Australia-based NoGrey is a pre-scene negotiation app for the kink and fetish community, intended to leave ‘no grey areas’ when it comes to sex.
Even though Google placed NoGrey on review back in July due to “objectionable user content”, it is temporarily available for direct download on Android devices. For Apple users, a beta version is currently available on TestFlight, upon request.
How does it work?
Unlike other kink-based apps out there, NoGrey offers a visually precise method of communicating interests, participation, and experience when preparing for a ‘scene’. A scene, in BDSM terms, is usually a set of pre-negotiated sexual activities, with a beginning, middle and end – along with safe-words to communicate boundaries throughout.
BDSM sexual activities, boundaries, and consent can be very grey for people new to kink, and even for more experienced kinksters. With AI-driven recommendations, the app is built to match you with like-minded play partners, not dissimilar to Waves. A dynamic graph is created to represent your ‘fingerprint’ of sexual interests, making it visually clear to decipher interest compatibility. With encrypted chat, there’s an option to “build a scene” in-app, which you can then create in real life. Post-scene, users are offered personalized aftercare support and can review a person based on whether they fulfilled their expectations.
What does it cost?
For a lifetime membership, you can gift NoGrey for around $100 (AUS $150 currently, normally AUS $260), but unpaid users can still experience the app’s many free features. These include creating a separate “community” and “main” profile, to enjoy the kink social elements as well as the scene experience without identity crossover. There’s the opportunity to build up to two scenes at a time, and to follow the latest 50 posts on the community feed.
The premium, however, offers multiple tailored profiles, which it says is great for ‘switches’ – people who enjoy being dominated as well as dominating, depending on their partner and the scene. Premium allows you to build and save multiple scenes, as well as giving unlimited feed access.
Some grey areas?
The kink community prides itself on taking “safe, sane and consensual” sexual activities very seriously. This means a lot of communication is needed to understand the broad spectrums within each individual interest, where boundaries can fluctuate situationally.
While NoGrey says it’s designed as a supplement to negotiating boundaries, not to replace communication, there’s arguably a concern that the very fact that it’s “designed to facilitate rapid negotiation” could simplify the nuance of consent. Hence why there is so much grey area.
As the app hosts a sex-positive community willing to educate each other, there is room for this kind of supportive education, provided the review safety feature is supervised and regulated.
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