audit purposes.
• Opt out of SMS at any time by unchecking the SMS notifications toggle in Settings, or by replying STOP to any text message.
• Opt out of email by unchecking the email notifications toggle in Settings.

Changes to this policy

If we make material changes to how we collect or use data, we will update this page with a new "Last updated" date and notify members via email or in-app notice.

Contact

Questions or requests? Email support@beaconmovie.club, or use the "Send feedback" form in the Borrow app.