[HN Gopher] Show HN: I gamified a habit tracker to fight procras...
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       Show HN: I gamified a habit tracker to fight procrastination
        
       Author : marclou
       Score  : 137 points
       Date   : 2022-04-02 06:12 UTC (16 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (habitsgarden.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (habitsgarden.com)
        
       | nnx wrote:
       | Interesting design. Will give it a try. Any plans for a iOS app?
        
         | marclou wrote:
         | Making a mobile app is in to the to-do list.
         | 
         | Meanwhile, you add it to your Home Screen so it behaves like an
         | app.
         | 
         | Quick tuto: https://habitsgarden.com/homescreen
         | 
         | Thanks for trying it!
        
       | Gasp0de wrote:
       | I think its fair to ask for payment, but I think it should be
       | waaaay cheaper. I know a few maintainers of really good,
       | productive open source software, and some of them earn about
       | 4000-5000EUR per month from it. I feel like 1EUR per month would
       | be a price that I'm both willing to pay and feels fair towards
       | the developer. If they can get a few thousand users they could
       | make this their only job, and it doesn't feel like this is a site
       | that would require multiple employees.
        
       | Delgan wrote:
       | One month ago, I spent hours testing dozens of apps for "gamified
       | todo list". I could not find any that would perfectly suits my
       | needs (Habitica is too gamified for example).
       | 
       | Your app looks very promising. Polished UI. Intuitive. Unlimited
       | habits. Simple "task -> award" principle without added complexity
       | layers.
       | 
       | Something I'm having trouble finding in the apps I've tried is
       | the distinction between "habit" and "task". An habit is something
       | I want to do multiple time in a week. While a task is a one-shot
       | TODO that I would like to execute at some point when I'm not
       | procrastinating. Once done, I don't need to repeat it, but I like
       | to be rewarded.
       | 
       | Your application seems to be more habit oriented. Is the notion
       | of a one-time task something you could eventually incorporate?
        
         | ZeroGravitas wrote:
         | Breaking one time tasks into small chunks that could become a
         | habit to start on at specific times might be worth looking
         | into. Similar to writers who write for an hour every day even
         | when not motivated.
        
         | LegoZombieKing wrote:
         | I have been in the same boat of trying to gamify my to-do list.
         | So far I have been working with progress bars and goals to try
         | and find a way to motivate me to get things done.
         | 
         | I realized that the hardest thing is getting the long term
         | goals to feel like a simple activity for today, bringing the 3+
         | month goal into a simple "read a few pages today" type of
         | habit.
         | 
         | I also created a simple spreadsheet app that focuses
         | specifically on the progress you made today in relation to your
         | goal. The progress you make today is a different color. Instead
         | of estimating how long it will take to complete the goal with
         | your average, I use the amount done today. So after every
         | addition page read you can see the amount of days left to
         | finish the book go down.
         | 
         | I also added a little bit of motivation text that says "if you
         | read X more pages you will be done Y days faster.
         | 
         | If you use the "MIT"(Most Important Task) type of system , then
         | you could make it a daily habit to complete your top 2-3 MITs
         | for the day.
        
       | colordrops wrote:
       | I really wish someone would make a generic open source Duolingo
       | clone that works for any content. Basically something to replace
       | Anki, which never really worked for me.
        
       | senectus1 wrote:
       | I think there is too little reward/gamification in the free tier
       | and also the pay for tier is too much also for too little
       | gamification/reward
        
         | marclou wrote:
         | Too little gamification on - the habit tracker - the garden
         | game
         | 
         | Do I get your point correctly?
        
           | senectus1 wrote:
           | yup. also there is no real "competitive" nature to it.
           | 
           | I want to be able to beat it, beat someone else.
           | 
           | as for price. if it was around $2 a month I might pay for it.
           | its quite likely I'd pay for it and not feel guilty about
           | forgetting i've paid for it, which means i'd keep coming back
           | to it after forgetting about it...
        
             | marclou wrote:
             | The next update on Habits Garden will be about social
             | features.
             | 
             | You'll be able to see your friends garden and compete on
             | who's growing the fastest with the most unique flowers.
             | 
             | It's a matter of a few weeks, stay tuned :)
        
       | rustybolt wrote:
       | Looks really polished and very easy to sign up. On the other
       | hand, deleting your account is a terrible experience.
        
         | marclou wrote:
         | Hey, the app launched this week and it's lacking a few features
         | for now.
         | 
         | I'm taking care of manually deleting accounts until the feature
         | is available.
         | 
         | Give me a few hours :)
        
           | rustybolt wrote:
           | Understandable, thanks for the fast reply!
        
       | shaolinspirit wrote:
       | I'm currently building a habit tracking app as well, mainly for
       | myself. I like the simplicity of this one and the nice
       | animations.
        
         | marclou wrote:
         | Thanks, it means a lot!
        
       | ZeroGravitas wrote:
       | Amazon had a thing where they would send you a physical button to
       | re-order subscription items. I wonder if you could do the same
       | for this. I don't want to pull out my phone to tick a box. I want
       | it to get ticked automatically when I do something.
       | 
       | The reason I don't get into these is that I want an API so that
       | it can hook into other things. But I see why an app is easier to
       | start with.
       | 
       | But maybe a programmer focused habit tracker with an API is a
       | niche. Some kind of payment system where it takes a tiny payment
       | every time you actually achieve a step towards your goal seems
       | like it would align incentives too.
       | 
       | Also, if you can track sleep/exercise/happiness I'd wonder if you
       | could demonstrate what makes an individual, or people in general
       | happier. Big task I know, but I think Google Fit and that ring
       | mounted mood tracker is aiming for something like this.
        
         | marclou wrote:
         | These a good points!
         | 
         | Habits Garden could see an API integration with Zapier, who
         | knows?
         | 
         | Just curious, what would be the shape of that physical button
         | you'd tap when you're done with a habit?
        
           | ZeroGravitas wrote:
           | A large red button that you can slap with gusto seems
           | appropriate, especially for finishing excercise, but anything
           | that can be incorporated into the activity is good.
        
         | BrandoElFollito wrote:
         | A lot of this is done with home automation where you have
         | physical buttons (zigbee, rf433) or sensors (rfid) doing
         | <something>
         | 
         | The something can be logging the fact, displaying it, ... Your
         | imagination is the limit.
         | 
         | A great product to stay with us Home Assistant
         | (https://www.home-assistant.io/)
        
         | owje wrote:
         | A youtuber made this and called it a 'dopamine box':
         | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JJeQIXBdVuk
        
       | medimikka wrote:
       | Here's a habit I have gotten into: not paying $9/month for
       | someone's code, in perpetuity, if the data are locked behind that
       | payment.
       | 
       | And, for all that is holy, please stop trying to convince me to
       | pay by using lines like "for less than two cups of coffee." Where
       | I come from, that's as much as a family of four has for dinner,
       | many days. It's what 85% of the world and 65% of the US have per
       | day for non-mandatory spending. It's pretty damn privileged to
       | worry about gamifying habit tracking and justifying it with $4.50
       | coffees.
        
         | ge96 wrote:
         | There is this site I found a while back, wip.chat it's like a
         | social-media/shared to-do list but you have to pay $20/mo to
         | use it. Maybe there's mechanics on dropping money on something
         | that makes you stick to it. I did not sign up for wip ha.
        
         | maps7 wrote:
         | Well then I have a great solution for you: don't pay for it.
         | You're not in the market for this app. It's akin to crying
         | because you can't afford an expensive car.
        
         | [deleted]
        
         | aerosmile wrote:
        
           | katet wrote:
           | Wow, I'm impressed how grumpy one can seem in a few short
           | sentences. Take an upvote for that alone.
           | 
           | GP has a certain - admittedly orthogonal - point. At what
           | point does "just two coffees per month" translate into "too
           | many coffees traded for services"?
           | 
           | If it's relevant, a fairly high-end black coffee made from
           | medium-roasted in-house coffee beans - which I strongly enjoy
           | - costs me $1.70 in my local economy.
           | 
           | So this costs me 5x coffees, or a work-week of coffee. And
           | I'm a pretty well-paid foreigner living in a strange land.
           | 
           | If I were to take a charitable reading of the GP - with no
           | expertise in economics on my side - I'd say they were
           | pointing out that you are potentially losing a 65+% of your
           | market for whom $9 is not "a couple of coffees".
           | 
           | That's not an indictment - maybe you don't care! Maybe 100x
           | customers @ $9 = $900/month and the service pays for itself.
           | 
           | I am a big fan of what I think is Purchasing Power Parity
           | (PPP) / Pay What You Can (PWYC), even though I see it pretty
           | rarely.
           | 
           | I guess it depends on whether you want to provide your
           | product/service to as many people it can benefit at once,
           | versus the minimum number of people who can support your
           | costs with a profit.
           | 
           | Neither position is inherently "wrong"/"privileged", they
           | just seem to have different incentives and/or target markets.
           | 
           | The voice of a _potential_ target market that is being
           | excluded seems valuable to me - even if the revenue increase
           | might be negligible per-user, perhaps it 's worth considering
           | the volume of potential users in that market :shrug:
           | 
           | (To re-iterate that I'm trying not to pick a side here:
           | _maybe it 's not_ - maybe the business model is to target
           | affluent consumers. That doesn't make criticism of the
           | exclusionary nature of this approach "privileged", however,
           | in my view. YMMV)
           | 
           | (Edit: minor emphasis)
        
             | aerosmile wrote:
             | If I'll be accused of being grumpy for calling out some
             | couch quarterback for bringing irrelevant arguments to
             | squash down some developer's hopes and dreams, then so be
             | it. You have to be really full of yourself to criticize
             | someone's launch on HN so harshly. This community is famous
             | for sharing kind feedback, with a few notable exceptions
             | that now live in infamy (eg: Dropbox). A good question to
             | ask yourself would be - "how did my Show HN post compare to
             | this one?" If you haven't made one yet, then be extra kind
             | and humble.
        
             | turtlebits wrote:
             | This is akin to having a hissy fit over marketing speak.
             | It's like seeing a red car in a commercial but don't like
             | red cars. Doesn't mean the product isn't targeting you.
             | Just ignore it.
        
           | hall0ween wrote:
           | I respectfully disagree as I found the comment (1) insightful
           | that upon terminating a subscription the data is no longer
           | accessible, (2) that $9/month could be seen as a lot to many
           | people [honestly did not cross my mind, I guess that's a
           | priviledge of mine] - it's the same argument as "$9/mo is too
           | expensive for me" using different words and (3) it did not
           | come off as overly negative, especially compared to some
           | comment sections on controversial topics.
           | 
           | > uses sloppy reasoning, and tells us a lot more about
           | yourself than about the topic you're commenting on.
           | 
           | An example of being overly negative in one's comments.
        
             | rosndo wrote:
             | > (1) insightful that upon terminating a subscription the
             | data is no longer accessible
             | 
             | This doesn't seem to be true.
             | 
             | > (2) that $9/month could be seen as a lot to many people
             | 
             | This is a fairly worthless piece of information in this
             | context. Do we really need a "check your privilege!"
             | comment every time we discuss a product?
             | 
             | > (3) it did not come off as overly negative, especially
             | compared to some comment sections on controversial topics
             | 
             | Complaining about privilege in this context seems overly
             | negative.
        
         | collegeburner wrote:
         | I guess he is probably targeting America and Europe where
         | people have disposable income then. Nothing wrong with that.
         | And there's a free tier.
        
         | marclou wrote:
         | You can choose to pay for the game after the free trial is over
         | but the Habit Tracker is (and will always be) 100% free.
         | 
         | Thanks for your feedback :)
        
           | toshk wrote:
           | Looks like a great product!!! Well done.
        
           | jeanlucas wrote:
           | Ah, that is unclear. Looks like you have only 7 days to
           | decide to pay.
        
         | JanSt wrote:
         | Do you offer your work for free? It's a fair comparison for
         | EU+US market in my eyes.
         | 
         | For EU customers data export has to be possible
        
           | number6 wrote:
           | Yes, thus this advise is free: And no one should spend 4.50
           | on coffee. It's a bad habit - spending it on absolving
           | oneself from procrastination is even worse. Better spend $10
           | on "Getting things done" and reread it every month or so.
        
             | alar44 wrote:
             | I'm going to buy an extra coffee today just for you.
        
             | ljm wrote:
             | Different things work for different people and oftentimes
             | the difficult part of habit forming is the accountability
             | piece. If you're great at holding yourself accountable then
             | maybe re-reading Getting Things Done every month will work
             | for you, or you can just change things through sheer
             | willpower. If you need something else to help keep yourself
             | accountable then maybe $9 a month for an app that tries to
             | make it into a game will work, or maybe another
             | subscription would help because the payment makes it feel
             | like you've put more skin in the game. Maybe you can afford
             | $80 an hour for a weekly session with a professional coach!
             | 
             | One thing is for sure, beng judgmental about how people go
             | about improving themselves is a sure-fire way to kill their
             | motivation. To that extent, I don't think your post
             | constitutes good advice and it wouldn't be worth much even
             | if you did charge for it.
        
               | number6 wrote:
               | > One thing is for sure, beng judgmental about how people
               | go about improving themselves is a sure-fire way to kill
               | their motivation
               | 
               | Key concept here: motivation. Motivation is not your
               | friend. Motivation is getting you hooked and leaves you
               | cold turkey. Become independent of motivation. Don't
               | allow motivation to be your scapegoat or you master.
               | 
               | Put $9 a month into a jar and do whatever you want with
               | it if you need it as motivation.
               | 
               | > If you're great at holding yourself accountable then
               | maybe re-reading Getting Things Done every month will
               | work for you, or you can just change things through sheer
               | willpower
               | 
               | If you aren't or you don't have a lot of willpower, then
               | you are lost to the grace of your motivation?
               | 
               | My next free advice: work on your willpower and self
               | accountability. You brush your teeth every day, don't
               | you? Why? Because you hold yourself accountabel. You
               | don't need motivation for this, right? To simple an
               | example? Yes, you are right. We all, myself included,
               | fall apart on the big challenge. Why? Because they are
               | challenging - and it is ok. Stand up and fail better. You
               | aren't a quitter - how many hours of Eldenring are on
               | your clock? Isn't it a damn frustrating game? Yes, until
               | you fail better. Sometimes failing better needs time,
               | research and/or training.
               | 
               | Ok if you want to spend the money on ops game, more power
               | to you, as long as it helps you to fail better, I give
               | you that.
               | 
               | To conclude: go cold turkey on motivation, learn to hold
               | yourself accountable, improve on willpower and avoid its
               | drains, be kind to yourself. You will fail in all of the
               | above but you have to fail better everytime, thus be kind
               | to yourself, its hard and its hard for all of us. Even
               | when you're thinking it's easy for somebody else, it's
               | not he is just doing it longer.
               | 
               | Thanks for reading my blogpost.
        
               | ljm wrote:
               | This is a pretty remarkable satire of your typical shelf
               | help book, I give you that.
        
               | number6 wrote:
               | Thanks, not sure if I got a whole book in me, but if I am
               | on par maybe I should charge
        
           | riedel wrote:
           | And for Italians it should rather cost 2EUR/months jsut with
           | smaller font size, for Germans it would rather be 6EUR ,
           | however you will need to accept cash.
        
       | ekianjo wrote:
       | I don't believe this would work to fight procrastination for more
       | than a few days. Just like all gamification systems, they are
       | very limited and won't change your inner motivation.
        
         | nicolas_t wrote:
         | In my experience as someone with adhd who is a perpetual
         | procrastinator, gamification apps and any new shiny system to
         | get me working last 1 to 3 months which, while not great, is
         | better than nothing..
        
         | marclou wrote:
         | "Outward changes comes after we change from within"
         | 
         | Definitely! Sometimes, starting a workout for just a few day is
         | enough to change your inner motivation :)
        
       | chrsig wrote:
       | Person with adhd here --
       | 
       | The good: I really appreciate that the free trial doesn't require
       | a credit card/just freezes the features until an opt-in for a
       | subscription.
       | 
       | The bad: i think there's a bit of a bootstrapping problem
       | here...You want me to set up a system to make me do more stuff?
       | I'll get started on that later ;)
        
         | hackernewds wrote:
         | similar boat.
         | 
         | The trick to counter the bad I've found is to do these setups
         | when my brain is tired, and in "delusions of grandeur" mode -
         | which is at 2-3AM. The Habit app on Android has really helped
         | me stick to some tough good habits and give up some bad ones.
        
       | lifeisstillgood wrote:
       | Don't fight procrastination. If you are putting off work, it's
       | because it is not aligned with your needs. Chnage your job.
        
         | dazc wrote:
         | Procrastination stems from a wide spectrum of underlying causes
         | though, from serious depression to temporary boredom. I've
         | experienced both extremes and one is much easier to manage than
         | the other.
         | 
         | Changing your job may, sometimes, be the answer and, then
         | again, it might not be?
        
       | marclou wrote:
       | Hey HN, I'm Marc.
       | 
       | It's unreal how game features like quests can get us to play for
       | hours to earn some gold (WoW dailies anyone?)
       | 
       | What if we use these hacks to do things that are good for us,
       | like working out or reading a book?
       | 
       | That's why I created Habits Garden: To help you form habits while
       | having fun.
       | 
       | How does it work?
       | 
       | 1. Create your habits 2. Complete dailies to earn some gems 3.
       | Buy flowers to grow a wonderful garden 4. Be consistent to unlock
       | special/unique flowers 5. Visit your friends' gardens to see
       | their progress (coming soon)
       | 
       | I hope it will work for you as well as it does for me and other
       | users.
       | 
       | If you have any good or bad feedback, I have no ego, be straight-
       | forward :)
        
         | detcader wrote:
         | It takes too much scrolling to see an end result of all the
         | habits. Put a preview of someone's sick 6-months-in-the-works
         | garden close to the top, that's what I'd sign up for.
         | 
         | Loot boxes you can buy with gems offering limited time flowers
         | would be a hit I think
        
         | ZeroGravitas wrote:
         | Is there any good sources on why these things work?
         | 
         | Like I saw a condolences card that someone made for a colleague
         | that lost his wordle streak. What's actually going on there in
         | that person's brain, why do they view this as a loss to be
         | mourned or a failure while happily ignoring other things that
         | may be healthier options?
        
           | hackernewds wrote:
           | Streaks. I use a really good habit tracking app (not going to
           | steal poster's thunder here again) which is based on streaks.
           | Has helped me at least maintain and build habits due to the
           | loss aversion of some arbitrary streaks!
        
             | marclou wrote:
             | Which app do you use that's good for streaks?
             | 
             | Habits Garden has also a streak counter per habit and you
             | can achieve special quests for maintaining your streak for
             | xyz days :)
        
               | xenodium wrote:
               | I built one for iOS https://flathabits.com
        
               | jchook wrote:
               | There's one called "Streaks" for iOS that I use.
        
             | ZeroGravitas wrote:
             | Yeah, but why do we like being consistent? Does this mean
             | that you could give up smoking faster of you intentionally
             | 'broke your streak' of bad stuff?
             | 
             | Can you train yourself to have an arbitrary tic like
             | touching the top of a doorframe every time you walk through
             | using the same system?
        
       | bayesianbot wrote:
       | Really nice! I've been thinking of habit gamification like this
       | for a long time but never got too far as.. well, procrastination.
       | Hopefully I can stick with using this instead.
       | 
       | As you don't have mobile apps yet I have one far out suggestion
       | that is easy to implement and in my tests worked much better than
       | I ever though it would. It's possible to create two kind of menus
       | in Telegram chats[0]. For my start of a habit tracker my bot sent
       | me possible actions (as in habits) to our chat, and I could just
       | click what I'd done and that's it. Works on both on mobile and
       | desktop and just takes a second. It's possible to keep a
       | permanent menu below the typing area and attach an inline menu on
       | a message, so I kept my habits in permanent menu and possible
       | follow-up actions (leave a note, cancel the action, stop taking
       | time) in the reply to a confirmation of selected action. I know
       | it's strange suggestion but I've been thinking and implementing
       | different ways to make use of that menu system as I was blown
       | away how it worked and with just a few lines of code.
       | 
       | [0] https://hetzger.ohmycron.xyz/web/telegram_menu.png
        
         | marclou wrote:
         | First, thanks a lot for all the details, it was really clear.
         | 
         | One core value of Habits Garden is to make you actually want to
         | do XYZ.
         | 
         | Nobody needs a reminder to play video games or watch Netflix.
         | 
         | Habits Garden's goal is to make you actually want to workout
         | using game hacks.
         | 
         | The Telegram Bot you mentioned makes you reactive (notification
         | > action)
         | 
         | I believe I can create a system where you won't need to be
         | reminded to act.
         | 
         | So far, it's been working just as described above for 12 users,
         | hopefully it will for you too (so you can work on that habit
         | gamification project^^).
         | 
         | If you do give the app a try, I would love to hear your
         | thoughts (https://twitter.com/marc_louvion)
        
       | gverrilla wrote:
       | "Completing my habits is the first thing I think about when I
       | wake up" god
        
         | [deleted]
        
       | tobyhinloopen wrote:
       | Cool idea, i'll be sure to start using it tomorrow
        
         | marclou wrote:
         | Do miss your daily claim today, even though you don't do your
         | habits!
        
       | historia_novae wrote:
       | $9 (or $6 if paid annually) per month is very expensive,
       | especially for an app that should be a one time payment. I'll
       | stick with my green square grid inside OneNote.
        
         | marclou wrote:
         | The Habit Tracker is (and will always be) 100% free.
         | 
         | Thanks for your feedback :)
        
         | iSloth wrote:
         | Why "should" it be a one time payment...?
        
       | beaconstudios wrote:
       | This seems nice - it blends the features of Habitica and Forest
       | that I find useful, and it's always great to see more innovation
       | in the anti-procrastination space.
        
         | BolexNOLA wrote:
         | Habitica has gotten so busy/complicated for my tastes. When it
         | was HabitRPG it was a little leaner in a way that my ADHD
         | really needed. Definitely going to try this one out and see if
         | it's better suited.
        
           | beaconstudios wrote:
           | They certainly do have a lot going on. I'm in a party so I
           | still use it, but I only really use the dailies now.
        
       | thyrox wrote:
       | Be honest OP you were making this to actually procrastinate on
       | whatever it is you had to be actually doing at that time, didn't
       | you? :P nah I'm just kidding, this looks like a wonderful site
       | and congrats on completion and launch!
        
         | [deleted]
        
         | bratwurst3000 wrote:
         | As a professional procrastinator I have no respekt for people
         | finishing things while procrastinating. I am writing a book
         | about how to procrastinate properly but I will start
         | tomorrow...
        
           | oliwary wrote:
           | Sounds like rookie-level procastination to me - I will decide
           | when I will start writing my book tomorrow. ;)
        
         | peppermint_tea wrote:
         | being an active procrastinator, this made me laugh.
        
           | danuker wrote:
           | I was in the same boat. This might help you: consciously
           | reduce the baseline stimulation level, and the cravings will
           | greatly reduce.
           | 
           | https://www.deprocrastination.co/blog/how-to-use-boredom-
           | to-...
        
       | jimmydddd wrote:
       | Nice job. The interface has a nice look. Here are some others
       | I've tried.
       | 
       | *For Desktop https://habitica.com http://dontbreakthechain.com
       | http://tdp.me * For Mobile https://www.lifehack.org/668261/best-
       | habit-tracking-apps
        
       | rambambram wrote:
       | Nice work! These 'habit tracking' concepts/products always have
       | my attention. I built one myself 10 years ago - only personal
       | use, but still using it - and I had big plans.
       | 
       | I'm a bit cynical now, about habit apps. I think they act more
       | like a coping mechanism, a stress center, a buffer, etc. I also
       | thought about more gamification to make it easier. Now, I think
       | that's a slippery slope. I mean, what is it: a tracking app, or a
       | game!? To me, they are opposites now. Gaming is for fun, changing
       | habits is not a fun process. It's a serious and important
       | process, but not fun. Free kudos (basically pixels on a screen)
       | are not going to change that, but maybe that's just my cynical
       | side speaking.
       | 
       | What I did found out was that my app was perfect for tracking
       | expenses and putting spent money in neat boxes. It became more of
       | a personal finance app this way. It became a general tracking
       | app, without the habit changing part.
       | 
       | Another thing that I found out: I used procrastination as a means
       | to change some habits. I gave myself points for procrastinating
       | that next cup of coffee, for example. So maybe the gamification
       | angle can work, I still don't know.
       | 
       | Also, changing habits is an all-encompassing process. Change of
       | environment, inner change, change of deeper layers (which might
       | be the root cause of some habits), etc. I wondered a lot if a
       | tracking app can be enough.
       | 
       | Then there's two important distinctions I found. The distinction
       | between an app for habits in general, and an app for specific
       | habits. I see you also chose the general path, with a multitude
       | of habits that one can track. I chose that direction too, and I
       | noticed that there's too much of a difference between habits.
       | Drinking alcohol for example is different than eating too much
       | junk, although they might seem similar.
       | 
       | The distinction between habits that you want to quit, and the
       | habits you want to do more. Completely different approach.
       | Although I still think there's power in swapping one for the
       | other. Eat an apple instead of smoking a cigarette. Go to the gym
       | instead of hanging out and drinking beers. Etc.
       | 
       | And at last, what's a habit? Is someone smoking cigarettes a
       | habit or an addiction? Is "read books" (as I saw on your
       | homepage) a habit, or just an act that you do?
       | 
       | I don't want to discourage you or other people, these are just
       | some thoughts I had that might be of value. Good luck!
       | 
       | P.S. One of the main takes I learned, was that some kind of
       | external thing can really help with changing habits. I noticed
       | people with Apple Watches who took there exercise/fitness way
       | more serious because that device gave you rainbows, fireworks and
       | other colorful pixels when you reached some walking target or
       | something. The tracking is done for you, there's no work entering
       | stuff yourself, so only the shiny rainbow at the end. I myself
       | really liked entering the stuff, but the positive kudos are
       | linked to the act of entering, not to the habit changing.
        
         | marclou wrote:
         | Thanks for sharing your thoughts!
         | 
         | Gaming isn't always fun. You play a game when you collect
         | stamps on that restaurant's card to get a free coffee after 10
         | visits.
         | 
         | Games are powerful for making us achieve things we don't
         | necessarily want to do.
         | 
         | At least, that's what I believe, and I hope it will work out
         | for you too :)
        
           | rambambram wrote:
           | No thanks!
           | 
           | You're right in a sense. Everything is a game. I personally
           | hate these discount games at commercial venues. Maybe the
           | gamification might not work on everybody, and it might work
           | better on people who also collect stamps for free coffee.
           | 
           | But are we talking 'transactional analysis' now? Or does
           | 'gamification' still mean creating artificial challenges and
           | rewards, like in computer games?
           | 
           | Habits are pretty personal, not some external thing like
           | collecting stamps for a free something-something. And that,
           | to me, is the hard part about habit tracking/changing apps.
           | The motivation and rewards for change becomes offloaded on
           | something else. Which might work for some use cases, for a
           | while.
           | 
           | > Games are powerful for making us achieve things we don't
           | necessarily want to do.
           | 
           | Parents are also pretty powerful for this goal, just as the
           | rest of real life. ;)
        
       | anthk wrote:
       | https://github.com/pickfire/spt
       | 
       | Enjoy.
        
       | endisneigh wrote:
       | I find it kind of funny these sorts of things give you points, to
       | then waste your time planting or creating things. I'm curious if
       | people who actually, consistently get all of their stuff done use
       | these sort of things.
        
       | ffhhj wrote:
       | What if procastrination is recursive, you never exit it, and when
       | you get back to work that's procastrinating away from your
       | previous task. Your own company should ask you to work on project
       | A instead of project B, so what you call "work" is a higher level
       | of procastrination, that goes up to the whole objectives vs
       | actual tasks of humankind. Procastrinate about it!
        
       | MisterSandman wrote:
       | Looks like a simpler, straight-forward version of Habits in
       | Habaitica. So pretty awesome, I would say!
        
         | marclou wrote:
         | Knowing that I'm a solo-founder with 0 employee, I'm very
         | proud!
         | 
         | Thank you, Mister Sandman :)
        
       | peppermint_tea wrote:
       | I will not use it since I am already an organized person, but I
       | absolutely love the default user name the author put in the login
       | section.
        
       | Bellamy wrote:
       | I've been using Habinator a year now and it's working for me.
        
       | servytor wrote:
       | Habitica[0] is free and a semi-idle RPG basically, it's pretty
       | cool. Also has a slick iOS app.
       | 
       | [0]: https://habitica.com/static/home
        
         | [deleted]
        
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