SlowJourney — Terms of Use & Privacy Policy

Last Updated: August 2026

1. About SlowJourney

SlowJourney (referred to in the app as "Journey") is a slow friendship and language‑exchange app for iOS and Android. Two real people on two real devices become pen pals and exchange text‑only letters that are deliberately delayed — "slow mail" — so the experience feels thoughtful and calm rather than like an instant messenger. The app also lets you set personal "dreams" (life and language goals), track vocabulary and achievements, and discover other people who share or complement your goals.

The app is developed and operated by ZIK ("we", "us", "the developer"). In these terms, "the app" and "the Service" mean the SlowJourney application and its supporting backend.

2. Acceptance of Terms

By downloading, installing, or using SlowJourney, you agree to these Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. If you do not agree, please do not use the app.

3. Eligibility

You must be at least 13 years of age to use SlowJourney. By using the app, you confirm that you meet this requirement. If you are between 13 and 17, you confirm that a parent or legal guardian has reviewed and agreed to these terms on your behalf and is aware that the app allows you to exchange written letters with other users, including people you do not already know.

4. Your Identity and Account

• No sign‑up, no credentials: SlowJourney does not have a login or registration screen. On first launch, the app silently creates an anonymous authentication session with Firebase. The identifier for that session becomes your identity throughout the app — it links your device to your profile, your letters, and your friendships.
• No personal identifiers required: We do not ask for, and the app does not collect, your name, email address, phone number, or any third‑party (Google, Apple, social) login.
• Single‑device identity: Your identity is tied to the app installation on your device. If you delete the app, clear its data, or switch to a new device, you may start over with a new identity, and previous pen pals may no longer be able to reach you. Cross‑device account recovery is not currently supported.
• You are responsible for your device: Because there is no password, anyone with access to your unlocked device and the installed app can use your identity. Keep your device secure.

5. How SlowJourney Works

• Letters are text only: Letters support lightweight text formatting and an optional sender location label. There is no image, audio, video, or file attachment feature anywhere in the app.
• Delayed delivery: A letter's content is transmitted over the network promptly, but your device intentionally withholds it from view until a calculated delivery time has passed. Delivery time is estimated from the sender's and recipient's country/region and the depth of the friendship.
• Discover: If you choose to be discoverable, other users may find your public profile and send you a first letter. You can turn discoverability off at any time in Settings → Privacy.
• Offline‑first: Most of the app works without a connection. Letters and changes you make offline are queued on your device and synced automatically when you are back online.

6. Privacy and Data

6.1 Data stored only on your device

The following are stored locally on your device (in an on‑device SQLite database and local app storage) and are never transmitted to our backend or shared with anyone:

• Your vocabulary notebook, achievements, and letter drafts.
• Your app settings and preferences (theme, language, font scale, notification choices, accessibility options).
• Per‑device state such as which letters you have read, archived, favorited, or deleted, and which profiles you have bookmarked or blocked.
• Cached copies of profiles and letters belonging to people you correspond with.

6.2 Data synced to the backend (Google Firestore)

To let real pen pals on other devices actually receive what you send, a limited set of data is synced to Cloud Firestore, a Google Firebase service:

• Public profile: nickname, chosen avatar, bio, country and country code, timezone, age range, native and learning languages, personality tags, writing preference, weekly letter goal, activity level, discoverability setting, and your subscription status.
• Dreams: a dream is synced only if you mark it public; private dreams stay on your device.
• Letters you write: subject, body text, word count, language, vocabulary highlights, and timestamps. A letter is readable only by its author and its recipient.

Fields not in this list — including your read/archive/favorite state, blocks, bookmarks, drafts, vocabulary, and achievements — are deliberately excluded from sync so they never reach another person.

6.3 Location

SlowJourney can optionally use your device location once, during setup, at country‑level (low) accuracy only, to detect your country automatically so that letter delivery times are estimated correctly. The coordinates are converted to a country on your device; we do not store or transmit your raw coordinates. Granting location access is entirely optional — you can decline and simply pick your country from a list. The app never requests background location.

6.4 Notifications

With your permission, the app schedules local notifications on your device to let you know when a letter is due to arrive. No push‑notification token is generated or collected, and notification content is created on your device.

6.5 What we do not do

• No advertising, and no advertising SDKs.
• No analytics, telemetry, crash‑reporting, or tracking SDKs in the app.
• No selling or sharing of your data with data brokers or marketers.
• No photo library, camera, microphone, or contacts access.

6.6 Third‑party services

• Google Firebase (Firestore & Anonymous Authentication): hosts your anonymous session and the synced data described in section 6.2 on Google's infrastructure. See Firebase's Privacy and Security information.
• RevenueCat: manages subscription entitlements. When you use a paid feature, RevenueCat receives your anonymous identifier and purchase information from the app store. See RevenueCat's Privacy Policy.
• Apple App Store / Google Play: process any purchases and provide the app to you. We never receive or store your payment details.

7. Your Content and Conduct

• You own your letters and dreams: You retain ownership of the text you write. You grant us only the limited permission needed to store, sync, and deliver your content to its intended recipient and to operate the app.
• You are responsible for what you send: You are solely responsible for the content of your letters, your profile, and your dreams.
• Prohibited content and behaviour: Do not use SlowJourney to harass, threaten, bully, or abuse others; to send spam, scams, advertising, or solicitations; to share sexually explicit material or content involving minors; to promote violence, hatred, or illegal activity; to impersonate another person; or to share anyone's private information without consent.
• Language‑exchange spirit: The app is intended for genuine friendship, cultural exchange, and language learning. Using it primarily to sell things, recruit, or drive people to other platforms is not permitted.
• No reverse engineering: You may not reverse‑engineer, decompile, or attempt to extract the source code or bundled assets of the app, except where such restriction is prohibited by law.

8. Reporting, Blocking, and Moderation

• Report & block: You can report a profile from within the app. Reporting a profile also blocks that person, so you will no longer receive or see their letters. Blocked users can be reviewed in Settings → Blocked Users.
• Enforcement: We may review reported accounts and content and may restrict or remove access for users who violate these terms. Because the app has minimal server infrastructure and no support team on call, moderation is best‑effort and may not be immediate.
• Peer‑to‑peer nature: Letters are exchanged directly between users. Once another person has received a letter from you, they retain their own copy of it; deleting your account does not remove copies already delivered to your pen pals.

9. Subscriptions and In‑App Purchases

• Free tier: SlowJourney is free to use with some limits, which currently include a cap on letters sent per 24 hours, a cap on simultaneous active pen pals, and a daily cap on newly viewed Discover profiles. These limits may change over time.
• Journey Pro: An optional paid subscription removes those limits and unlocks additional features such as data export and extended personalisation. The exact feature set and pricing are shown on the paywall inside the app using live App Store / Google Play pricing.
• Billing: Purchases are processed by the Apple App Store or Google Play and are subject to their payment terms. Subscriptions renew automatically until cancelled.
• Cancellation: You can cancel at any time through your App Store or Google Play account settings. Cancellation takes effect at the end of the current billing period; you keep Pro access until then.
• Restoring purchases: You can restore an existing subscription from Settings → Subscription.
• Refunds: Refund requests are handled by the App Store or Google Play according to their policies. The developer cannot process refunds directly.

10. Exporting and Deleting Your Data

• Export: You can export your letters, dreams, and vocabulary as a single JSON file from Settings → Export Data (this feature requires Journey Pro).
• Delete account: Settings → Delete Account permanently deletes your public profile, your letters, your friendships, and your dreams from Firestore, wipes all local data on this device (including vocabulary and achievements), and deletes your anonymous authentication record. The app then generates a brand‑new identity with no link to the deleted one.
• Limitations of deletion: Letters already delivered to a pen pal remain in that person's own copy of the app. If deletion is attempted while offline, the local wipe still completes, but the cloud copy may be removed on a later sync or may remain orphaned under the old identity.

11. Disclaimers and Limitation of Liability

• No warranty: SlowJourney is provided "as is" and "as available", without warranties of any kind, express or implied, including merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, or non‑infringement.
• Service availability: We do not guarantee that the app or its sync backend will be available, uninterrupted, timely, secure, or error‑free, or that letters will always be delivered.
• Interactions with other users: We do not vet users and are not responsible for the conduct, content, or accuracy of any user you communicate with. Use good judgement and do not share sensitive personal or financial information with other users.
• Data loss: The primary copy of much of your data lives only on your device. We are not responsible for loss of letters, drafts, vocabulary, or other content resulting from device loss, app deletion, OS behaviour, or sync failures. Export important content regularly.
• Limitation of liability: To the maximum extent permitted by law, the developer shall not be liable for any indirect, incidental, special, consequential, or punitive damages, or any loss of data, arising from your use of or inability to use the app.

12. Changes to the App and These Terms

We may add, change, or remove features, limits, and subscription benefits over time. We may also update these Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. The date of the most recent revision is shown at the top of this page. Your continued use of the app after changes take effect constitutes acceptance of the revised terms.

13. Governing Law

These terms are governed by applicable law without regard to conflict‑of‑law provisions. Nothing in these terms limits any consumer‑protection rights you have under the laws of your country of residence.

14. Contact

For questions, privacy requests, or concerns about these terms or the SlowJourney app:

Email: funroboticshere@gmail.com

---