Algorithmic Aikido
I recalibrated my social media blocker (Cold Turkey), so that I need to write 250 characters of gibberish (takes 5 minutes), and if I get one character wrong, it resets the whole string (with moderate focus, I still get ~5 characters wrong). This creates a passable, but significant block. I had a more lenient block before, where I only had to rewrite 5 random works, which I could do in <5-10 seconds. Now, the friction is real. My friend called it “torture.” Is it really worth focusing for 5 minutes on non-sense to unlock a feed I know that will distract me?
App idea: a browser extension that locks any feed (Notes, X, etc.) until you write X words. Points: (1) There would be no option to skip, you have to write before you can enter your typical infinite scroll mode; (2) you get to set the word count (ie: 50-500 words); (3) there can be prompts so you don’t have a blank canvas each time; (4) it saves all your writings, either for future sharing, or to build an internal knowledge graph for AI context.
Feels like this could be “algorithmic Aikido” (a martial arts term for redirecting violence). It hijacks a consumption addiction and turns it into creation.
I’m fascinated by this idea because it could be a way to bootstrap a healthy social network by helping them get unhooked off the bad ones. Everyone, even the most discipline people, know how addicted they can get. If creation discharges the need to binge, then this could save something like 30 hours per month (a modest calc of 1 hour saved per day); and if you value your time at $100/hour, that’s $3k in monthly value for only $9/month. That’s a non-advertising business model.
Put simply, it’s a fusion of a “browser blocker” and a “note-taking app” that exists at the OS/browser level. It is adaptable enough to layer on top of any, all, future social networks.
It follows a strong virtue: you have to write before you do anything. After you write, you have 3 options: (1) continue to your feed, guilty; (2) copy your text, so you can post it, or (3) open a finite feed of [13] related posts, ones from our network that are semantically related to your own.