Plain language, because there is no reason for it not to be.
One true history anecdote a day, under 120 words, each one checked against two independent published accounts before it is marked Verified.
Today's story is free, every day, with no account and no trial. One optional purchase — once, not a subscription — unlocks reading ahead, the full back catalogue, search and saving. The price is whatever Apple shows you in your own currency. There is no second charge, nothing renews, and nothing expires.
The purchase goes through Apple, so Apple holds the receipt and Apple handles refunds, at reportaproblem.apple.com. I cannot issue one, see one or reverse one.
If the unlock does not appear on a new device, tap Restore purchase in Settings. That asks Apple again; it does not ask me.
Every story marked Verified has been checked against two independent published accounts. Where those accounts disagree, the story says so rather than quietly picking a side.
Stories are researched, written and checked with the help of AI. Before a story is marked Verified, every claim in it must be matched, word for word, to two independent published sources, and those sources are listed under the story.
History is still a reconstruction. Dates get corrected, attributions move, and a good anecdote sometimes turns out to have been improved in the telling. Anecdota is written to be accurate and is not a scholarly source — the sources for every story are listed in the app so you can go to them yourself. If you find something wrong, tell me and I will fix it. That is a promise I can keep.
The stories are written for this app and they are mine. Quote one, share a link, read one aloud, tell someone at dinner — that is what they are for. Republishing the catalogue wholesale, or feeding it into something as training data or filler content, is not.
Newsreader and IBM Plex Mono are used under the SIL Open Font License 1.1.
Anecdota is static files on a content delivery network and an app that keeps what it has already downloaded, which is about as little as a thing can depend on. It opens offline. When the feed is unreachable it shows you the last story it has instead of an error.
There is no uptime promise. If I ever stop publishing, the stories already on your device stay on your device, and nothing takes the purchase away.
The app is provided as it is, without warranty. To the extent the law allows, anything I could owe you is limited to what you actually paid for it. Nothing here removes rights your local consumer law gives you.
These terms are governed by the laws of Denmark. If you live elsewhere in the EU, you keep the protections your own country's consumer law gives you, and you can bring a claim in your own country's courts.
Honestly: Apple takes its share, the developer programme is $99 a year, the domain and the hosting are a little more, and what is left is the reason there will be another app after this one. There is no investor to answer to and no growth target. It buys the time to keep writing, and it keeps me building things for people instead of for metrics.
If you bought it — thank you. You are not a user, a conversion or a cohort. You paid once for a small thing that works, which is the deal I would want too.
anecdota@mauropr.dev
Last updated October 2026.