Yes, unfortunately. This is because the admins can only read in English, and if they cannot read your postcard, they cannot prevent harassment. Greetings in your native language as well as well-known canonical quotes from non-English fandoms are fine.

To put it simply: because it is within the realm of possibility that a participant may end up regretting their decision at a later time. In the future, we may allow for “penpal lists” of people who are not worried about giving out their personal information–something that one would definitely have to opt into separately. But that’s a discussion for a later time when we are more established.

Yes, it’s called ‘We will never share your real name or mailing address with anyone else.’ We’re serious. We take issue with the erosion of privacy, the selling of data, etc.

The information you submit to us via the Google Form is kept on our Google account, protected by an extremely secure password and multi-factor authentication. A hard copy will also be printed and kept. Your private information will only exist on our Google account and in hard copy format--it will not exist on anyone's hard drive.

If you are quite done with Google and prefer to not involve them in any way, you can alternatively fill out a PDF and email it to our secure ProtonMail address, which is also protected by an extremely secure password and multi-factor authentication. Again, a hard copy will also be printed and kept. In this case, your private information will only exist in our ProtonMail account and in hard copy format--it will not exist on anyone's hard drive. If you prefer to use this method, please email us. (Please note that this was originally our default method; however, most users do not appear to be as alarmed by Google as we are, so we have opted for the convenience of a Google Form.)

Either way, we will not share any of the private information you submit.

I’m Vex Verlain and the “us” consists of me and my partner, who isn’t a part of fandom but helps me with getting the mail out. Being that I haven’t been particularly active in fandom since 2001 and have mostly just been lurking, there isn’t really any good reason to trust me–except that I promise I’m nice and take my ethical responsibilities seriously. Also, the way the Exchange is set up, I am the most likely person to be doxxed, as everyone will be sending their postcards to me so that they can be forwarded on to the recipient.

To add new fandoms or make changes to existing ones on your profile, please submit them via the Interest Profile form.

To update your email address, mailing address, social media accounts, content rating, squicks/triggers/Do Not Wants, as well as to opt in or out of freebies, envelopes, and whether or not you want the number of postcards you've sent and/or received to be kept private, please submit an Update Public & Private Information form.

To update your interest profile in the Member Directory (either by adding, editing, or deleting fandoms, favorite characters, and/or favorite relationships), please submit an Interest Profile form.

To update your gifting information, please submit an Update Gifting Information form.

If you would like to fully retire your membership, please submit a Retire Membership form.

If you simply need us to hold your mail for a while due to personal circumstances, please email us instead!

Yes, you can–I just didn’t want to make the instructions too complicated. If you are horizontally dividing the back of the postcard, keep this in mind:

The address side of the card must be divided into an upper portion and a lower portion, with or without a horizontal rule. The portion of the address side that does not contain the destination address is the message area.

The address, postage, and any Postal Service marking or endorsement must appear within the portion containing the destination address. As an alternative, when the destination address appears within the lower portion, it is permissible for the postage, return address, and any USPS marking or endorsement to appear in the upper portion. The portion bearing the destination address must be at least 1-½ inches high. ^(source)