As a peer[1] in the habit-building space, there are so many things I love about this:
* No self-reporting. I can attest this a huge source of friction for users.
* Aligned business model. I also donate 100% of penalties to charity. It's shocking how many accountability apps are incentivized for you to fail.
* External accountability. It's an underrated tool and I'm glad it's gaining more recognition.
However, I think there's also such a thing as too much accountability. Life comes in the way and people won't always hit their goals. When you penalize failure, you penalize trying. Instead, it's better to encourage learning from failure.
That's why I impose compassionate accountability. You're only required to check in on your goals, not succeed at them. This way, you can fight through the problem instead of giving up the moment you fail.
Here's a recent example from Habit Gym that illustrates this quite well. It's a user trying to quit smoking - they start off slow, but pick up momentum quickly because they learned from their mistakes. https://i.imgur.com/1eiZEMy.png
Exactly! It's the digital equivalent of placing the milk at the back of the grocery store. It's meant to distract you from why you're there in the first place.
That's the problem with self-help today - inspiration/consumption is overrepresented and action is underrepresented. The problem stems from misaligned incentives - creators make money through engagement, regardless of actual change created.
I created a platform [0] to solve this problem - for creators to develop programs (example [1]) that are aligned with their audience's best interests.
