This new Mac application holds your screen captive until you consume some water.
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Hydration Hostage resides in your menu bar, blocking access to your screen on a set schedule, only permitting access once your camera verifies that you've taken a drink.
A new Mac application is proposing that the primary reason your hydration reminders often go unheeded is due to their ease of dismissal. Applications like Loook take a soft approach, prompting you to hydrate alongside reminders for maintaining posture and taking eye breaks. In contrast, Hydration Hostage adopts a more forceful method. Developed by a single creator, the app occupies your menu bar and takes control of your screen at scheduled intervals until it detects via the camera that you have actually consumed water.
**How it operates**
Hydration Hostage utilizes Apple’s Vision framework for verification purposes. Given its requirement for camera access, the developer has been transparent about its privacy model in a Reddit post, clarifying that frames are processed locally and promptly discarded without any analytics related to the verification process.
The app features three enforcement modes depending on the level of accountability you feel you need. The Gentle mode provides a standard reminder that you can acknowledge and dismiss. The Enforcer mode necessitates a camera check before your screen can be unlocked. The Hostage mode, being the most stringent, operates under the assumption that you might attempt to cheat the system, making it as challenging as possible to do so, although an exit via the Escape key is always an option for legitimate emergencies.
**Pricing and availability**
Hydration Hostage is currently available for free download, offering a seven-day full-feature trial that allows you to determine whether this tough-love strategy is effective for you. If you find it beneficial, a one-time license is priced at $14.99 until June 18, after which it will increase to $19.99. There is no subscription required.
While passive reminders for hydration have been easily dismissed, Hydration Hostage is grounded in the belief that the solution lies in completely removing that option and directly linking screen access to your adherence to hydration.
Pranob is an experienced tech journalist with over eight years of expertise in consumer technology coverage. His work has been...
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This new Mac application holds your screen captive until you consume some water.
Hydration Hostage schedules screen locks on your Mac and will only unlock once the on-device camera verifies that you've indeed consumed water.