Show HN: I created an app for you to be a more unpredictable romantic partner | Hacker News Reader

Show HN: I created an app for you to be a more unpredictable romantic partner

lovefuel.app

Hi All!

Love Fuel aims to make you a romantic partner that is full of surprises. A partner that is unpredictable, in a fun and exciting way. The app does this, by giving you +450 surprise-ideas and by being a tool to plan actions.

As a happily married man, I didn't understand why there was no apps for already happy couples. Love Fuel focuses on excitement; not therapy; not emotional topics; not reconnecting.

One key feature is the reminders. As a technical solo-entrepreneur and married man, I understand we all get distracted sometimes, but that shouldn’t cause problems. Love Fuel has a hidden reminder system to nudge you to surprise your partner and shift your focus to what matters.

Please also feel free to check out PAS 1.0, our custom Personality Assessment AI-System. Its goal is simple, analyses you and your partner, and then provide personalized suggestions based on personality psychology. Together with a small group of psychologists here in Scandinavia we have used 2 years developing this new approach to Rec-Psych Systems. Many more features will be coming soon!

The app should be out in the US + EU on Apple Appstore now, and Google Play tomorrow.

I would love to get some feedback and any advice on my Love Fuel journey!

EDIT: A clarification. We do not sell or ever intend to sell data, no matter how lucrative it is, i would rather abandon the project than do that.

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The idea is very nice and the app seems good enough for what it is, but having to also create an account on my partner's phone and connecting with them defeats the whole purpose for me. I want to surprise them, not let them know that I installed an app, which they have to create an account for and connect to me, to surprise them.

I guess that the idea is to connect the personality test results between partners to find better suggestions, but please consider dropping that suggestion. With only 5 suggestions, this app is sadly getting deleted from my phone very soon.

Yeah doesn’t that defeat the unpredictability goal?

Hi the two of you, Thanks for commenting! Yes that is the general idea with the connection, but based on feedback i have removed the partner-limits. In addition i am also created a guest login (which works for most features), and many more changes based on the feedback from you folks in hacker news. No profile picture requirement anymore etc. etc. The update should be out very soon, I just gotta test everything works.

Why need a login/account at all? What core functionality actually requires a server to be involved, from your point of view?

What we've seen again and again is apparently well-intended founders who say something like this.

Fast-forward a few years and for whatever reasons, the company transitions ownership, and the founder and original team are out of the decision-making loop. After which the already-gathered data gets increasingly exploited and the gathering of data from users expands, contrary to promises and intents of the founder.

By being stricter in your original implementation and application architecture as can be observed externally and from the point of view of the client, you make it harder to for silently break user trust without a way for users to detect it.

I am having a hard time understanding how you could even ask for all this personal information with a straight face for an app like this. In fact why would any kind of account at all be required?

Given the apparent simplicity of the app I don't see any other conclusion than this is a pure and shameless gimmick to collect this information from people.

As far as I can tell this can be replaced by a plain text file of suggestions and a random number generator. Of course I'm not sure about this since I am never going to never going to submit to the requirements to find out.

This seems like a really cool idea! After downloading, I decided to delete it for the following reasons (some are duplicated in other comments):

- profile picture requirement -> this seems unnecessary

- unlocking additional access by inviting partner -> with the current value prop, it doesn’t seem like an app where both partners need to be engaged to get value

- the ideas presented on download weren’t as creative as I hoped -> the first few I swiped through before deleting were some variation on “Watch a movie and buy candy.” I understand I didn’t give you a lot of data on what our preferences are, but diversity would have helped keep me engaged at this phase

I look forward to revisiting the app in a future version. Again, cool idea!

Edit: I changed a few words to try to make this comment less harsh. I know how much work it is to release a product and it’s hard to hear negative feedback.

All I am really saying is: consider why you are adding the complexity inherent in forcing user accounts and such. Just because everyone else does it, is not enough reason.

——-

I really really like the idea. Enough to have immediately downloaded the app.

My 2 cents: The entire UX needs to be analyzed with fresh eyes. My email confirmation went to spam and i almost forgot I downloaded the app. But why is there an email confirmation? Why must i make an account? Why must i upload a picture?!? Why must I tell you my age? Why must I invite a partner to seemingly get any use out of this?

What is your goal with this app? If you want to gain users, focus on making getting started as seamless and quick as possible. Iron out the UI elements like the clumsy rectangle warning modals, focus on making it really intuitive to use. Figure out how to make it really easy to get me setting up ideas. At this stage it is a privilege for you to have any of my time and attention, and you need to iterate your UI and offering based on customer feedback and usage metrics.

Hi! I really appreciate your comment, and thank you for saying it so nicely. Not harsh at all ;) It's absolutely amazing to get this much feedback all in one, and I will be sure to make updates to the UI and get-started flows better.

How do you plan to monetize the app?

Subscription seems to me won't work well because the churn rate of such app will be quite high (folks will play few weeks and learn basic "quests").

Using data is very controversial as can be seen in comments - also not sure how to monetize it well.

aye, same question. what's to stop me from buying it for a few weeks / couple months, running through a few ideas, and then ditching it?

put another way, what value does this have over a static html page of "150 cute date ideas" from Elle or Cosmo that I could just cut out and pull out of a hat?

searching for "cute date ideas" gets me to Marie Claire with "80 Fun date ideas for when you're tired of a Dinner and a Movie". And with the fashion mags, if I pay them money I get plenty of other stuff that's not date ideas, and won't datamine me (as hard)

Fun idea. It might worth getting some proof reading done on the FAQs. Some of them have small typos or are not particularly clear, especially "Why is Love Fuel a not couples game?"

Pretty cool app, I like it! I have some random thoughts that I'll try to write down about it:

- In order to start using its core feature, that I would say is the "advice" to do special things for your partner, you have to sign up, then verify your email, then create your profile, and when you finally get to the "home" view you still have some banners eating screen real state from your main feature. That is too much friction! I think it would be best to just let people try it straight away and then lead them to sign up in order to unblock further usage/features. I think that the conversion funnel of the app can be improved. - Nice design, I like it, very modern towards what are we seeing this 2024 as "trendy". - You are using firebase on the backend, nice choice for a v1.0!

Hi, thank you so much for your comment. Based on you comment and everyone else's feedback i've decided using today creating a single button signup = a anonymous a guest user. Then later again ask people to fully create their account. Kind of like reddit does. The update should be out in a few days.

Why require a login/account at all? What core functionality actually depends on a server to be involved, from your point of view?

i wanted to check this out, but the sheer amount of data it collects and links to me makes it a "hell naw dogg" from me, unfortunately. :(

i see the update about not selling data, but still. im VERY selective with what apps get installed based on the data they collect.

Was testing it and trying to create an account and got a random error because was not accepting the terms. The error should say “please accept the terms”instead.

Thank you for trying it out and letting me know, I will be sure to fix that in the next update!

I'd love to try it but it says it's not available in my country (United States)

Can you please make your app available in the UK for Android? I'm blocked from installing it from the Play Store.

Hi! Thank you for the comment, i'm currently awaiting google playstore. The app has been uploaded for review. Stay tuned ! :)

The developer replying to this, and not to the more pertinent questions inquiring about privacy (posted hours earlier), does not increase my confidence in the intentions behind the gathering of so much private information.

Explanations welcome, maybe you’re one of the good guys.

In the UK. Installed the app on Android but it seems to require a photo with no way of setting a photo.

Tapping the camera icon does nothing.

Crap. I will get right on that. Thanks!!

Thanks!

Came in to say this. Thanks. Looks interesting

Can someone please upload the .apk somewhere? It's not available in my country (Canada).

Thank you for being so willing to try it, I hope to release it to Canada on Tuesday. If you are interested, I have an email list on the website, I will be sure to notify you.

Congrats on putting this out there in the world!

Quick landing page feedback: Could you update it so that the first two screen captures are not the same content? And then pick a different second example that isn't also about leaving a note? More variation in the landing page examples would give me a better intro.

Is it possible to just call them "researchers at xyz institute" and link to their lab rather than "Scandinavian researchers"?

It might be inappropriate or disallowed to use the name of the institution in separate commercial promotion.

But mentioning Scandinavian seems savvy. If they hadn't said they were Scandinavian, I would've assumed the startup was totally full of poo, because many of the signs thus far look like stereotypical US techbro sociopathy. If I had that reaction as a US techbro myself, then presumably some Europeans they might be speaking to (as prospective investors, hires, or users) would also have that reaction.

Thank you for answering for me. And yes this is the case, the contracts with Scandinavian Universities are very slow and heavy. But the process has started.

Datamining, don't use

Harsh untrue comment. I'm rn creating an anonymous guest user signin option. Don't assume the worst just because you can.

It's datamining until you add the guest option. Why did you think collecting that much data was necessary in the first place?

The guest option will be out soon (max 2 days, i hope). I have just developed it yesterday/today.

Why did i choose it: I simply did a little less than what my other couples apps do, and where I'm from this amount of information is not considered a lot. In Sweden everything is public. Everything, as in everything: salary, address, phone number, car etc. (this is by law) So for me and my many Scandinavian test users, no-one cared. But now i see the feedback, and I am working fast to take the feedback and create a good experience with just a guest account.

If you have anymore feedback let me know, I will be sure to listen!

This is reasonable, I didn't think about it this way. Wild it's less than what other apps take. I'll sure try the app once the guest option is implemented

Lots of comments are saying this is disingenuous, but they are missing the fact that you have to care enough about your partner and relationship to get this app, and actually follow through with the suggestions. There is nothing disingenuous about that, and, frankly, most people wouldn’t care or couldn’t be bothered enough to actually do it.

As a busy adult with ADHD, a young kid, and a demanding job it is hard to remember to regularly surprise my partner and keep things fun, interesting, and unpredictable year after year. I always want to but can’t always remember to. I think this is a great idea. Personally, I would not follow the suggestions directly, but would add some personal creativity, or just use it as a concept to trigger my own ideas. I usually do already do surprise/ mystery dates and things like that when I remember to.

That said, I won’t be trying this app because of the account requirements mentioned by others. Deal breaker for me.

This comment made my day, I've been working for two years, day and night, and this is the most accurate representation of how I vision the world with Love Fuel. Thank you!

Your vision of the world with your app is that people don't use it because of its account requirements?

I think the comment above has been edited, me and my wife did not see the last sentence before now. It's very surprising to me that the Hacker News is so against having an account? Most of the internet requires one nowadays.

I will keep following the direction/mood of the comments and react based a whole view, so far around +80 people have downloaded, with 4-5 people talked negatively about account requirements.

Much of the internet requiring it does not mean anyone likes it. Especially among the HN crowd.

“Most of the internet requires one” is not a good reason to require one when one is not needed.

By this logic most of the internet is full of ads so you should go ahead and add those.

By looking at your site i don’t see why an account is even necessary and that’s probably why people are rightfully complaining about it.

Very true, it is not a good reason, we do this for now due to the security, users calendar, notes, and partner related information is truly personal, so for now it's much more secure. But it's really interesting to see all the feedback, so thank you!!

> Very true, it is not a good reason, we do this for now due to the security, users calendar, notes, and partner related information is truly personal, so for now it's much more secure.

...No?

"Much more secure" would be not saving anything on the server that doesn't need to go there in the first place (move things and logic to the client from the server - what value does the user get from uploading everything?)

Or if this is for syncing/backup purposes, at least encrypting data on the client before with a key only available to the client before uploading the encrypted data to the server (this sounds overkill and unnecessary for the goals of this app).

User data is a (in places legal) liability for you. Handling it properly will cost you time and money. Without extracting additional value ("selling") it, it is not in your interest to centralize it.

Simple rule of thumb: If you don't strictly require it to provide service to the user, don't strictly require it from the user. For optional functionality (email reminders, server-side push) requiring server-side to collect additional information, that information and functionality should also be opt-in. This is the gist of GDPR. As you note, many companies either (obliviously or not) flaunt it or employ dark patterns or legal chicanery to maliciously comply (courts are still out on the latter in many cases).

Anything you put elsewhere is not more secure, unless you are more secure than Apple's servers, which seems highly unlikely. If you don't have it, it can't get compromised.

The user has an iCloud account, you can write to iCloud storage without making them "sign in" to your app. It's their data, they can find it in the folder for your app in their iCloud drive on a Mac.

And see https://developer.apple.com/game-center/ for a way to let two users coordinate "play", multiplayer, turn based, achievements, etc., which cover most of the interaction you'd need.

For sharing personality test, a person can do their own and their partner's, but for a better take on the partner you and your partner can each take your own test then generate a sharable fun code that captures the "bits" of the answers without repeating the test. As partners, you could tell each other the sharable code as a NFC bump or QR code to scan, or generate one of the word based codes like bitcoin wallet passwords.

See BIP39: https://github.com/bitcoin/bips/blob/master/bip-0039.

(This passphrase would be short if the test results distill down to a smaller set of outcomes, like 64 questions give 8 results. It would be long if you need all 64 questions' answers to match with.)

I added the last part later because I was really excited to try this until learning it required so much personal information up front just to see what it is. Generally I’m willing to create an account on a platform I trust, am familiar with, and certain will be useful. For this type of thing, I would not expect it to be necessary, so it feels weird, and makes me suspicious. It’s also just a hassle- usually apps like this have a guest mode so you can initially explore without hassle, and then only create an account when doing so is useful to the user, and they are sure they like the app.

It sort of feels like someone asking for a commitment on the first date…

Haha good analogy, thank you for your comment! As said in some of the other comments, I am very surprised to see the push back on the account creation. I do have Guest Mode in the roadmap, but based on everybody's feedback, I will prioritize it much higher. Again thank you for taking your time to comment!

Good luck, I really do believe your idea is a good one that can help people! HN is full of privacy obsessed tech people so take the feedback with a grain of salt.

However, lowering the barrier to getting to try out you app is going to give you much better user retention. When I download any app and it immediately asks for an account and or a credit card, I usually just uninstall it. I suspect that is true for most people.

Why do you need them to have an account? What on your roadmap requires it?

And perhaps you could leverage Game Center accounts for "play" data, which leverages Apple's sensitivity to provide privacy while allowing achievements, multiplayer, and turn-based games, between partners.

https://developer.apple.com/game-center/

> There is nothing disingenuous about that, and, frankly, most people wouldn’t care or couldn’t be bothered enough to actually do it.

While I agree that there's nothing specifically wrong with using an app to inspire spontaneity, this seems oddly self-congratulatory.

Actually, most long term partners manager to surprise each other just fine without an app. Just like using it wouldn't make you a bad partner, it doesn't mean you're automatically any better than anyone else either.

Do they? Most marriages end in divorce, and most people I know in long term relationships are miserable. I think most people don’t manage fine and keeping a relationship strong is a skill that takes practice and deliberate effort to master.

Most marriages do not end in divorce. What nonsense.

'Just' 40-50% of first time marriages, you'll have to excuse them the exaggeration

With respect, there's only two or three developed countries where that could even remotely considered true.

Sure, so in the USA slightly under half end in divorce, but I’d argue that the vast majority of ones that don’t are miserable and if ended both would be better off- the tragedy isn’t the divorces but the even more common unhappily married. I say that as someone that is in a happy long term relationship after many hard won lessons, but I see that a lot of people are not… but could be if they either left or learned some key skills: how to communicate, how to be emotionally vulnerable, how to deal with a crisis as a team, how to set boundaries, how to communicate assertively without emotional manipulation, how to keep a relationship exciting and valuable for both people. Our culture generally does not equip people with the tools to make a relationship work long term, and many people are blindsided by the fact that it does not happen automatically. I’ve met maybe 1 or 2 people ever in the USA from my parents generation- Baby Boomers that is married but not miserable due to basically being a fully grown adult with the emotional maturity and communication skills of a toddler. Perhaps other countries and cultures better equip people with the skills they need.

The world is not the US and US divorce rates are anomalous globally. You cannot generalise from such outliers.

You have an extremely warped view of relationships.

I’m not talking about relationships globally, but in the USA. I’m not sure why you would expect anyone to have global rather than local personal experience. However, in places where divorce rates are low, I wonder if it’s because people are happier and relationships are working, or if it is just legally and culturally more difficult to escape a bad relationship?

What specifically is warped about my view of relationships?

The app is not limited to the US, hence the absurdity of your comment.

> What specifically is warped about my view of relationships?

The idea that you are somehow more enlightened in your relationships while the majority of people wallow in misery is absurdly arrogant, bordering on delusional and narcissistic.

So the idea that there are skills that can be learned to improve relationships is fundamentally nonsense to you, without any curiosity or knowledge on your part about what specifically they might even be?

Calling someone delusional and narcissistic because they have a different viewpoint from you is a pretty tiring modern trend on the internet… it certainly lowers the quality, friendliness, and usefulness of a conversation. Ironically, that is itself a narcissistic conversation tactic, where you aren’t trying to understand or communicate but to make it appear that anyone who disagrees with you has an egregious personality flaw.

I have met plenty of people with actual narcissistic personality disorder, and the most common theme is an underlying inability to admit fault or work towards improving things like relationships- an inability to do what I am claiming here to be working on myself to improve my own relationships, and an aggressive dismissal of the idea that such things are possible when it is mentioned by other people. It requires admitting fault and being vulnerable and human enough to take responsibility and work to improve things.

One of the most important characteristics in a partner is authenticity.

If they didn't think of getting you flowers themself (and had to use an app), is that real?

So you don’t have a birthday calendar?

> If they didn't think of getting you flowers themself (and had to use an app), is that real?

I did confess to my girlfriend once that I'd never thought of getting her flowers, and that every time I had bought her flowers in the past was actually just the output of a Chinese room. [1]

She said it was fine, and she liked the flowers either way.

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_room

They didn't think of it "themselves," but they did choose to do it.

Well, they cared enough to use the app. Doesn't that count for something?

What if they thought of using an app to think up ways to make you happy

That's a 10x lover!

I’d say yes. We are all flawed. It’s not because you are busy or because your brain is tired that you don’t love your partner.

Being spontaneous requires energy. A lot of people lack energy but still loves their partner.

Following the prompt isn’t mandatory, just take it as a source of inspiration for when you want to be kind but have no idea.

> Being spontaneous requires energy. A lot of people lack energy but still loves their partner.

The point is that you have a limited amount of energy, but you chose to dedicate some of it to something your partner would like.

Optimising by reducing the amount of energy you use to do that defeats the purpose.

Uh huh.

Try having a couple kids and then apply this kind of reasoning. There simply isn’t enough time or energy to do everything you want for your family.

If you can leverage technology and good ideas to enhance your experiences and relationships, do it.

Yeah honestly I’d be very happy to be at the receiving end of such an app.

(But not this one because I’m pretty suspicious about this mandatory account creation and the fact that they didn’t release in France because of data laws - which are not stronger than GDPR)

Hi, Thank you for your comment, regarding the Data Laws in France, they require a datasheet of encryption for Apple Appstore, something our team have never made before. Otherwise the data law is the same, yes. Any tips are welcome.

If your application doesn’t implement custom encryption code (which it probably does not) you can just check the "None" option, even if your app does use encryption (which it probably does if you are using https for example).

As long as your app is not providing an encryption algorithm, you are fine ignoring this.

It’s also fine if you do use encryption with the Apple provided libraries since in this case you are not providing encryption code but just using it.

In fact, nobody cares about this in France, it looks like Apple is the only one being so bureaucratic about this stupid declaration. It’s pretty specific, absolutely not verified by anyone (our current government is obsessed with public expenses reduction so you can easily imagine that nobody cares about the version of RSA a random foreign app uses).

This declaration is only useful for apps that have encryption in their core business (password managers, encryption of files …).

IIRC, this declaration is only a mean for the national cybersecurity agency to know if a given application can become a threat for national security if it happens to use outdated or flawed encryption. It’s not to give them access to anything (you just declare algorithms, not the keys).

It’s a frequent thing that happens to frighten foreign developers and we regularly have unavailable apps for this reason because it’s true it’s unclear.

Thank you so much for taking your time to write this in-depth comment! Based on advice from you, and others, the app is now launched in EU (incl. France), US, Canada, and UK on both Andriod and iOS. Thx!

You are being quite patronising. I have two children.

Respectfully, I think you’re limiting the valuation to just the culturally propagated version of “caring”.

Some people wake up naturally in the morning. Some people need an alarm. They can both care deeply about the reason they’re waking up (a job, an appointment, whatever) but for some people, they need the extra help.

For some, setting the reminder is the effort and energy that shows you care. It’s worth saying though that the most important thing is doing the things that show your partner that you care.

Waking up on time is an end in itself. The point is not to show that you have made an effort.

For some other things that we might try to do, the point is to make an effort.

I would say using this app to try and surprise/do nice things for your partner is, in fact, making an effort: going out of your way to think of nice things to do with them.

People are all different. The idea of getting flowers for your partner, or leave cheesy notes for them, might come natural to some and not to others. Another comment pointed out how having ADHD makes it hard to remember to do the sort of stuff this app might suggest, so it can be a great help.

Besides, is this different from scrolling through social media and seeing couples activities and deciding to try them? Is this different from seeing a florist ad while walking and deciding to buy flowers? If anything, going out of your way to install an app shows more care and effort than these "spontaneous" activities.

At any rate, spontaneity is overrated, especially in relationships (maybe because of Hollywood relationships?). Constance, effort, care, are more important... you still need to keep things fresh tho

If spontaneity is overrated then why participate in a simulacrum of spontaneity?

This app doesn't suggest that you do longer term things to support your partner and make their life easier. It proposes that you fake being in a honeymoon stage by eg leaving cute little notes.

> It proposes that you fake being in a honeymoon stage by eg leaving cute little notes.

Well, yes. And you know what ? Faking being in a honeymoon is enjoyable for both you and your partner. As you said, available time is limited, which is also true with your lifetime. Not doing something both you or your partner would enjoy because you feel like it’s not spontaneous is in fact wasting joyful moments.

Is it real if they just buy the flowers instead of growing them? If they take you to a restaurant where someone else cooks the food and not them? It's not like this app is taking anyone by the marionette strings and forcing them to be romantic - they're still seeking out romantic ideas to make their partner happy, picking one, and carrying it out. Sure, showing personal creativity might be more romantic, but I don't think seeking out fun ideas that your partner will enjoy is particularly inauthentic.

Yeah, it does count. I don't remember all my friend's birthdays off the top of my head. I write them in Google Calendar. It definitely gives people a better, and more appreciated, experience by having their important dates remembered via the use of technology vs being forgotten entirely.

It seems fine to extend this rationale out further.

Depends.

If someone defers their decision making process to an app and blindly gets flowers when it tells them to, I wouldn’t like that.

If someone uses an app like this as an inspiration or a reminder, then I could see this working well.

And then again there is the gray area where things get mixed.

I think someone downloading an app to help them be more spontaneous for a partner who wants that is extremely authentic, it takes someone seeing that they have a blind spot.

One of the ways you become authentic is by practicing something you want to become. It’s doing the thing consistently that leads to character development. Also, if you and your partner value different love languages (my partner is meh on flowers, I spent time in high school doing floral arrangements) then having a guide to help you translate could be super helpful. Disappointed this is EU and USA only for now but will see if it shows up in my country soon.

jmcmaster Thank you for taking the time to comment!! Let me know where you are from and I can let you know. I'm working as fast as possible, but I'm also being careful, I really don't want to do anything wrong with the datalaws. So for now we are only publishing when we know we are good, legally speaking.

If I set a calendar reminder to call my mom on Mother's Day, is that less authentic?

So, following your line of reasoning: buying jewelry, flowers, going to a movie or a restaurant is all bullshit and inauthentic because you didn’t have it as an original idea?

I guess I understand your desire to be creative and original in expressing affection. But, in the real world, ideas are cheap and execution is the hard part!

Is it more real because it's the result of decades of marketing efforts, as almost all flower purchases are?

I think this deserves some expansion.

In receiving flowers, the value the recipient gets is not so much the flowers themselves, but by what the gift betrays about your mind state. This authentic information about your mind state is what makes the act “real”.

So it is reasonable to consider the act less real or even a bit deceptive if the mind state that you’d first expect the act to imply (they care about me and thought to get flowers) does not reflect your true mind state (they cared about me enough at some point in the past to set up this app).

I think your looking at this wrong. They care about you enough that they wanted to keep the relationship interesting and not fall into the trap of complacency that's so easy to fall into as time rolls on. Enough that they took steps to remind themselves not to take you for granted, and still enough that they take those reminders to heart. It's not like getting flowers or planning a picnic or whatever becomes zero effort because an app reminded you. You had to look at that reminder and care to act upon it.

That's all true. I'm just saying if they knew that you needed this app to get them flowers, then a.) they would likely feel a bit disappointed vs. if it was all you, and b.) that is not unreasonable.

I think you're saying "it's the thought that counts" and it's good enough that they thought to get you something, even if the idea comes from an app?

But then why use an app at all then, you could get them a used bottlecap and "it's the thought that counts"

Yeah what I want from a partner is unpredictability.

Probably surprise flowers, not surprise career change.

Haha yes precisely. Fun exciting surprises, not life altering surprises ;)

I like the idea, but the fact I have to create an account and upload a profile picture immediately put me off. I created one with fake data and a random image, once in the app it appears to just exist to hover up personal data. Then you have to create and link a partners account to get more than 5 or so ideas…

I’d honestly rather pay a small one off fee for this same app, without the need for an account.

Perhaps the lack of availability in certain countries due to their data laws is a sign that this app really shouldn’t require an account. If the ultimate goal of this free app is monetizing my data, no thanks.

Downloaded it. It wants my email, date of birth, full name and access to all my photos, before it will let me use it. Way too much info. Delete app. Shame because it seems like a nice idea.

https://www.lovefuel.app/terms-conditions Binding arbitration with no opt-out provision. I would also be hesitant to share this much information.

+1. I immediately reject any app that is asking for a piece of information it has no business knowing. A messaging app asking for my contacts? Makes sense. A gym tracker asking my contacts? Instant delete.

"Not available in your region." You're saying it's because of data privacy laws. I'm in the EU, so it's not available in the whole EU? Why even is it so privacy sensitive? Do I have to share any private information to use the app?

Yeah, weird. It should be just a set of suggestions and yet it wants so much data from the users.

The EU rules are essentially that if you give them information for a particular purpose, they can only use it for that purpose and no other. So they obviously want to break this.

Doubtless if you use this you're training a model that understands what kind of interactions romantic partners find meaningful and sentimental.

I can just see it, “Did you buy me these flowers I was it that stupid app?”

If your SO would be annoyed at your romantic gesture because you got the idea from an app you might have other problems in that relationship. Generally, I find women appreciate the gesture, even if the idea isn't entirely original. People just like that you think about them.

With the increasing pushback against AI and reliance on technology, it might happen.

They would probably react that way since the partner was just following instructions of an app rather than something more romantic and genuine

I mean, if a robot told you to do it, then I would be inclined to argue that it’s _not a gesture.

> People just like that you think about them.

Indeed. The trouble here is that this rather seems like a _substitute_ for thinking about them.

My SO is very grateful for flowers she tells me to buy. I second your statement.

What "other problems in that relationship" do you think they might have?

Doing little surprises for someone, texting them to wish them a good day, etc, is a form of signalling. People like it because they know that you are thinking about them randomly, and that you care how they're doing. If you're simply using an app reminder to do stuff in order to grind relationship points, it has a completely different meaning.

Two or three times a year, I schedule a dozen emails to my wife. Just little missives that say something sweet that I appreciate about her. I spread them out over the next few months, so she gets little reminders from me that say I love you.

When I’m staring down a long, busy day and she looks run down, I schedule an email a few hours later to say “Hope your day is going well, you’re awesome and I’m grateful to have you.”

When my wife gets the emails, I’m almost certainly not thinking about her. I’m usually at work focused on work.

Am I doing romance wrong?

> Am I doing romance wrong?

If it works for you then maybe not.

Personally, I think that if there's time to schedule an email, then might as well just send a quick text message. That's more personal and allows for an instant response. I'd also never send an email for personal communication like that, but maybe that's just me.

Not sure if you are disagreeing with my comment but I don't see any contradiction. You are showing your wife that you are thinking about her and that you care about her wellbeing. The fact that there's a time lag between the moment you think about her and the moment she gets the message, isn't an issue.

Why isn't "downloading an app to help us have a more unpredictable romantic relationship" also thinking about her and caring about her wellbeing?

This. My partner has reminders in her calendar to leave me post it notes with a kind thought.

Double thoughtful.

I find that extraordinarily cute.

"People just like that you think about them" - but this is an app telling you to think about them.

And the person who downloaded the app did it because they were thinking about their partner and their relationship. It's the example that others have mentioned of writing a reminder in a calendar to buy some flowers, or scheduling an email with a nice message; but instead of flowers or an email, the romantic gesture is going to be something unknown, and I suspect that's half the fun of an app like this. It's still got the same intent though – "I love my partner and I want to do something fun/romantic for them."

Haha, yes your concern is so valid, we did 150+ interviews to analyses potential social situations. But that is why the app suggests both partners to join the app. But let me know if it happens to you, would love to do more interviews1 ;)

Is it inauthentic if I think back to romantic gestures I did 40 yrs ago and redo them?

Account creation process is unnecessary. Biggest issue with the app

Cool idea, but I do wish an account wasn’t necessary to use the app.

This might be good, in the balance, for some people, but an important component is lost...

There are things that past partners have done that were especially meaningful because they came from the heart -- because they thought of it, and wanted to.

And I'd never say what those things were, because it wouldn't be as special if a future partner did one of those other things because they'd been given intel that I'd like that.

Nor if they were told to by an app.

But, you did want to, so much so you used an app to ensure you did.

If my partner cared enough about me to ensure they used tools that helped them express it... I'd be flattered.

Have you used the app? Perhaps the ideas and reminders are along the lines of "put their fav songs in a playlist for your next car journey together"

That's actually a good one. Ima do that.

Quoting `https://www.lovefuel.app/team`:

> PAS - Personality Assesment system

> In cooperation with neuropsychologists, couples therapists, and psychologists, we have developed DIREBP. (Dyadic interpersonal romantic emotional behavior profiles).

> Each user has one DIREBP, and it represents you and your personal profile inside of the PAS. The DIREBP represent you measures of psychological personality descriptors. It keeps track of descriptors like: Extrovertism, Anxiety, The Relationships sense of Commitment, and several of hundred more descriptors.

This is very sensitive, intimate, personal information.

Does this profile stay on the device only, and are there conscious measures to prevent inadvertently leaking information about the profile (e.g., such as avoiding leaking interests implicit in secondary network accesses it makes)?

Or is this profile accessible directly by the corporate mothership?

It would be wise to assume the goal is to sell it along with the company at a later point to a data broker.

Hi. Thank you for the question. + this comment? 1. Never sell it. See text in the post. I know this is normal in the US, but way less so where I/we are from in Scandinavia. There's a fair mistrust given the norms in other countries, but as said in the post, I would rather abandon the project then start selling the data. 2. The data of the personality profiles gets processed anonymously. You as a user cannot even access the anonymous-results directly, there's an encrypted service in between the data-points, fetching only select data. 3. Everything is encrypted, on device, from device to servers, and on servers.

In other words, the intimate data doesn't stay on the device, and the user must trust the company that is grabbing the data.

Regarding trust, the must trust the company to not misuse the data now, must trust that future version of the company (and asset acquirers) not to misuse the data, must trust the company to perfectly secure the data against intruders.

(The talk of encryption and anonymization is usually mostly a diversion or misunderstanding.)

Wish it was a website instead of an app.

I could actually see an app making sense, because then you can easily do everything it does totally offline and private.

Of course, the fact that it wants to create an account rather undermines that.

I hope my partner never finds about this.

Getting random "prank" tickets sounds like torture :/

Couldn’t this just be an email or text based service? Why a mobile app?

Because that already exists and is ChatGPT

Not supported in your region (I’m in France, on iOS).

True, due to the national data laws in France we are not ready to launch there yet. Sorry.

What is this again ? You mean that you are not GDPR compliant for an app that generates random phrases ? It feels like there is something shady.

Yes its GDPR compliant. Our team has simply never made one of the Apple Appstore Required Encryption documents, and due to that we decided to be on the safe side, and therefore wait with France untill tuesday next week when we can get help with it.

Trust me, you don't need any of that.

Can you tell me more? I am funded by The Danish Innovation Foundation, and so I always remain on the safe side, as recommended. It sounds like you have experience with this, do you have any good resources I perhaps can read or anything alike? :)

Why is it not available in the Canadian app store?

Annoying, but fair data laws of the world, this case: Canada. Hopefully will be okay next week.

Canadian couples are even-keeled, rather than imprudently ‘happy’.

Sorry aboot that.

Android app not available in my country, France.

Hey, thank you for the comment, Android / google play are a bit slow to approved compared to Apple, but it should be out on Andriod very soon!

Yes it's now a available. Thank you !

Please remove the need to create an account

First impression matters: no iOS sso and pw policy intransparenten, had to retry x 4 without any useful feedback

Not available in Chile :(

Or NZ

Or Sweden.

Sorry, do you mean on Andriod or IOS? (I live in Sweden ... and can download on IOS) If Android, then it is because we are waiting for Google Playstore Approval.

On Android.

It says not available in Canada, just pointing it out in case that was not intended

> This item is not available in your country

United States on Android?

> This item is not available in your country

UK.

Romantism as a service

Haha, Yes SaaS is so outdated ;)

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