Distraction Blockers

We estimate that in the US 90% of people use the internet for an average of 7 hours a day which is 19% of their whole lifetime! Around 30% of this use is unintentional based on previous research findings. Leading fixes for this include setting a reward/payment system, quitting cold turkey, and use of internet blockers. For setting a reward/payment, participants were able to reduce their screen time by 39% during it was in effect but slowly declines once the reward has stopped. In quitting cold turkey, we roughly estimate its efficacy between 15-20% based on personal accounts. We have looked at several survey results (1, 2, 3, 4) and estimated that distraction blockers were able to reduce 64% (1.6 hours of 2.5 hours) of internet unintentional use on average.

We have computed the overall score using our own conversion table which you can check out here. Assuming a person will start using at 18, and considering the life expectancy of Americans which is 77. We came up with a total of 34456 hours saved or 3.9 in years.

In the US, there are a total of 298.8 Million internet users as of 2021 which is 90% of the total US population and is expected to rise in 2022.

Benefits:

Users have noted that they are less distracted, more productive, save a least an hour, experienced improved mental health and reduced overall screen time with the help of distraction blockers.

Costs

We think that the cost is insignificant compared to the benefits that an individual gain when using a distraction blocker. Freedom only charge as low as $6.99/month.

Risks

There are no significant risks involved by using distraction blockers. In extreme cases, one might be obsessed in blocking all apps, and work too much but that is a risk we are more than willing to take.

We looked at user reviews, blogs, articles, and online forums to see how Freedom helped them in controlling their internet use. From what we found, along with the research studies that utilized the use of Freedom, it is effective especially for people who have expressed a desire to quit.

Getting used to a new app or system can take some time so we have considered this as a factor for difficulty rating, but overall, distraction apps like Freedom are intuitive. That means, customizing it to your preferences is fairly easy. In terms of workarounds, people who are so keen and have tremendous self control problems might go through lengths to study the workaround in each blockers.