Remember 2013? That was the year everyone installed those bright "Flashlight" apps. You just wanted to find your keys in the dark, but if you looked closely at the permissions, that little app was asking to read your Contact List, track your GPS Location, and access your Microphone.
Why does a flashlight need to know who your mother is?
It doesn't. But the data broker paying the developer $0.05 per user does.
We've been conditioned to believe that "Free" comes with a silent asterisk: *In exchange for your soul (or at least your metadata).
The "Permission Request" Industrial Complex
As a Product Manager, I've sat in meetings where we discussed how to "reduce friction" in getting users to click "Allow" on permission popups. It's a dark art. We tell you it's for "better ad relevance" or "improved local experience," but mostly, it's just hoarding.
Data is the oil of the 21st century, and your phone is the drill site.
I got tired of being part of the drilling crew. I wanted to build something that felt like... cleaning up the spill.
Enter LiveMarquee: The "Three-No" Philosophy
I decided to build LiveMarquee, a simple LED scrolling text app for concerts and airports. It’s a utility, just like that flashlight. But I built it with a set of stubborn, arguably bad-for-business rules I call the Three-No Philosophy:
- No Ads: I don't want to sell your attention. If you like the app, buy the pro version. If not, use the free one in peace.
- No Tracking: I don't know who you are, where you are, or what you're typing. I don't install Facebook SDKs or Google Analytics to spy on your usage graph.
- No Permissions: The app doesn't ask for your location. It doesn't ask for your contacts. The only permission it might ask for is the Camera, and ONLY if you explicitly try to take a photo within the app.
This is technically "bad product management." I have no retention cohorts to analyze. I have no funnel data to optimize. I am flying blind.
But I sleep better.
Privacy is the New Luxury
In a world where everything is smart, connected, and watching, "dumb" and "offline" are becoming luxury features. Silence is expensive.
When you use LiveMarquee, the text you type—whether it's a pickup line at a bar or a protest slogan—stays on your phone. It doesn't go to a cloud. It doesn't getting fed into an AI training model. It just... scrolls.
It reminds me of that scene in The Truman Show when Truman finally hits the wall of the studio. He discovers the limits of his fake world and chooses to leave it.
I can't tear down the surveillance studio, but I can at least give you a tool that doesn't belong to it.
If you're tired of being the product, try using a tool that's just a tool.