diff --git a/.gitignore b/.gitignore
index 1be269b173c36e43a45111748a08cb6e0c7615a7..231c3248b0dbae404b8bacca81e809c52c35465d 100644
--- a/.gitignore
+++ b/.gitignore
@@ -6,3 +6,5 @@ nm2/local_settings.py
 *.gz
 /.coverage
 /htmlcov
+# there is a .keep file in there to keep /data/logs/ in the repository
+/data
diff --git a/data/logs/.gitignore b/data/logs/.gitignore
deleted file mode 100644
index 890cdd883860bd6d310a2338e198433c4180353d..0000000000000000000000000000000000000000
--- a/data/logs/.gitignore
+++ /dev/null
@@ -1 +0,0 @@
-/*.log*
diff --git a/data/logs/.keep b/data/logs/.keep
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000000000000000000000000000000000..e69de29bb2d1d6434b8b29ae775ad8c2e48c5391