hazel

I accepted the terms, signed away all of my privacy, and completed a whole questionnaire regarding my goals for using the app, my level of knowledge about my menstrual cycle, regularity of my periods, symptoms I experience before and during my periods, and other conditions I have which impact my sexual health.

Only after the app had harvested all of that from me did it reveal that a subscription is required, and the only way to trial it is to commit to payment when the 14–day trial period ends. Like all “free” trials, I can “cancel any time”, and like all “free” trials, it’s my job to remember to cancel it before it automatically charges my card, so fuck you very much and uninstall.

Having already agreed to my sexual health data being sent to “people you can trust because we just want the best outcome for you we promise”, I would have actually been fine going the whole way and trialling it if there were no strings attached, because it did seem to be a lot more about sexual health generally than just tracking periods.

When it asked for my goals, I included “better orgasms” and “sexual intimacy”. It asked for my current level of sexual activity and something about my masturbation habits.

When it asked about my other conditions, it provided options for PCOS and Endometriosis. I was genuinely curious at this point. I was basically entering the responses my wife would give, and right now we’re strategizing ways to alleviate PCOS–related pain. Data driven insights may have been genuinely useful. Could have persuaded us to subscribe, at least for a couple of months, had the trial showed promise. Guess we’ll never know.

I just wanted to say that I have the same questions, and it’s a relief to see it posted by someone with more courage. I’m too ignorant to contribute to the discussion though. I don’t know how a government or private entity could pressure a FOSS project in this way, unless that pressure was put on the project’s git platform. At which point the repo just moves elsewhere.