[gary_bernhardt]

Here's an anecdote about what happens when you design a product in the opposite way.

I own https://www.executeprogram.com, which has interactive in-browser courses on various software development technologies. Currently they all cover languages, more or less: TypeScript, SQL, various JS topics, regexes. (Disclosure: it costs money after you finish your 16th lesson.)

Almost all (maybe literally all) of our competitors are amenable to binging. It's true of books, video learning platforms, and most/all other interactive learning platforms.

Execute Program is very intentionally non-bingeable. When you start a course, you get 5 lessons on the first day, then it stops you and tells you to come back tomorrow. On the next day, you get some brief reviews of yesterday's lessons, then a few new lessons, then it stops you again until the next day. That cadence repeats until you finish the course. You can't binge/cram even if you want to.

(A bit more technical detail: it's a spaced repetition system with exponential review intervals, similar to those used for language learning in e.g. WaniKani and Anki. But it also has a lot of fine-grained knowledge of its own course structure, so it can use reviews to intelligently unlock different lessons depending on how the user performed on their reviews.)

Occasionally, we get support email from new users who don't like this. They want to cram a whole course in a day. But cramming is a very time-inefficient way to learn, so this is self-defeating! Since launch, we've had good success adjusting the app's behavior and internal explanations to reduce these complaints.

However, we still get emails from long-term users who appreciate the time limitations. Generally these fall into two categories:

1. Users like that an enforced break before the reviews provides tangible evidence that "yes, I genuinely understood yesterday's lessons". If we allowed cramming, that reassurance wouldn't exist; it's too easy to succeed at a review when you just finished the lesson 30 seconds ago.

2. Users like that the usage limits remove a source of anxiety and worry. You do your reviews and lessons, you finish, and then you wait until tomorrow. There's no temptation to think "I really should've done 10 lessons today instead of 5; I'm so lazy".

It's still possible for a very dedicated user to do all of our courses in parallel within their first monthly billing cycle. (Median course start-to-finish time is 8-18 days depending on the course.) So this scheme doesn't make users pay us more than they would otherwise. And they're spending the same amount of wall-clock time that they'd spend if they crammed all of the lessons in one day. That makes it pure win: they memorize the topics more deeply, they worry less, and they get those benefits for no extra time expenditure. The only exception I can think of would be people who think "I must get exposure to all TypeScript syntax and semantics before tomorrow morning, even if that significantly reduces my ability to remember what I learned."

Obviously I'm very biased here, and the goals that we're optimizing for don't even exist in most other product spaces. But I thought it would be nice to have a counterexample to "engagement at all costs".

[charcircuit]

Just because there are spaces, it doesn't mean something isn't "addictive." I was addicted to WaniKani when I first started it even if I wasn't binging it. Optimizing your product so users come every day (and hence every month paying for a subscription) you care that users engage every day more than the amount that they engage every day. Advertisement monetization streams care about how much time users are on the platform where subscriptions just care that users continue to use the platform.

[gary_bernhardt]

I think your argument here could be made about pretty much any activity that humans do repeatedly. The critical difference is that both WaniKani and Execute Program quickly tell you "go home, you're done", so it's difficult to dump hours of low-quality time into them. Whereas advertisement-driven platforms are incentivized to retain your eyeballs for as long as possible, as you pointed out.

[asutekku]

The thing is, if your product is a subscription then maximizing your engagement in a way that the users will stick longer and pay for longer is not a counterexample, it’s just adapting the engagement to fit your business model.

[taberiand]

It could also be seen as adapting the business model to fit the process.

Essentialy, the goal was to sell a product that guided users to learn in the most effective way possible. The learning model is spaced repetition, which requires users to use the product over a long period - therefore the best way to sell it is as a long term subscription.

If the best way to learn was to cram as much as possible in as short a time as possible, then maybe the product would be sold as a bunch of individually priced courses paid in full up front.

As long as the product is fairly priced and provides a valuable service, there's nothing wrong with making money as effectively as possible with it.

[asutekku]

Absolutely, it makes sense for a product. But claiming it’s ”counter addicting” is just false.

[ussy]

I completely agree with your view on this.

[dna_polymerase]

> Just because there are spaces, it doesn't mean something isn't "addictive."

Right, this results in habit creation, which means sustainable addiction.

[pixelbro]

Uh, it's interesting that you see the design of your product as a counterexample, because to me it looks exactly like what mobile games have been doing as a mechanism for maximizing engagement.

You want to stop them from playing through too much of the game's content and burning themselves out on it. So you lock them out with a timer, forcing them to come back later. Then you reward them for coming back every day. This encourages them to turn the game into a habit and integrate it into their routine.

Looks to me like you've accidentally stumbled onto one of the very tactics games use to turn people into addicts.

[cercatrova]

Habits can be good or bad. In this case, one would want the user to be rewarded for coming back every day to learn programming. Habit acclimation is a neutral process, just because the parent uses the same tactics as those who use them for building bad habits does not mean that those processes are bad in and of themselves.

[pixelbro]

Of course! I'm not ascribing any moral weight to it, just pointing out the similarity in tactics. Engagement can be a good thing if you're using it to improve someone's life rather than simply trying to extract as much time and money from them as possible.

[Loughla]

>Engagement can be a good thing if you're using it to improve someone's life

Can we agree that entertainment and being entertained can improve someone's life? If we can agree to that, then we can also agree that games designed to entertain an individual are good for said individual.

It's not a leap from there to say that a game that is engaging and keeps someone playing is good for them, because it's entertaining them, and that, as we've established, is good.

Once you take the step to make a product addicting, as a formal part of your business model, everything after that is just shades of grey, I believe. Morality and justification of your own truth is a fascinating process. Or maybe I'm overthinking this.

[pixelbro]

I wouldn't say you're overthinking it at all! You make an excellent point, and as a game developer it's something I have to consider. Our mission is to craft joy for our players, but I certainly cannot afford to rule out any potential in terms of designing our games to be more engaging.

On the other hand, I've witnessed many instances of gamers who have fallen victim to habit-forming mechanics that continue sinking hours and dollars into a game daily but also say that they no longer truly enjoy the time they spend in that game. There's many aspects that play into that sort of behavior which games can be designed to exploit, not least of which being the sunk cost fallacy and fear of missing out: a player who has reached the endgame might have run out of interesting content to play through but feel obliged to continuously "defend their title". They're encouraged to keep coming back long after it stops being fun by being constantly presented with what appears to be an existential threat to the supremacy they have labored towards.

At that point I think we can safely say that such a game is no longer a positive impact on that person's life.

My way of attempting to ameliorate these sorts of conflicting interests is to structure our organization as a multi-stakeholder cooperative, in a way that gives players meaningful influence over business, design and development decisions.

[Retric]

The issue is these games stop being entertaining. Pulling the lever on a slot machine might be fun the first few pulls, but after that it’s simply waiting for a dopamine rush.

MMO’s basic gameplay without leveling, item drops, or any form of progression have some fun aspects. But, they need to tell players to collect 50 rat tails because otherwise players wouldn’t.

Mobile games have distilled this down even further, with the minimum possible amount of actual gameplay possible.

[Loughla]

But again, splitting hairs into dopamine rush versus actual fun is simply semantics. Fun = dopamine rush. Does it matter if you are cognizant of the fun, or do the chemicals matter?

To be clear, I am 100% in agreement with you. Most mobile games (and honestly, most pc games at this point with their item and resource gathering mechanics; and I am absolutely talking about MMO's - there's a reason many many many franchises are working toward a multi-player experience instead of focusing on the single player game) aren't supposed to be 'fun'. They're supposed to be addictive, and I believe it is a real problem, especially for kids growing up learning that a dopamine hit is just one iphone game away.

Anyway, though, I guess my point is - it's all semantics. When you say, it's not 'fun', it's just a dopamine rush, developers and sales people can say that's just the same thing. They can argue that people wouldn't play unless they received some kind of value out of it.

To be honest, I've forgotten where I started with all this, other than to say - when you have to split hairs on the definition, it leaves room for people to interpret their own meaning and ignore nuance. Therefore, this is an argument that people don't want to hear, engage with, or consider, I believe.

[oarsinsync]

> You want to stop them from playing through too much of the game's content and burning themselves out on it. So you lock them out with a timer, forcing them to come back later. Then you reward them for coming back every day.

Simultaneously offering a pay-to-play option that enables the user to bypass the timeout with money

[stoolpigeon]

This is the key difference. They mobile games don't want you to wait and come back tomorrow. They want you to pay to remove the blocks and just keep playing, today, tomorrow, every day.

[LaGrange]

This is not _entirely_ true, not that it changes anything significant about the predatory nature of f2p developers.

They absolutely want you to come back tomorrow. Apparently (inferring from what e.g. Mihoyo says and does about "total lifetime income") a whale that spends a bit less at once, but keeps doing this for years is far more valuable than one that blasts through the game and burns out immediately. You also need some dolphins and free-to-play people, both to fill out the multiplayer lobbies and appear less predatory.

[hutzlibu]

But since they know not everyone is addicted, they want both.

Hardcore addicted people and people who are at least so on the hook to come back regularly.

[wahnfrieden]

Yes... I build iOS apps for learning Japanese ( https://reader.manabi.io https://manabi.io ) and recognized how the same kind of SRS system I was building is both optimal for learning and habit-forming in the same way as game dark patterns. It felt economically and morally fortunate but I recognize it’s not an easy or light responsibility to customers to get it right.

[dencodev]

Bummer this isn't available for android

[the_du_]

Try Memrise!

[LaGrange]

> Uh, it's interesting that you see the design of your product as a counterexample, because to me it looks exactly like what mobile games have been doing as a mechanism for maximizing engagement.

Addiction is a habit that interferes with other areas of your life. Smoking isn't bad because you're having something to do with your hands during a break, it's bad because it's expensive and impacts your health. Playing games for 8 hours is fine if you have time for that, but bad if it stops you from keeping your bathroom clean.

So yeah, intentional habit forming is using the same techniques as addiction building. The difference is, essentially, in the informed consent involved in the former.

[imtringued]

>Looks to me like you've accidentally stumbled onto one of the very tactics games use to turn people into addicts.

You're confusing something. It's the exact opposite.

"Games accidentally stumbled onto one of the very tactics you use to turn people into addicts."

Industries take advantage of human behavior, they don't invent them.

[Loughla]

That reads like such a weird take on that statement, that I think I had to have misunderstood what you're saying. Please clarify.

Is your claim that industry isn't at fault for addiction, because people are able to be addicted to things?

[pedalpete]

Unrelated to original thread - I find it interesting the way you approach this comment. You mention pricing almost as if you're apologizing. Your competitors, even if they are binge-focused, don't apologize for charging customers. They would never have a an advert that says "we've got this great course, but before you go check it out, I'll warn you, it costs money".

I like your thinking of non-binge learning, and think you could really use that as a differentiator, in your marketing.

Your site looks great, and I really like the way you approach it, or describe it here, but that isn't coming through in your branding. Think Salesforce's "no software", they showed who the enemy was, and put them squarely against it, and if you really look at it, they were selling a CRM, not selling "no software", you're even closer to your product.

If you haven't yet, you may want to check out the book Play Bigger and category creation.

Just a thought, best of luck to you.

[gary_bernhardt]

I appreciate it. We've struggled with communicating the non-binge aspect, and usually approach it from the other side: by talking about reviews, spaced repetition, remembering, etc. But I think you're right that approaching it from the "non-binge" side is a good idea. Coincidentally, we're about to do a major landing page revision, so the timing is right to give that a try!

As for apologizing for charging money... you're right there too. A lot of people will complain when someone dares to charge money for learning resources, even those that take multiple full-time staff to maintain. I think that's worn me down a fair bit!

[riho]

I'd look at it from another perspective. Committing to learning an entirely new language is a big undertaking, so ideally you want to make sure that the resources you're using are of high quality. In that sense, it costing money is actually a good thing, since it signals that this is premium quality content and worth spending your time on. Of course this needs to be clearly communicated as such, like Brilliant.org for example (at least their marketing communication focuses on the quality).

[pedalpete]

Cool, I'm not a marketing expert, but I've had a bit of experience in the past. I'd be happy to give you my thoughts if you want to run it by me. Details are in my profile.

[Demigod33]

Do you mean the book by Kevin Maney, Al Ramadan et al.?

[pedalpete]

Yup, that's the one.

[donmcronald]

I don't know if I'd like that. I grabbed some of Maximilian Schwarzmüller's courses off Udemy a couple years ago and, by far, my favorite thing was being able to blast through the simple concepts that I already understood and to slow down on the new stuff.

I think a recommended pace that's easy to achieve would make a nice goal, but I would balk at the idea of it being enforced if I were paying money for it.

[bostonvaulter2]

Ah, that looks really neat! I have a couple minor pieces of feedback after looking at the homepage. The graphic for "Review Exponentially" [1] was a little difficult to grok initially. My first thought was that time was flowing downwards. I think a labeled arrow indicating the flow of time would be helpful, perhaps also a label to indicate that the numbers at the bottom represent days (instead of relying on me to understand that implicitly because one of them is labeled "Day 4: Lesson".

Also in the "Course" section I think you should include a link to "All Courses" because I almost bounced because none of those three courses were interesting to me (but I eventually found the list at the bottom, and SQL is a topic I'm interested in solidifying further).

Lastly I think it would be great to have a sign-up list to be notified of new courses (I do realize that perhaps if you sign up for a free account you _might_ also get information about new courses, but that's doesn't seem fully certain).

[1] https://www.executeprogram.com/images/diagram-lessons-over-t...

[gary_bernhardt]

All good feedback, thanks! An upcoming landing rework will get the first two, and I added "separate sign-up list for new courses" to my queue.

[bostonvaulter2]

Thanks!

[feralimal]

Your product has a feature that curtails 'addiction' for the benefit of the user - ie to improve knowledge via spaced repetitions. A knowledgeable customer will recommend you and come back for more. Great!

Social media requires time from those users - they want to know you, crack you open psychologically, so they can then be better at selling you stuff (and, incidentally, pass all that info on to 3 letter agencies for their population modelling etc). That is a different model. They want you to be deeply engaged for a long time. The longer the better.

[JetAlone]

Interesting. I was recently recently reminded about the "Pomodoro" method ("Pomodoro" = 25 minutes on, 5 minutes off, 1 "set" is 4 Pomodoros followed by an additional 30 minute break) - it might be interesting to have a learning platform with a Pomodoro timer baked right into the site.

[jcelerier]

> But cramming is a very time-inefficient way to learn,

who are you to judge how I learn ?

[Zebrakopf]

I don't think he is judging the way in which you learn. He's simply referring to the current state of research like: Putnam, et al. (2016). Optimizing Learning in College: Tips From Cognitive Psychology

There has been lots written on learning strategies but one thing we are rather certain of is that cramming is usually the worst way to retain information (if you want to learn it well). You can even read about funky neuronal reasonings for that argument if you are interested.

[TeMPOraL]

Expanding your thought a bit: for example, for people with ADHD-PI, cramming may in fact be the only way in which they can learn the stuff they're not currently being obsessive about.

That said, you can't optimize for everyone simultaneously. There's plenty of cramming-friendly resources available.

[teraku]

I first learned of spaced-repetition learning from wanikani when I started learning japanese kanji and can only recommend to everyone!!!

Great approach, Kudos!

[torgian]

Well this is very interesting. Congrats on the marketing, I’m going to check this out

[cesarvarela]

This reminds me of the drip feed algorithm used by Tinder.