Privacy Policy
Defying Gravity is a video journal for calisthenics skills, operated by Joshua van der Merwe ("we", "us"), the responsible party for your personal information under South Africa's Protection of Personal Information Act, 2013 (POPIA). This policy explains what we collect, why, and what you can do about it.
The short version
- Your videos stay on your phone. We do not upload, copy or look at them.
- We store the journal around your videos — dates, skills, stages, metrics, notes — so it survives reinstalling the app.
- We never sell your data, and we do not track you across other apps or websites.
- You can export everything, and you can delete your account from inside the app.
What we collect
Account information. When you create an account we store your email address, and your display name and timezone if you provide them. If you sign in with Apple or Google, we receive an account identifier and the email address you choose to share; we never receive your password. Authentication is handled by Supabase on our behalf.
Your journal. For each attempt you log we store the date it was filmed, the skill and stage, any metric you enter, your notes, and whether you marked it as a milestone or a personal best. We also store technical details of the clip (duration, resolution, frame rate, file size) so the app can play it back correctly. This is synced to our servers so your journal is not lost with the phone.
Your videos — on your device only. The app never modifies, re-encodes or deletes the original in your camera roll, and in this version it never uploads your videos anywhere. The copies the app makes for playback live in the app's own private storage on your phone and are deliberately excluded from iCloud and system backups. If you lose or wipe the phone, those copies are lost with it; your camera-roll originals are unaffected because we never touch them.
Photo library access. When you log an attempt, the app asks for permission to read videos from your library so you can choose one. It reads only the clip you pick. It never writes to, alters or deletes anything in your library.
Usage data, if you allow it. If analytics are enabled in this build, the app sends anonymous events recording which features are used — for example that an attempt was logged or a comparison was opened. These events carry no video, no notes, no metrics, no names and no email addresses. You can turn this off at any time in Settings → Privacy → Share usage data, and the choice is remembered on your device. Analytics are processed by PostHog.
Crash reports, if enabled. If crash reporting is enabled in this build, a crash sends us diagnostic information about the failure — the error, the device model and the app version. Crash reports carry no video and nothing you have written. Crash reporting is processed by Sentry.
Notifications. If you turn on streak reminders, those notifications are scheduled by your phone, on your phone. We do not send push notifications and we do not operate a notification server.
Why we process it
- To give you an account and keep your journal available across reinstalls (performance of our agreement with you).
- To make the app work — playing back your clips, building the calendar, computing streaks (performance of our agreement with you).
- To fix crashes and understand which features are worth keeping (our legitimate interest, and your consent where analytics require it).
We do not use your data for advertising, we do not profile you, and we do not make automated decisions about you.
Who else sees it
We use a small number of processors, each doing one job:
| Processor | What it handles |
|---|---|
| Supabase | Accounts, authentication and your journal metadata |
| Apple / Google | Sign-in, only if you choose to sign in with them |
| PostHog | Anonymous usage events, only while you allow them |
| Sentry | Crash diagnostics, only if crash reporting is enabled |
We do not sell your personal information, and we do not share it for advertising.
How long we keep it
Your account and journal are kept until you delete them. When you delete your account, your account record and everything attached to it — entries, skills, notes, streaks — are deleted from our database immediately and permanently. Deleting the account also removes the app's own video copies from your phone. Your camera-roll originals are left exactly as they are, because they were never ours to delete.
Backups of our database may retain deleted records for a short period before they expire. Crash and analytics records are retained by their processors on their own schedules.
Your choices and rights
- Export. Settings → Your data → Export your journal writes a file containing every attempt's details that you can save or send anywhere.
- Delete. Settings → Your data → Delete account deletes your account permanently, from inside the app, with no email required.
- Turn off analytics. Settings → Privacy → Share usage data.
- Access, correction, deletion and objection. Under POPIA you may ask whether we hold personal information about you and for a copy of it, ask us to correct or delete it, and object to how we process it. Write to support@defyinggravity.info and we will respond. If you live outside South Africa, your local law may give you similar rights.
- Complaints. If you are not satisfied with our response, you can complain to the Information Regulator (South Africa) at inforegulator.org.za or POPIAComplaints@inforegulator.org.za.
Children
Defying Gravity is not directed at children under 13, and we do not knowingly collect their personal information. If you are under 18, you may use the app only with the consent of a parent or guardian.
Where your data is processed
Our processors operate servers outside South Africa, so your data may be processed abroad. Where that happens we rely on each processor's binding contractual protections, as POPIA permits for transfers of personal information outside the country.
Changes
If this policy changes materially we will update the effective date above and say so in the app's release notes.
Contact
Joshua van der Merwe — support@defyinggravity.info