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Whenever you check social media, an app charges you money that gets locked in a Bitcoin wallet for 10 years

Image credit: left: Tresnologi, right: VectorStock

Darko Savic

Darko Savic Apr 05, 2022

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An app that puts all the addictive apps behind a paywall. Whenever you check social media, a small amount of Bitcoin gets locked for 10 years. Your addiction funds your savings in a deflationary currency.
Why?
Your addiction becomes apparent when you see how much money you spend on checking social media.
Your addiction is used to fund your savings.
Another reason to limit your tech-addiction time. How much money are you prepared to spend on social media?
A way to stay invested in Bitcoin for 10 years. Panic selling is impossible.
How it works
You install the "paywall" app on your smartphone and configure which apps you consider "attention vortexes". These would be the apps like Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, etc, that are enjoyable/addictive and mostly drain your time. The paywall app charges you a micro fee every time you check one of the paywalled apps.
All the money that you spend checking social media gets locked for 10 years. You get access to it at a specific time in the future.
Bitcoin timelock contract
A timelock is a type of smart contract that restricts the spending of some Bitcoin funds until a specified future time. 
The app configures a bitcoin wallet that will hold all the funds. It gives you 24 seed words (glorified password) that you have to save somewhere safe. You will need it to regain control of your funds after the 10 year period has passed.
Pay per load and time spent
The app charges you per every load of a paywalled app and per time any of these apps stays on your screen.
The app controls an allowance wallet that you pre-load with bitcoin. As long as the wallet has sufficient funds, you can continue opening social media apps. You pay a little fee each time. If you run out of funds, you cannot open the social media apps until more bitcoin is added to the allowance wallet.
To save on the bitcoin network fees, the app can transfer payments to the locked wallet in batches.

tech addiction mobile application social media

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Creative contributions

Charge only after a "healthy" limit of time spent on the app is breached

Povilas S

Povilas S Apr 05, 2022

Maybe charging for each opening of the app is a bit too much, then the users would feel like they have to pay for using social media (or any of the addictive apps), doesn't matter what purpose they want to use it for and doesn't matter how short they stay there.
What if they set the limit themselves for how much they can use it, say, daily. If that limit is breached, they get charged for every additional minute of use. Once you set a certain limit, say, half an hour per day, you can't change it for, e.g. - a month. 
After a month you can evaluate how well/bad you did that month and how much you spent on abusing certain apps and then adjust the limit accordingly to test it for another month. This would help you find a certain balance between spending little time on addictive apps and allowing yourself to spend a little extra, if you really want, for a little cost. 

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Darko Savic

Darko Savic3 years ago

Good point, however here are 3 arguments for doing it in the way originally proposed (charge for every load):
The apps are purposefully designed to be addictive. They are made to exploit a "loophole" in human minds and are thus damaging to your interests. Even if you happen to find useful information on social media, it will not come without side effects. Losing money is bad. Being exploited by social media is bad. Keeping the two connected will at least make you feel one (the other is elusive).
Saving money is good. Save as much as you can afford. You can afford a few loads per day. 
Paying for every load will make you re-evaluate every load. Do I really need to check social media right now? This lowers unchecked impulse loads.

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General comments

Miloš Stanković

Miloš Stanković2 years ago

Make it a dual activity so that both you and your friend or spouse are linked to the same wallet and hence have an extra incentive not to check social media. 
The end tally is split 50/50 so if you check social media less than your partner, you'll end up earning money in the long run. 

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Goran Radanovic

Goran Radanovic3 years ago

If your social media account gets locked due to a temporary ban, you get some of the money back or the savings account grows with interest. Extra points for a permanent ban. 

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Shubhankar Kulkarni

Shubhankar Kulkarni3 years ago

People who become successful (receive great returns after 10 years) might boast that they spent hours on social media in their twenties and were rewarded in their thirties, making others fall into the trap.

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Darko Savic

Darko Savic3 years ago

Shubhankar Kulkarni Also, people who become successful might have stayed away from social media while focusing/working hard, but are nowadays relaxing in semi-retirement and spending more time having fun on their platform of choice. This could make it seem that tech addiction is working well for them so it might not be as negative as some make it out to be. 

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