About
No ads. No data sales. No exceptions.
Common Sense Consortium is a mission-locked group. Our purpose is to build ethical technology that serves adults 65+ and the families who care about them, without dark patterns, without selling data, and without optimizing for time-on-device.
What mission-locked means here
We are structuring the company so mission commitments are legally binding — not just brand values — from the moment we're formed. For us, that means older adults, families, and the public interest of safe, non-exploitative technology come before shareholder return. Mission is not a slide deck. It is a constraint on product decisions, written into our founding documents.
Why we're building this
It's the unanswered text that sits a little too long before you check it again. The phone call where your dad sounds almost like himself, except for one detail that doesn't add up like a bill he doesn't remember agreeing to. It's not knowing whether what he clicked on or believed today was true, safe, or something designed to take advantage of him. The worst part is knowing that even if you ask, he might not remember.
We couldn't stop asking: how do we keep our parents safe from scams and misinformation, engaged in the real world, and as cognitively sharp as possible? How can we do this from a distance and while working full-time? How can we do this when so much of what's supposed to “connect” them to others instead pulls them further into isolation?
The “social” platforms built to hold anyone's attention are especially good at holding an older adult's. They use the tactics we're all familiar with i.e., the endless scroll, the outrage bait and the algorithm that doesn't know or care that it's talking to someone's parent. It's not designed to help them feel less alone. It's designed to keep them there.
We looked for something built differently. We couldn't find it. Most technology aimed at older adults and their families is still built to capture attention or monetize data — not to actually help.
So before writing a line of code, we made commitments to ourselves: no ads, no data sales, no design tricks meant to keep someone scrolling when they should be sleeping, cooking, or calling the people who actually love them. We're in the process of making those commitments legally binding — not just promises on a webpage.
We're not there yet. We want to know who's with us. We want to hear your experiences — especially those of adult children and caregivers who live this every day. If you're willing to tell us what's actually hard, we want to hear it before we build anything else.
Principles we will not trade away
These are the six things we refuse to trade for growth. Not because a lawyer told us to write them down — because we watched what happens to companies that don't.
If a feature would improve engagement metrics at the expense of wellbeing, wellbeing wins.
No advertising model
We do not sell attention. Products are funded in ways that keep incentives aligned with the people who use them — not with advertisers.
No data sales
Personal information is not a product. We do not sell user data, and we design to minimize what must be collected.
Anti-addictive design
We refuse streaks, guilt notifications, infinite feeds, and other patterns that exploit loneliness or habit. Good technology gives people their time back.
Dignity and truth
We speak plainly. We do not overclaim what technology can do. Older adults and families deserve honesty over hype.
Accessibility as default
Readable type, clear contrast, and inclusive interaction are not extras. They are part of treating people with respect.
Family partnership without surveillance
When products involve family members, privacy walls and consent matter. Care should never become covert monitoring.
You don't have to take this on faith
Every principle above is something we could quietly abandon later, the way plenty of companies have. We're telling you now, in public, before we've built anything, so you have something to hold us to — and somewhere to come back and check. If you want to help shape what we build before any of this is finished enough to hide behind, we'd be grateful for your time.