@djsundog @Claire having been on the corporate side of this, I am almost completely certain that what happened was: acquisition happened, new corporate owner's lawyers looked at their privacy policy, red flagged the lack of COPPA protection since the app does a nonzero amount of data collection, then they added it in the interest of being safe rather than sorry. (Just noting I am also dismayed at the acquisition, I think Audacity has been doing great for 20 years slowly improving all the time.)
@djsundog @Claire heh, as a matter of fact, here's a peek at my desktop this very moment...