MacroFactor is very rare in the modern software world, probably because it was created by fitness science junkies rather than VCs or engineers. Greg was extremely adamant from the start that they're charging money, take it or leave it, but selling the product itself is all they're ever going to sell. No monetizing user data. No dark patterns to drive engagement and keep you in the app. All they're trying to drive is better lifting and better eating because that's honest to god Greg and Lindsay Nuckols passions in life, not getting rich. Classic lifestyle business that'll never eat the world, but it'll pay the rent in North Carolina for two 40 year-olds with no kids.

Greg isn't the only person who owns MF, there are people like Nippard who call it (my app and are either shareholder or promoter with a lot of influence), if you look at the whole hussein and julian fiasco and solomon nelson episode well...

This is kinda misleading. First of all, MacroFactor uses the Gemini API for photo to calorie/macro estimation, so the data does leave their premises. It does not work completely offline, so it does call home, and after that, you never really know what happens with the data.

MacroFactor charges roughly $70 a year. MacroCodex is free and doesn't require an internet connection to work. It can also offset random weight gain due to PMS or other short term hormonal cyclical issues, as well as other water retention issues. It doesn't even ask for your phone number or email or even date of birth!! (it just asks age) on Android. On the web app, an email is required only for storing your data (due to the volatile web storage offered in PWAs, where the OS/browser can evict storage under memory pressure).

If an app doesn't collect your personal identifiable data it cannot sell it, if it's capable of running offline it can be put behind a firewall rule and/or diagnostic/telemetry data disabled in setting though i'd argue if it's not collecting your personal info and want data for improvement of specific app feature (which benefit from data analysis) then you should perhaps analyze the risk of this decision.

I do find that the best apps are the paid ones, they don't need to be relying on selling user data to make a profit.

Sadly, a lot of the great boutique lifestyle business paid apps are apple only, and I can't stand the typing experience on iphones.

I've been using Macrofactor for many years (after a HN recommendation) and now that you mention it, I've been super happy with the experience and don't detect a whiff of dark patterns, unwarranted tracking, or bad business practices that plague other apps.

The value of tracking my diet and health has been well worth it. I will happily pay their asking price and it's heartening to hear that the founders/owners are committed to good practices.

Side note: I recently switched over fully to the Proton Unlimited ecosystem. Another ethical service that I will happily pay for.

I'm beginning to think that we might be able to turn this shitty ad-industry-lead ship around, folks. Or at least we have strong alternatives these days for the people who care.

Now if I can just get my social groups to use Signal.