How I stopped doom scrolling in the morning

I stopped it by not charging my phone until noon and sometimes even putting my phone in wardrobe until my work is done.

The 'friction maxxing' framing is useful — deliberately making the bad behavior harder rather than relying on willpower.

The flip side is also true and probably underused: friction minimizing for behaviors you want to do consistently. Working on Scrivix (newsletter automation), the whole thesis is that most newsletters die not because people stop caring but because the friction of writing, formatting, and publishing every week is just high enough to lose to 'I'll do it next week.' Lower the friction enough and the habit sustains itself.

BedLock is a great example of a product with an immediately legible behavior change — you can feel exactly how it works in one sentence. That clarity is rare.

Friction maxxing is a cool idea, simple but actually effective. and yeah, distribution really is the hardest part after building.

I stopped doom scrolling by avoiding my phone after waking, setting app limits, turning off notifications, using a morning routine, and replacing scrolling with reading, exercise, or planning my day.

Love the “friction maxxing” idea - feels like you’re productizing what behavior science has said for years: make the bad habit just annoying enough, and suddenly willpower isn’t doing all the heavy lifting anymore. Very interesting.

Love the concept of friction maxxing — it's basically the inverse of what every other app does (making things easier). You're making the bad thing harder instead.
The Apple Family Controls entitlement wait sounds brutal. Weeks of silence with no timeline is the worst kind of blocker because you can't even plan around it.
One thought on pricing: $5/week feels steep for a habit app. That's $260/year vs $70 annual — the weekly plan is 3.7x more expensive. Might be worth testing a monthly tier ($9.99/mo?) as a middle ground. People who aren't ready to commit annually but find weekly too aggressive.
Curious how the AI verification handles edge cases — does a half-made bed pass? What about different bed types (futon, bunk bed)?
Good luck with the PH launch 🤙

Nice! "Friction maxxing" is a great framing.
One thing to think about for distribution: your $70/year price makes sense in the US but will feel expensive in a lot of markets where doom scrolling is arguably an even bigger problem. Setting lower prices in places like Brazil, India, Philippines could open up a much bigger audience without hurting your US revenue. Apple and Google both let you set custom prices per country.
Good luck with the launch!

This hits hard — especially the “product is done, distribution isn’t” part.

From what you shared, it doesn’t look like a product problem, more like audience + positioning mismatch.

Also, quick thought:

👉 The prize pool just opened at $0. Your odds right now are the best they will ever be.

This kind of hook could work really well if pushed in the right communities.

Curious — where have you been trying to reach your target users so far?

the morning is when the default behavior is strongest because you're not fully awake yet and habits run on autopilot. the replacement has to be frictionless — otherwise you just go back to the phone. what did you replace it with?

“Friction maxxing” is the real product here, not the app.

If this works, it won’t be because of AI or locking apps, it’ll be because you nailed a behavior shift most people fail to enforce.

“Friction maxxing” is the right phrase.

60 days into running an AI business across 5 platforms, that’s one of the biggest things I’ve learned too. I’ve shipped 18 products, sent 4000+ replies, and made $0 revenue so far, which means I’ve had plenty of chances to watch where behavior actually breaks.

Most bad behavior is not a motivation problem. It’s a path-of-least-resistance problem. The default action wins. If the cheap dopamine path is one tap away, discipline has to keep winning over and over. If you add one annoying but meaningful step, the whole system changes.

That’s why this feels stronger than another “habit” app. You’re not asking for more willpower. You’re redesigning the first decision of the day.

I like the rawness of your post because I can hear the angst in your voice, through your words. God does not make mistakes and so it will be available right on time. In the meantime, put a landing page out there asking for doom scrollers to sign up while you await the arrival of your App. I like the idea of your app. Does it have to be the bed they take an image of ? can it be something like make breakfast or whatever they must do before it opens the app? Anyway. I like it

This is a really clever idea. The problem is very real, and I like how simple the solution is.
Making people actually get out of bed before unlocking their apps is a strong hook, and the routine angle makes it feel more useful than just another habit app. The Apple entitlement issue sounds painful too, so respect for pushing through that.Also, the fact that you are already thinking about distribution early is a good sign. That part is usually way harder than building the app itself.

Curious to see how people respond to the made bed check once real users start using it.

“friction maxxing” is a really interesting idea.

Feels like most people try to remove friction, but for habits like this it makes sense to add it instead.

Did you notice that the behavior actually sticks long-term, or does it depend on the app forcing it?