# Beta Mode + Wider Paid/Free Gap — Design Spec **Date:** 2026-05-25 **Status:** Draft — awaiting approval **Scope:** Three coordinated changes that ship together because they all target the closed-beta launch: (1) a visible BETA indicator in the app chrome, (2) a free-tier cap on the news feed window, and (3) email digests — daily for paid, Sunday-weekly for everyone. ## 1. Goals - Set expectations for closed-beta testers that the product is still evolving, without making the app look unfinished. - Create a tangible reason to upgrade beyond portfolio import + sync. Today the free tier carries nearly the entire editorial layer; after this change, paid gets meaningfully more. - Use existing infra (scheduler, SMTP, OpenRouter, settings page) rather than introducing new dependencies. ## 2. Non-goals - No payment / Paddle work. Pricing copy is updated, but checkout is still gated behind the existing "Coming soon" CTA. - No per-user personalised digests. Same content for all recipients. - No timezone handling for users. Fixed 06:30 UTC daily send. - No new analytics / metrics dashboards for opens or clicks beyond a simple audit row per send. ## 3. Component overview | Component | Change | |-----------|--------| | `app/templates/base.html` | BETA chip in header next to brand. | | `app/static/css/cassandra.css` | `.beta-chip` styles. | | `app/config.py` | `BETA_MODE: bool = True` env flag. | | `app/services/access.py` | `FREE_NEWS_WINDOW_HOURS = 6` constant. | | `app/routers/api.py:222-280` (`news_list`) | Soft-auth dep + free-tier window clamp. | | `app/templates/partials/news.html` | "Showing last 6h — upgrade for 24h" footer when capped. | | `app/models.py` | New columns on `User`: `email_digest_opt_in: bool`, `digest_tone: str | None`. New table `EmailSend(user_id, kind, sent_at, status, error)`. | | `alembic/versions/0017_email_digest.py` | Migration. | | `app/services/openrouter.py` | Add `build_daily_digest_prompt(tone)` and `build_weekly_digest_prompt(tone)`, bump `PROMPT_VERSION`. | | `app/services/email_service.py` | Add `render_digest_email(kind, tone, content)` + `send_digest(user, kind, tone, html, text)`. | | `app/jobs/email_digest_job.py` (new) | Daily-or-weekly orchestrator. Generates content once per tone, fans out to recipients. | | `app/scheduler_main.py` | Register the new job at 06:30 UTC. | | `app/templates/settings.html` | "Email digests" section: opt-in toggle, tone radio. | | `app/templates/login.html` (post-OTP-verify flow) | Default-checked "send me the digest" checkbox. | | `app/routers/auth.py` | OTP-verify handler reads the new `subscribe_to_digests` form field and sets `email_digest_opt_in` on the new `User`. | | `app/routers/settings.py` (or wherever existing settings PATCH lives) | New `PATCH /api/settings/digest` endpoint: body `{opt_in: bool, tone: "NOVICE"|"INTERMEDIATE"}`. | | `app/routers/email.py` (new) | `GET /email/unsubscribe?token=...` — HMAC-verified one-click off switch. | | `app/templates/pricing.html` | Updated bullets — free gets weekly digest + last 6h news; paid gets daily digest + last 24h news. | ## 4. Detailed design ### 4.1 BETA chip `app/templates/base.html` only (not `public_base.html`). Insert immediately after the brand link: ```html {{ BRAND_NAME }} {% if BETA_MODE %}BETA{% endif %} ``` The `BETA_MODE` flag is injected into the template context globally — add it to `app/templates_env.py` so every render gets it (analogous to how `BRAND_NAME` is provided today). CSS: small uppercase pill with `var(--accent)` background and brand-bg foreground; spaced ~8px from the brand link. Sizing matches the existing top-right `.meta` chip so the visual weight is balanced. `BETA_MODE` defaults to `True` in `app/config.py`. Flip to `False` for general launch — one-line change. ### 4.2 Free-tier news cap (6h window) `app/routers/api.py`'s `news_list` (lines 222-280) currently has no auth dep. Add `principal: CurrentUser | None = Depends(maybe_current_user)` (soft-auth — keeps the endpoint reachable by anonymous visitors, matching today's behaviour). Compute the effective window: ```python window = since_hours if not is_paid_active(principal): window = min(window, FREE_NEWS_WINDOW_HOURS) # 6.0 cutoff = utcnow() - timedelta(hours=window) ``` `FREE_NEWS_WINDOW_HOURS = 6.0` lives in `app/services/access.py` as a module-level constant. Tuning it later is one edit; promoting it to env config is YAGNI for now. `is_paid_active` already accepts `CurrentUser | User | None` and admins auto-pass — no special-casing needed here. When the cap is in effect, pass `capped: True` into the news partial so it can render a soft footer: > Free tier — showing the last 6 hours of news. [Upgrade] for the full > 24-hour feed plus daily and weekly email digests. When the user is paid (or admin), the footer is absent. When the visitor is anonymous, the link goes to `/pricing`. ### 4.3 Database changes ```python # app/models.py — User columns added: email_digest_opt_in: Mapped[bool] = mapped_column(Boolean, nullable=False, default=True, server_default=text("1")) digest_tone: Mapped[str | None] = mapped_column(String(16)) # NOVICE | INTERMEDIATE ``` Defaults to opted-in (matches the chosen UX). `digest_tone` is nullable; NULL is interpreted as INTERMEDIATE at render time. New table: ```python class EmailSend(Base): __tablename__ = "email_sends" id: Mapped[int] = mapped_column(BigInteger, primary_key=True, autoincrement=True) user_id: Mapped[int] = mapped_column(ForeignKey("users.id", ondelete="CASCADE"), nullable=False, index=True) kind: Mapped[str] = mapped_column(String(16), nullable=False) # "daily" | "weekly" sent_at: Mapped[datetime] = mapped_column(DateTime(timezone=True), default=utcnow, nullable=False) status: Mapped[str] = mapped_column(String(16), nullable=False) # "sent" | "skipped" | "error" error: Mapped[str | None] = mapped_column(String(255)) __table_args__ = ( Index("ix_email_sends_user_kind_sent", "user_id", "kind", "sent_at"), ) ``` Idempotency: the job queries `EmailSend` for the current day before sending, so a job restart can't double-deliver. Migration: `alembic/versions/0017_email_digest.py`. ### 4.4 Digest content generation Two new prompts in `app/services/openrouter.py`: - `build_daily_digest_prompt(tone)` — returns a `(system, user)` pair. Pulls the same `quotes_by_group` + `headlines_by_bucket` data as the hourly log but with a 24h headline window and a different instruction set: less "current state" framing, more "what mattered in the past day, what to watch today". Target length ~600 words. - `build_weekly_digest_prompt(tone)` — 7-day headline window, weekly recap + week-ahead anticipation. Target length ~900 words. Both reuse `call_llm()` and the existing cost-cap / ledger plumbing. `PROMPT_VERSION` is bumped so the audit trail is unambiguous. For each digest run, the job generates **two** variants (NOVICE + INTERMEDIATE) and stores them in memory for the fan-out batch. There is no DB persistence of digest content — emails are the artefact. If we later want to render them on a web archive, that's a separate spec. Cost: at our current model pricing, two daily generations ≈ $0.04/day, two weekly generations ≈ $0.06/week. Both well under the existing `OPENROUTER_MONTHLY_CAP_USD` headroom. ### 4.5 Email rendering and delivery `render_digest_email(kind, tone, html_body, text_body) -> (subject, text, html)` in `email_service.py`. Wraps the LLM output in the same multipart template family used for OTPs (light/dark palette, inline styles, monospace stack, 520px max-width). Adds two footer rows: - "Don't want these? [Unsubscribe in one click](.../email/unsubscribe?token=...)" - "Or change your preferences in [Settings](.../settings)" Subjects: - Daily: `"Read the Markets · Daily — {date}"` - Weekly: `"Read the Markets · Weekly recap — {date}"` Fan-out: one SMTP send per recipient. Sequential with a small `asyncio.sleep(0.1)` between sends to stay under common SMTP rate limits. Failures are caught per-recipient, logged into `EmailSend`, and don't block the rest of the batch. ### 4.6 Sign-up opt-in checkbox The OTP-verify POST handler in `app/routers/auth.py` is where the user is first established — that handler reads a `subscribe_to_digests` form field and persists it into `User.email_digest_opt_in`. Default to `True` if the field is absent (covers older clients or curl flows). The verify template (`app/templates/verify.html`) gets a checkbox: ```html ``` Pre-existing users get `email_digest_opt_in=True` from the migration's server-side default — but see §6 for the cutover plan. ### 4.7 Settings page In `app/templates/settings.html`, add a section: ``` Email digests [✓] Send me digests Free tier: Sunday weekly. Paid: daily + Sunday. Reading level: ( ) Novice (•) Intermediate Last delivery: 2026-05-24 06:30 UTC — sent ``` The "Last delivery" row reads the most recent `EmailSend` row for this user. If none, shows "—". Wire it via the existing settings JS pattern (look for the sync / tone-toggle handlers in `static/js/`); the endpoints are `PATCH /api/settings/digest` with body `{opt_in: bool, tone: str}`. ### 4.8 One-click unsubscribe `GET /email/unsubscribe?token=`: - Token is `itsdangerous.URLSafeSerializer` over `{"uid": user_id, "purpose": "digest_optout"}`, signed with `CASSANDRA_SECRET`. - Handler verifies, flips `email_digest_opt_in=False`, renders a tiny confirmation page ("You're unsubscribed. Re-enable any time in [Settings](/settings)."). - No auth required — that's the whole point of one-click unsubscribe. - Replay-safe: re-running the same URL is idempotent (the column is already false; the page renders the same confirmation). ### 4.9 Scheduler integration `app/scheduler_main.py` already runs the hourly jobs. Add: ```python schedule_daily( # whatever helper exists, or apscheduler equivalent "email_digest_job", hour=6, minute=30, target=email_digest_job.run, ) ``` The job itself decides what to do: ```python async def run(): today = utcnow().date() if today.weekday() == 6: # Sunday — weekly digest for everyone await _run_weekly() else: await _run_daily() # paid only ``` `_run_weekly()` queries all users with `email_digest_opt_in=True`. `_run_daily()` queries paid users with `email_digest_opt_in=True`. ### 4.10 Pricing copy updates `app/templates/pricing.html` — modify the bullet lists. New copy: Free: - "News aggregator — last 6 hours, auto-tagged by theme" (was: no time qualifier) - "Cross-asset macro signals across every asset class" - "Hourly AI interpretation of the news + the tape" - "Per-group cross-asset summaries" - "Novice / Intermediate reading levels" - "**Sunday weekly digest by email**" *(new)* - "❌ Portfolio import & analysis" - "❌ Encrypted cloud sync" Paid (replaces the "Priority email when something material changes (later)" line): - "Everything in Free" - "**News aggregator — full 24 hours**" *(replaces the implicit 24h)* - "Portfolio import (Trading 212 CSV)" - "AI commentary on diversification, sector and currency concentration, …" - "Optional encrypted cloud sync across devices" - "**Daily email digest** (Mon–Sat) + Sunday weekly" *(replaces 'Priority email')* The intro paragraph at lines 8-13 needs to soften: > Two tiers. The news aggregator and hourly AI interpretation are > available to everyone — paid extends the time window from 6h to 24h > and adds daily editorial by email, plus the portfolio-import features. (Old copy said "free for everyone — we want the read out where people can use it." That stance is moderated, not abandoned.) ## 5. Error handling - **SMTP failure**: per-recipient try/except. Log to `EmailSend` with `status="error"`, `error=str(exc)[:255]`. Job continues. Job-level failure metrics surface via existing `JobRun` mechanism. - **OpenRouter failure**: if the content generation fails for both tones, the job records `JobRun.status="error"` and sends nothing. Half-success (one tone) → send the variant that worked, skip the other; users on the failed tone get nothing today (rather than wrong content). - **Cost-cap hit**: same pattern as the hourly job — skip the run with a logged reason. - **Unsubscribe token invalid / tampered**: render the same confirmation page generically; do not leak whether the token was valid (avoid enumeration). ## 6. Cutover plan - Migration sets `email_digest_opt_in=True` for all existing users via `server_default`. This is the user-requested default — they want every paid beta-tester actually receiving the email. - BETA mode is on from the first deploy. - News cap is on from the first deploy. - The first daily run lands at 06:30 UTC the morning after deploy. - The first weekly run lands at 06:30 UTC the next Sunday. - A pre-deploy admin CLI command (`python -m app.cli send-test-digest --email me@…`) is added for the operator to dry-run a digest into their own inbox before flipping the scheduler. ## 7. Testing - Unit: `is_paid_active` window-clamping, opt-in flag round-trip, token signing/verification. - Integration: `tests/test_news_api.py` — anonymous + free vs paid windowing. `tests/test_email_digest.py` — job runs, EmailSend rows written, idempotency on re-run within the same day. - Manual: send-test-digest CLI, click unsubscribe link, verify Settings toggle round-trips. ## 8. Open questions None at design time — all earlier ambiguities (chip scope, window shape, content shape, send time, tone variants, opt-in default, unsubscribe model) were resolved during brainstorming.