OpenButtondown subscriber.created or equivalent event is received with metadata fields intact.Required before public referral totals or sponsor-backed rewards are shown.OpenConfirmation state is checked before a referral increments public totals.Required before public referral totals or sponsor-backed rewards are shown.OpenSelf-referrals, duplicate aliases and same-household abuse patterns are excluded before scoring.Required before public referral totals or sponsor-backed rewards are shown.OpenA private attribution table exists separately from the public leaderboard view.Required before public referral totals or sponsor-backed rewards are shown.OpenLeaderboard cache can be rebuilt without exposing raw subscriber records.Required before public referral totals or sponsor-backed rewards are shown.OpenManual kill switch hides public rankings if abuse, privacy or sponsor-risk flags appear.Required before public referral totals or sponsor-backed rewards are shown.

Launch sequence

Safe order for moving from static referral links to a live public ranking.

Step 1

Keep /share/ and /subscribe/ static referral capture in place.

No live ranking, prize fulfilment or subscriber data exposure is triggered by this static page.

Step 2

Verify Buttondown stores referral_source, reader_token and signup_market from embedded form submissions.

No live ranking, prize fulfilment or subscriber data exposure is triggered by this static page.

Step 3

Backfill a private referral ledger from confirmed subscribers only.

No live ranking, prize fulfilment or subscriber data exposure is triggered by this static page.

Step 4

Generate a redacted leaderboard JSON containing publicColumns only.

No live ranking, prize fulfilment or subscriber data exposure is triggered by this static page.

Step 5

Review reward wording and sponsor-backed prize terms manually.

No live ranking, prize fulfilment or subscriber data exposure is triggered by this static page.

Step 6

Publish public rankings only after the editor approves the live leaderboard.

No live ranking, prize fulfilment or subscriber data exposure is triggered by this static page.