Cairn vs Strict App Blocker

You make the promise. Cairn helps you keep it. Cairn blocks the apps that pull you away, and you decide in advance how hard it is to get back in. Not a dashboard, not a report on how bad last week was. A commitment device. THE UNLOCK LADDER Every block has a price you set when you're clear-headed, and pay when you're not: • Confirm: one tap to say you mean it. • Cooldown: wait it out, then a short window. • Effort: a puzzle, a long passphrase, or ten pushups. • In stone: no way through. It opens when it was always going to open. The top rung is only offered where a block ends on its own: a schedule that closes, a daily limit that resets, a place you can walk out of. A hard block that never lifts isn't a commitment, it's a trap with app deletion as the only key, so Cairn won't offer it. The same price applies to every way out. Turning a block off, deleting it, and editing it all cost what opening it costs. A lock you can undo by flipping a switch isn't a lock. FOUR WAYS TO BLOCK • Hard block: on until you turn it off. • Scheduled: a window on the days you choose. • Daily limit: after 30, 60, or 120 minutes, it closes for the day. • At a place: holds while you're at the gym, the office, or any set location. Plus Focus sessions and a Vacation mode that stands everything down. THE TRAIL One stone for each day you keep every block. Seven stones make a week. Cairn counts the day you resisted, not just the day you slipped, and a day it can't be sure about stays blank rather than being awarded to you. A quiet day under your limit earns its stone like any other. WE CAN'T SEE A THING Cairn has no account, no servers, and no analytics. Not "we don't sell your data"; there is no data. You pick apps in Apple's own Screen Time picker, and Cairn only ever receives an anonymous token. It can't read which apps you chose. Neither can we. If you set a daily limit, iOS counts the minutes on your device and tells Cairn only that a limit was crossed. Never how long, never which app. PAY ONCE One payment. No subscription, no ads, no upsell. Free for a month first, and when the month ends nothing is held hostage: every block you made is still there, and nothing on your phone stays blocked because you didn't pay. WHAT CAIRN WON'T DO It won't stop you deleting it. That's deliberate. iOS lets you remove any app, and a blocker that pretended otherwise would be lying. Cairn is a commitment device, not a cage. Pair it with iOS Screen Time restrictions if you want that door closed too. Be where you are.

Set a daily time limit on the apps that eat your day, or shut them off completely between the hours you choose. When the time is gone, it's gone. Free. No account, no subscription, no trial that runs out. DAILY BUDGET Pick your worst apps and give them a limit. The timer counts down while you use them and resets each morning. Open a blocked app and you see how long is left, not a wall with no explanation. HARD MODE Schedule a window and the apps simply don't open. 9 to 5. 11pm to 7am. Whatever you need. No countdown, no bargaining. GREYSCALE Turn the screen black and white the moment you open something you're trying to cut down on. It sounds like a gimmick. It works better than it should. STRICT TRAINING Ten days to get used to it, then you can lock the settings so the version of you at 1am can't undo what you decided at 10am. WHY IT'S FREE Every other blocker wants forty dollars a year to help you use your phone less. This one doesn't. There's a tip jar in Settings if you want to, and that's the whole business model. No account means there's nothing to leak, and your data never leaves your phone. Dark mode, a sixty day history of the days you left your rules alone, and Otto, who tells you where you're at without nagging.