At least with iOS, you can cancel the trial immediately after signup, and your account is still active until trial period ends.

Sorry! message me in app I'll give you a free month

(stands for anyone from HN)

Ok cool but... Why not just not do that? Is the one month of revenue from people who forget to cancel, then cancel and are pissed about it, Worth it?

Not really — since I'm spending money on ads on day 1 I need to make the money back ASAP to reinvest in ads.

Since traffic from HN is essentially free I have no problem with an extended trial period :)

Wait, now I'm confused - to clarify, I'm asking, "is it worth it to engage in shadow marketing (a free trial that converts automatically to a paid one)" and you've answered "not really." As in, "it's not worth it to do this." But you're doing it anyway?

Sorry! I'm trying to keep up with all the comments and have been responding hastily.

It's fair game in my book to use the tools Apple provides us as developers to monetize our apps. Other apps offering subscriptions do so in the same way... it's why Apple provides us the ability to even offer free trials.

I'm sorry you disagree, but this is common business practice.

I will be the first to admit that I am not a businessperson, but I would predict you're not going to make many friends here standing on "the rules allow us to do this" and "everybody else does it". That's the weakest possible defense, and shows you're not really hearing why people "are pissed about it".

At least he is answering honestly. And everyone seems to dislike honest answers. Looks like people only want to hear some lies wrapped in nice promises, which would never materialize.

edit: typo

Sure, honesty is a good value, which is why it's disappointing to hear that they'll be honest to us about their dishonesty to their customers.

Message you.. in app...

In the same app that he's reluctant to sign up for in the first place because of the predatory trial.

I don't think it's really the point made there.