DoomToll is an iPhone-first digital tollbooth for the apps I open without thinking. It replaces social-media icons on the home screen with look-alike shortcuts. Most taps pass through; roughly one in four stops at a tollbooth and asks me to pay ten cents or touch grass for free.
Psychology, pointed in the other direction
Attention apps use behavioral psychology to remove friction. I built DoomToll to add a tiny, well-placed piece of friction back.
- Habit replacement keeps the familiar tap but routes it through a different choice.
- A variable toll interrupts the reflex without making the shortcut unusable.
- Loss aversion and the pain of paying make the cost of another scroll concrete.
There is no subscription, and walking away always costs nothing. If I choose to continue, the small tolls are collected into a monthly Stripe invoice.
Try it
Set up DoomToll at doomtoll.com, see the Product Hunt launch, or read Media is new smoking indeed for the thinking behind it.