Privacy

• Your notes live on your Mac. Mote has no server for notes, no sync, no cloud storage.
• Mote does not collect analytics, usage telemetry, crash logs, or device identifiers.
• There are no accounts. You do not sign up. You do not give us an email to use the app.
• The only information we ever receive is what you type into the in-app feedback form and choose to send.

Notes are written as plain markdown files to a folder on your Mac (by default, ~/.mote/notes/). Settings and preferences are stored in the standard macOS defaults system. If you connect an Obsidian vault, Mote reads and writes files inside the folder you point it to — nothing leaves your machine.

Mote has a built-in feedback form. When — and only when — you press send, the app posts what you wrote to a feedback endpoint I run. The payload contains:

• The title and body of your message
• A category (bug, idea, etc.)
• Your name, if you chose to fill it in (optional)
• A screenshot, if you checked the box to include one (optional)

That is the only data Mote ever transmits about you, and it is only transmitted when you explicitly submit the form. Feedback is used to improve the app and reply to you if you asked a question.

Meeting mode transcribes audio from your microphone and system output on-device using local ASR models (FluidAudio with Parakeet). Audio and transcripts never leave your Mac. Nothing about your meetings is uploaded anywhere.

YouTube mode and the Web Clipper need access to your browser so they can read the current tab — the video URL, the page title, and similar metadata — in order to build the note's front matter for you. macOS will prompt you the first time for browser automation permission. Mote does not forward any of that tab data to a Mote server; it is used only locally to build the note. YouTube mode may fetch publicly available video metadata from YouTube directly to populate the note.

The app makes a small number of outbound network requests for specific features:

• License validation. When you enter a license key, Mote validates it with Lemon Squeezy, the payment processor. This is a direct request from your Mac to Lemon Squeezy. See their privacy policy.
• App updates. Mote checks a public appcast file hosted on GitHub to see if a new version is available. GitHub will see this request the same way it sees any request for a public file.
• Feedback. Covered above — only when you submit the form.

These are the only outbound connections Mote makes on its own. No analytics SDKs, no error trackers, no third-party scripts inside the app.

Payments are processed by Lemon Squeezy. Mote never sees your card number. Lemon Squeezy collects the information needed to process a purchase (email, billing details, tax info) and issues you a license key. Their privacy practices are covered by their own policy.

The marketing site at getmote.md uses Google Analytics to understand aggregate traffic (page views, referrers, and which buttons get clicked) and Microsoft Clarity for anonymized heatmaps and session replays that help us improve the page. Neither identifies you personally, and Clarity masks text input by default. This applies only to the website — the Mote app itself collects nothing (see above).

Mote is not directed at children under 13 and we do not knowingly collect data about them.

If this policy changes in a meaningful way, the date at the top of the page will change and the updated version will be posted here.

Questions about privacy can go to marcel@getmote.md.