Productive Friction · Notice · PF-04

Speed Bump

Instrument 04 / 06

Designation
Speed Bump
Classification
Notice / Checkpoint / Voluntary
Patterns addressed
01, 05, 07
Counter-move
Place one checkpoint. Move one icon.

A checkpoint placed between you and an app or site you open without meaning to. It does not block. It asks.

[Procedure]

  1. Identify one app you open without meaning to. One. Name it.
  2. On your phone, open this page and create a checkpoint for that app. Each browser keeps its own checkpoints. Create it on the phone you will use it on.
  3. Open the checkpoint and add it to your home screen. On iPhone: Share, then Add to Home Screen. On Android: the browser menu, then Add to home screen.
  4. Move the app's own icon off your home screen, into a folder or the app library.
  5. From then on, tap the checkpoint, not the app. When you continue, the app opens.

Limits. This instrument blocks nothing. A web page cannot stop an app from opening. The checkpoint works only when you tap its icon or follow its link. Open the app any other way and the checkpoint is skipped. That is deliberate. You choose the friction. You can remove it.

Checkpoints, visit counts and intentions stay in this browser. Nothing is sent anywhere. Visit counts and intentions are kept for 30 days, then dropped. If a checkpoint runs the audit protocol, each response is filed in the PF-01 protocol record and its weekly tally. Deleting the PF-04 records leaves those entries in place.

Create a checkpoint