Tag Archive

What To Mind: Picking a Metric

Saturday, September 13th, 2014
What To Mind: Picking a Metric

We use the word “goal” a lot but, ironically, we agree with Scott Adams (of Dilbert fame) who argues that goals are for losers. He points out that the most... »

New Feature: Supporters

Saturday, May 3rd, 2014
New Feature: Supporters

Technically we deployed this feature over two months ago, but not very well so we didn’t have much fanfare. It was one of our »

The Beekeeper Program: Beeminder-Based Lifecoaching

Wednesday, January 1st, 2014
The Beekeeper Program: Beeminder-Based Lifecoaching

This post is by Erica Edelman, our very first employee! She’s been knocking our socks off since we met her a couple months ago, and apparently the feeling was mutual because last week she moved to Portland from Columbus, Ohio to start with us full-time. The main excuse to hire... »

Socially Efficient Commitment Devices

Monday, March 4th, 2013
Socially Efficient Commitment Devices

StickK popularized the idea of the anti-charity as a commitment device. Another Beeminder competitor, Aherk, offers to publish embarrassing photos of you on Facebook to ensure you don’t fall prey to akrasia. Another clever idea — proposed by... »

Get the Jump on Your Resolutions

Thursday, December 20th, 2012
Get the Jump on Your Resolutions

This is a guest post by Philip Hellyer, who has done more in 2012 than he thought possible, with the help of Beeminder. He’s going to get a head start on 2013, and so could you. Here’s how. It’s approaching that time of year again. People will ask you about your resolutions... »

Pledge Short-Circuiting

Saturday, December 8th, 2012
Pledge Short-Circuiting

Until now you haven’t had much choice about how much to pledge (put at risk) on your Beeminder commitment contracts. It starts out free, then $5, then each subsequent time you derail from your yellow brick road you’re encouraged (though not forced) to jump to the next pledge level for your next... »

Synonyms for Self-Binding

Saturday, July 21st, 2012
Synonyms for Self-Binding

We’ve been collecting a list of synonyms for the crazy lifehack that sites like Beeminder facilitate. In addition to us being shameless SEO-whores, it seems like this list could be genuinely useful for humans, especially the kind of humans who read the Beeminder Blog. Here’s how... »

Hammers and Chisels

Wednesday, June 20th, 2012
Hammers and Chisels

We have a new competitor about to launch: Lift! Their (meta) goal is the same as ours. They want to “eliminate willpower as a factor in achieving goals”. Our approaches, however, are quite opposite. Or at least they have opposite sign. Lift emphasizes in their pre-announcement blog post today that they believe firmly in... »

Aiding and Abetting

Saturday, January 14th, 2012
Aiding and Abetting

I just blackmailed myself with a silly photo thanks to our competitor [UPDATE: former competitor; see graveyard... »

BMNDR vs StickK

Thursday, June 16th, 2011
BMNDR vs StickK

This is a guest post by Josh Jordan. While waiting for a Beeminder beta account, I tried using StickK to help me lose some fat. StickK is a brilliant concept and I hope they succeed in a big way, but I don’t like their weekly weigh-ins, for two reasons: It’s way too easy to »