Jumping on the subscription bandwagon, the journaling app, Day One, announced a premium version for $49.99/year (a discount is available for the first year for new users -- a bigger discount for certain existing users).

http://help.dayoneapp.com/day-one-2-0/day-one-premium-faq

If you are a Day One user you'd need to read the blog to sort out what this means for you. What it means for me is "forget it". I like Day One a lot. I migrated to it from MacJournal because Day One was well designed. But now for the same price, MacJournal might be a much better option since it offers far more features than Day One.

I don't mind subscription software if the developer is offering a significant difference for the increased price. On first glance, that's not the case with Day One.

While I too suffer from subscription fatigue, it should be noted that "All 2.0 features remain available for purchasers of the 2.0 apps. Day One Classic users are also unaffected. All Day One users will continue to receive maintenance and non-Premium updates, as needed." Hard to know what this means long term, but seems it will be some time before anyone will feel pressured to go premium if they don't want to.

Yeah, well they lied.

Mac AppStore and iOS AppStore updated my DayOne macOS and iOS apps. As soon as they launched I was locked out of all but one journal (I have numerous) and sync was locked up. The FAQ Luhmann quoted claims "all 2.0 features remain available for purchasers of the 2.0 app" -- multiple journals and sync are 2.0 features, and now they are locked out. The FAQ also claims 2.0 users can "lock in" a Premium subscription for $24.99. There is no setting in 2.0 to do so. The only option provided in the macOS and iOS version is to subscribe for $34.99 the first year and $49.99 per year thereafter.

There is no way to export my data because the app has locked it out. The only access possible is to pay the $34.99 ransom.

So BEWARE -- don't let the AppStore update your DayOne apps until you have exported everything. Unless paying ransom to rapacious developers is your thing.

Luhmann wrote:

While I too suffer from subscription fatigue, it should be noted that
"All 2.0 features remain available for purchasers of the 2.0 apps. Day
One Classic users are also unaffected. All Day One users will continue
to receive maintenance and non-Premium updates, as needed." Hard to know
what this means long term, but seems it will be some time before anyone
will feel pressured to go premium if they don't want to.

While it is true that it appears that way at first after the upgrade (they really did not handle this well), it does not appear that they were lying. After carefully exporting all my entries I allowed the app store to update my app. When I first opened it all but one journal was greyed out (as Paul reported), but after I went into the preferences and saw that it did a sync, those journals were no longer greyed out and everything seemed to be working again as normal. I then opened my iPhone and ran an update there as well. Sync was disabled, but I was able to turn it back on in the preferences. When I looked at the preferences I also saw "account status" which said "Plus." I clicked on that and it had text very similar to the FAQ text I posted earlier. You can see it here:

http://d.pr/i/tQlyp

In short, it did appear at first to have disabled everything, but in the end everything is working as it was before. It may be that it takes a while to verify your "plus" account with the server, especially if a lot of people are upgrading all at once.

It's good that you got your installation working. No luck over here -- my data is still held hostage to the demand to pay. My advice stands: don't let the app upgrade. If there's a bug, let them fix it. If not, find a way to migrate your data somewhere else.

In short, it did appear at first to have disabled everything, but in the end everything is working as it was before. It may be that it takes a while to verify your “plus” account with the server, especially if a lot of people are upgrading all at once.

Aargh! Ran an update of some of my applications, including Day One, then read this. Even if I can untangle my data, not a way to run a railroad!

Among the beauties of DayOne was that it was easy. It works flawlessly on iPad and Mac, and syncs seamlessly. Now they are introducing this unknown -- how long will my copies of DayOne work without me purchasing the "Premium" edition? It takes what was a no-brainer app and introduces uncertainty. I don't begrudge a developer trying to find a financially sustainable model for running their business, but I think they've shot themselves in the foot. I wish them luck, though.

Steve Z.

The iOS and macOS versions were updated today -- the update appears to have restored access to my existing data and the sync between macOS and iOS.

Kind of reminds me of the Smile Software fiasco with TextExpander -- introducing a pricing scheme that fell flat in the market. It was later modified.

Hugh wrote:

Aargh! Ran an update of some of my applications, including Day One, then
read this. Even if I can untangle my data, not a way to run a railroad!

Glad everything is working. I agree with Steve though about the need for alternatives. The fact that they are doing this suggests their current business model isn't working great and I'm not convinced the new one will work any better. What do people see as reasonable alternatives?

Personally I use Bear for my regular note taking, but like Day One as both a journal app (because it can be password locked) and as a general archive for all my old Markdown formatted notes. So I need something which offers both security and markdown. One option is Ulysses which I already own, but I the tagging in Ulysses never worked well for me. It also doesn't work so well for me as a journaling app. And while it can be password protected, it doesn't offer end-to-end encryption like Day One (although this feature still isn't working for me, I'm hopeful that the bugs will eventually be fixed). What else is out there that might do the job?

Regarding alternatives to Day One. There is the venerable (because it's been around a long long time) MacJournal -- but the iOS version is not great, I have no idea about encryption, and the developer seems to have finally lost interest in it. But, it's pretty good.

I think an alternative is something that doesn't call itself a 'journaling' application. Maybe TrunkNotes, for example. No need to worry about encryption since it transfers data solely by WiFi, and it's a nice blend of markdown + wikification.

I've been looking at alternatives. If you just like jotting down notes about what happened on which day, NotePlan is pretty good. It isn't the app for composing long journal entries, though. And it doesn't allow you to have different "journals" as DayOne does.

Another interesting app I've recently found is called Lumen Trails. It is only for iOS, so that's the first strike. Otherwise, it seems like a very useful way to track various aspects of your life. You create categories for everything you want to track, then select the type of "note" that category will hold. You can have straight journal entries, but you can also have number trackers (i.e. if you tracking your blood sugars for diabetes), and there are several other entry types to choose from. It seems well designed and runs well. It is a subscription service, but it only costs $10 a year and the first month is free, so you can evaluate. You can learn more about it here:

http://lumentrails.com/

I love Ulysses, but I balk at keeping my journal in the same app as my other writing. That's silly, I know, but it is a mental thing. The writing in my journal doesn't have to be honed, but my "serious" writing does. I just want to keep the two types of writing separate.

So I too am leaning toward Bear as a replacement for DayOne.

Steve Z.

If the question of using the same app for business and private writing is not an issue for someone, I think Scrivener would be an excellent choice. There are sure a lot of folks who write blogs about using Scrivener for at purpose.

A nice thing about Day One is the ability to send things to it with macOS and iOS extensions. I send text snippets and pictures to Day One journals quite often. So, if that's a desirable feature, then beside Scrivener you also have Together and DEVONthink that can be used effectively for journaling.

Or, one could design a custom journal in Tap Forms and include fields for capturing health / diet / exercise stats in addition to text entries. I frequently create travel logs in Tap Forms and use it as a capture method on the front end of Tinderbox -- by exporting CSV from Tap Forms to Tinderbox.

I cannot answer @Lurmann's encryption requirement about any of the above, though.

yes, encryptions are necessary. And, also, the entries should not be visible to Spotlight. Otherwise, the journals would be easily public. For that reason, I don't think Devonthink and Tinderbox are great alternatives.

The json template seems better for export dayone. Ideally, the new journaling app should accept that format.

Do you guys know any of these apps accept json?

Bear can natively import from Dayone. that is interesting.

MacJournal looks much better because it supports encryption. The mutiple windows are also wonderful. I love applications that can open mutiple windows side by side (Devonthink and Tinderbox).

But, importing from Day One to MacJournal is a pain.

I am trying Bear as transition:

Day One --> Json-->Bear-->RTF--> JacJournal.

The problems is: the tags are lost in the transition. Bear is able expor the tags embedded into the text as #Tag.

But, that is not detected as a tag inside MacJournal. has anyone some script to transform those hashed key terms to Finder Tags (https://superuser.com/questions/1224583/assign-finder-tags-to-a-file-by-searching-within-the-content-of-the-file

I'm a long-time lurker here on the forum; hi everyone!

I can't say enough good things about 1Writer as a DayOne alternative on iOS; though not branded as a journaling app, it is an elegant text and markdown editor that allows you to sync text files over Dropbox. I understand that some here are disinclined to use cloud services for sensitive or personal content, so that would be a drawback for some (though for the technically inclined, you could set up a private Git server and use Working Copy in conjunction with 1Writer). There is also no companion app on macOS, though the portability of text files allows for use in your favorite text editor of choice. In general, I find this to be very pragmatic for avoiding vendor lock-in; if 1Writer were to ever migrate to subscription pricing, I could easily switch over to another text editor. It feels good to be able to trust that I will have access to my data even if my toolset has to change from time to time.

I use TextExpander snippets to create timestamped journal entries; if you're a fan of DayOne's journaling prompts, a comparable experience could probably be implemented in TextExpander.

A hazel rule to transform the in text tags to finder tags:

https://wordpress.com/post/dellu.wordpress.com/1039

Thanks for pointing out that Bear imports JSON exported from Day One -- it's an easy process.

Not sure I'll take the extra step to move from Bear to MacJournal.

(Sorry, the link below doesn't open a page with the Hazel rule, should it?)

Dellu wrote:

A hazel rule to transform the in text tags to finder tags:

https://wordpress.com/post/dellu.wordpress.com/1039

I've been disappointed by DayOne's synching behaviour recently (I cannot bring my iOS and Mac versions into 100% congruency), so have taken to writing my journal entries in Outlinely. But I hadn't considered the encryption issue. Hm. Have to look at that.

The blogger at MacDrifter.com wrote a little piece about the Day One situation here:

http://www.macdrifter.com

Gabe Weatherhead wrote:

I have greater concerns about Day One's ability to survive as a business. My impression is that the subscription model is a move to stay profitable. I don't think this will be a magic bullet. Customers simply don't want to pay the price for top-tier self sustaining apps on iOS, especially when the full annual cost of $50 is spelled out in black and white. As the reviews for Day One show, this change will forever sink their ratings in the App Store. Ratings matter even when the reviews are nonsense (which all of the new Day One reviews are).

A bit of a cheap shot to declare all reviews nonsense -- seeing as there are (today) 96 negative ratings since the new pricing was announced, for an app that before that announcement received five star ratings almost universally. The reviews might not be elegant, but their sentiment seems universal.

I think the blogger missed the point. It's not that "customers simply don't want to pay the price for top-tier self sustaining app". That sentence is hard to parse for sense. The real point, I think, is that customers don't want to pay the **same** price year after year just to retain access to their own data, with only minimal improvements to functionality. The promised Android version, for example, is not likely to entice a lot of iOS users.

I don't think the discomfort expressed by the negative ratings, and elsewhere, can be laid up to annoyance about paying subscription fees. Instead, I think it is annoyance about essentially buying the same app year after year for the same price. Customers aren't chumps -- and, worse, they despise being treated as chumps. Customers know that once development is complete on a core product, it normally doesn't cost the same to maintain the product and even expand it year to year. And they know if the developer does nothing but collect fees and produce little in return, the developer is merely grabbing economic rents. That's why the reaction is negative, in my opinion.

I think you're right Paul. I'd add that a lot of current users probably feel like the whole thing was a bait and switch. Buy the apps and get free synch. But now the free synch is kind of precarious. Yes, you can keep using DayOne's current version, but you know one of these days you'll be forced to upgrade for some reason. Not to mention, they're introducing the "Premium" version as if it is something new and better. As far as I can tell, it's pretty much the same as what we're supposed to get simply from buying the MacOS and the iOS versions. That also feels a little underhanded.

Just my 2 cents.

Steve Z.

Paul Korm wrote:

The blogger at MacDrifter.com wrote a little piece about the Day One
situation here:

http://www.macdrifter.com

Gabe Weatherhead wrote:
>I have greater concerns about Day One's ability to survive as a
business. My impression is that the subscription model is a move to stay
profitable. I don't think this will be a magic bullet. Customers simply
don't want to pay the price for top-tier self sustaining apps on iOS,
especially when the full annual cost of $50 is spelled out in black and
white. As the reviews for Day One show, this change will forever sink
their ratings in the App Store. Ratings matter even when the reviews are
nonsense (which all of the new Day One reviews are).

A bit of a cheap shot to declare all reviews nonsense -- seeing as there
are (today) 96 negative ratings since the new pricing was announced, for
an app that before that announcement received five star ratings almost
universally. The reviews might not be elegant, but their sentiment
seems universal.

I think the blogger missed the point. It's not that "customers simply
don't want to pay the price for top-tier self sustaining app". That
sentence is hard to parse for sense. The real point, I think, is that
customers don't want to pay the **same** price year after year just to
retain access to their own data, with only minimal improvements to
functionality. The promised Android version, for example, is not
likely to entice a lot of iOS users.

I don't think the discomfort expressed by the negative ratings, and
elsewhere, can be laid up to annoyance about paying subscription fees.
Instead, I think it is annoyance about essentially buying the same app
year after year for the same price. Customers aren't chumps -- and,
worse, they despise being treated as chumps. Customers know that once
development is complete on a core product, it normally doesn't cost the
same to maintain the product and even expand it year to year. And they
know if the developer does nothing but collect fees and produce little
in return, the developer is merely grabbing economic rents. That's why
the reaction is negative, in my opinion.

I am sorry, this is the page:
https://dellu.wordpress.com/2017/07/02/switching-from-day-one-to-macjournal/

or, just the hazel rule: https://www.dropbox.com/s/w5w597lz3emwyp8/ExportFolder.hazelrules?dl=0

I'm afraid I concluded I'd have to abandon DayOne a little while ago. It's always been a nice app, but recent updates have started to show signs of featuritis and the sync problem I mentioned earlier is slightly alarming. Having said that, it is difficult to know what to replace it with. There are quite a few not-very-good journal equivalents out there, but like others in this thread, I'll probably end up using a notebook-style app to continue keeping a regular record. Currently it's Outlinely. Bear would also be good, and I'm delighted to hear it can import DayOne, but I don't like Bear's limitation to tags only (even though the nested tags approach is a big improvement). I'd much prefer a folders+tags model. Oh, and folding. But hey, it's still early days.

I suppose the question that the Day One case raises in my mind is this: is there a more generalised crisis in the micro-economics of running macOS/iOS developers, or do the developers seeking to switch to a subscription revenue model simply want to get a little bit richer, sustainably? (Not a motive to be disparaged if they can achieve it and also make consistently good applications, in my mind.)

The developer of Pleco had a good twitter thread on this a few days ago. He argued that Apple doesn’t want developers to charge for version upgrades because that will mean that people might put off purchasing a new phone that might require an upgrade due to the extra cost of upgrading all their apps. For this reason Apple prefers developers adopt a subscription model, that way anyone paying a subscription will not worry about hardware or system upgrades as they will always have the new version. So it makes sense from Apple's perspective, but from the user's perspective I think a lot of subscriptions can get out of hand quite easily. I've already installed an app just to keep track of all my subscriptions!!! In Day One's case, however, I think they just handled the shift poorly. In addition to bugs, they also terminated a feature many people relied upon (sync via iCloud or Dropbox) without really adding any significant new features, and then started promoting Premium using very vague language that left existing users unsure about the future of the product. Personally I don't mind supporting developers if they are providing a service I can't get elsewhere, but Day One has been rather buggy for me and the new end-to-end encryption has never worked. If they can iron out the bugs I might stick with them, otherwise I'll look for an alternative...