Complete rebrand, new company name, up front privacy notices, and a transparent does not seem shady to me. If you mention the old product at all mention the lessons learned and desire to do it right this time.I made a little dating app for a super conservative religious group. As you might imagine, it did not end well. It's received bad reviews and the top review with 21 upvotes falsely accuses the app of stealing people's data.
I also have good reviews which are also more recent but the negative reviews get more upvotes so they're shown first.
Would it be a bad idea to just delete this app and start again with a new one? With a fresh start there are things that I would do differently which I think would really help but I don't want to be shady.
I've done shady things in my life (i.e selling pirated ebooks for a class, pumped up my other app with good fake reviews, cheating on exams when I know I can get away with it) and I've always regretted them. I want to operate with integrity or not operate at all. Am I being naive? I'd appreciate any thoughts.