Privacy

Effective 28 September 2026. OnlyIdeas is operated by LazyingArt LLC. Contact contact@lazying.art about privacy or your account.

Your account and library

We store your account identifier and display name, your private papers and figures, notes, comments, reading requests and agent conversations to provide the app. GitHub login supplies a numeric account ID, username and chosen display name; its provider token is discarded after sign-in. Apple login uses an app-specific identifier and an optional name. We do not need your email address. Sign-in sessions use protected cookies or native secure storage and expire after 90 days of inactivity. Signing out removes that device’s session and private offline downloads.

Your reading space and reminders

Saved and liked papers, private activity history, inbox read status, and your chosen interests, discipline, reading language and reminder time are stored with your account. We use the interests and discipline you enter to request matching research metadata from research indexes including OpenAlex, arXiv and Crossref; your account identifier is not sent with that search. These preferences personalize For you, without automatically downloading or converting papers. Approved comments on papers you follow and likes on your papers appear in your inbox, subject to privacy, moderation and block controls. Daily reminders use local operating-system notifications after your permission; activity messages currently refresh while the app is open. You can change these settings in Your space → Interests & notifications, and disable notifications in your device settings. Account deletion removes these personal records.

Conversion and AI requests

When you attach a PDF or image to a conversation, or request PDF import, the selected file is sent to Mathpix for text, equation and figure recognition. Attachments and chats stay private while processing. Word, Markdown and text attachments are converted on our own server without an external recognition provider. Temporary source files are removed from our service after successful conversion; failed uploads remain with your request until account deletion or support removal. You choose Shared or Only me before importing. Shared is the default in current apps. An indexed paper with a verified supported redistribution license can become public after conversion and source checks; other shared papers wait for permission and community review. We retain attribution, figures and license information. Only me keeps it private. Older app imports without a visibility choice stay private. Mathpix processes submissions under its own privacy policy.

The paper agent processes your chat, recent conversation and readable text from your chosen attachments on our connected workstation. Original images and extracted figures remain in your private library. Searches are sent to research indexes such as OpenAlex, arXiv or Crossref, and requested PDFs are downloaded from their source. When catalog searches cannot resolve a paper or its PDF, a bounded OpenAI Codex web-search fallback may receive the public bibliographic query (title, author or DOI). It receives no account identifier, full chat history, attachments or private paper text. See OpenAI’s privacy policy. When you explicitly request a reading guide or translation, the selected paper text is processed by our configured AI service. AI outputs are labeled and may be inaccurate. Requested translations of public papers are saved as reusable sentence and paragraph pieces by paper revision and language, so other readers can reuse completed work. Private-paper translation pieces stay private. Your conversations and attachments are never shared by this translation cache. Do not upload documents you are not permitted to share with these processors. There is no background conversion or translation.

Public contributions

Private papers and discussions are visible only to their account. Public comments show your display name after moderation. Choosing Shared requests publication after source permission and community review. Only me keeps the document private. Personal notes and agent conversations remain private even when the paper is shared. Approved text and figures are copied to the public OnlyIdeas-papers GitHub repository. Public content can be copied by others; GitHub history, forks, downloaded copies and rights already granted under a public license may remain after you remove your account. Never publish private information.

Credits and purchases

When reading credits are enabled, we store your balance and a transaction history linked to your account. Subscriptions are optional. Apple or Google handles native purchases; Stripe handles website/PWA checkout and billing management. The payment provider receives the billing information you supply; we do not receive your card details. We verify transaction and invoice identifiers, product, subscription/trial status and an opaque account binding, and record transcription/fetch quota usage to deliver and restore benefits and process refunds. These records are not public or used for advertising. Account deletion removes the personal credit history; minimal de-identified receipt and reward records remain to prevent repeated claims and meet accounting obligations. Cancel store subscriptions separately before deleting your account.

Security and retention

Traffic is encrypted with HTTPS. We keep operational security logs and database backups for recovery. Account deletion removes active account data and revokes all app sessions. Backup copies expire within 30 days and are not used to restore deleted accounts. Minimal revocation identifiers and records needed to address abuse or legal obligations may be retained. We do not sell personal data, use advertising identifiers, track you across other companies’ apps or run behavioral advertising.

Your choices

Use Profile → Delete account to delete your account. The web deletion page provides the same option without the installed app and a support route for lost access. You can delete your comments, block readers, sign out, and remove offline downloads. Contact us to request access or correction. OnlyIdeas is not directed to children under 13.