

Show HN: AcademyReady helps you finish online courses, punishes you if you don't - ericz
https://academyready.com/

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gibybo
I realize the 'profits' are donated to Teach for America, but doesn't using
any part of the $10 warp your incentives?

If you have a list of improvements to make to the site and it turns out one of
them indirectly helps students avoid the $10 charge without them realizing it,
aren't you going to move it down on the priority list relative to something
that doesn't make paying your expenses harder?

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AjayTripathy
Fair point. To try and allay these kinds of concerns, we've also provided a
completely free option with 100% of the scheduling/reminder functionality of
the paid option. Wagering is completely voluntary. Though we think betting a
bit of money will increase your motivation, our primary concern is helping
people through their classes.

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mvzink
I love this idea (with some reservations re: gibybo's comment), and it brings
to mind an important quote from Thomas H. Huxley that has been with me for a
while:

"Perhaps the most valuable result of all education is the ability to make
yourself do the thing you have to do, when it ought to be done, whether you
like it or not; it is the first lesson that ought to be learned; and, however
early a man's training begins, it is probably the last lesson that he learns
thoroughly."

The issue of motivating people to learn is often neglected in online and/or
self-directed education. This is an interesting take on the issue—and, at
least, an acknowledgement that this disconnect exists between the "no degrees
necessary" zeitgeist and socioeconomopolitical structure (or whatever) of
university degrees: on some level, your degree is also "free" (or profitable,
rather) if you finish your courses, and costly if you don't.

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droithomme
Man, I need to set me up one of these. Step right up everybody, lose 20 lbs or
pay me $100. Thanks for signing up, ma'am! Oh, how do you lose 20 lbs? Heck if
I know lady!

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jimrhoskins
It's already been done [1]. An interesting point someone brought up about this
is if your money goes to a good cause, it may be less of a motivator, since
even if you fail your personal goal, you still did some good.

Perhaps donating money to a charity or political party you don't agree with
would be more motivating.

[1] <https://loseitorloseit.com/>

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wahnfrieden
Radiolab ran a story about an older woman who was co Poetry addicted to
smoking, and eventually she caved out of shame and flippantly told her friend
she'd donate $5000 to the KKK if she caught her smoking again. It worked,
apparently, and she claims she entirely intended to donate it if she started
again, and that her hate and disgust of the thought overtook her will to
smoke.

Can't say I condone the method, but interesting anyway.

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petercooper
_Can't say I condone the method, but interesting anyway._

I'm intrigued now. Why not? (Because of the risk of the KKK getting the
donation?)

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wahnfrieden
Yes, from her telling of it, it worked because she was absolutely ready to pay
the consequences. At that point her smoking habit becomes other peoples
problem (in addition to second-hand smoke etc).

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petercooper
I guess the reason I don't see the problem is because I believe the gambit was
_so_ bold that she simply would _never_ start to smoke again. (A sort of
personal "nuclear deterrent", if you will. But like a nuclear deterrent,
dangerous if used!)

~~~
wahnfrieden
Maybe. I think it's dependent on how disposable your money is.

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natasham25
Negative reinforcement might get the students to finish the course, but they
will not enjoy what they're learning if they're doing it just so they avoid
paying money for it. The best learning happens when you want to learn because
you're curious and interested in the what you're learning, not because you'll
have to pay money for not learning.

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Bitwse
I love this because I feel like one of the biggest problems that I can see in
taking these online courses are that people think "Oh this looks cool - Let me
try it out." Soon enough they forget to stay on top of the lectures and other
course material because there's nobody there to force them, we just do not
keep going. Out of general laziness. I'm sure these constant reminders and
schedules would help many of keep on track - but adding the $10 charge really
ups the motivation, nobody wants to lose money.

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ajayjain
I like the structure (schedule) it gives to Khan Academy classes. The
reminders reminded me of an SAT prep site I used before (number2) that would
remind me every other day for a month to come back after I started slacking
off. Highly annoying but effective :)

Feature recommendation: use the Khan Academy API to allow users to mark videos
they watched before as viewed on the website. I've watched a bunch of
scattered videos already, so I guess I'll have to mark off as I go.

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ajiang
I'm not convinced that these type of commitment devices work unless the
monetary fine is significant to the user. The problem is that 1) people have
varying levels of what "significant" means, 2) if the fee is more than one can
afford to spend, then one would not sign up for risk of losing the sum and 3)
if the fee is easily affordable, it's not too difficult to justify in one's
head losing the fee -- especially if it's donated to charity. It would take a
lot of calibration to find the perfect amount to charge, if a general 'perfect
amount' exists.

Personally, I think more companies should bring in more 'social' commitment
devices, like setting up an e-mail that goes out to all my closest friends, my
boss, and that girl I like -- when I fail to complete something. Social
pressure, perhaps along with monetary incentives, are quite powerful and
nuanced in a way that money could never be.

EDIT: Wanted to point out that qntmfred made the same point on social
pressures 3 hours ago -- didn't see it until I posted.

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UK-AlasGou
Well the website is down for me, can someone say what it actually does?

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AjayTripathy
Sorry, we're experiencing the issue described here:
<http://www.hackerne.ws/item?id=4180339>

But basically, we schedule online courses and add email/text you when you
should be watching your online course.

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zafriedman
I've done customer development on things along these lines and I basically
have the following to share with the class:

Any app that is at its core assisting people to hack their current behavior is
inherently asking people to change their behavior beyond that point at which
it would be reasonable given the difficulty of such a task to attempt this
feat.

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DTrejo
The text could use some more contrast against the picture background, can be
hard to read. Other than that, I like it.

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sown
This is neat!

Can you implement a SuperMemo type quiz? I think that's a good killer feature
for good performance from students for both udacity and coursera.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SuperMemo>

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qntmfred
Subjecting yourself to social pressure rather than financial pressure is
another good approach to disciplined self-directed learning.

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rudasn
Or both. I admit that my primary motivation in completing my degrees was the
huge amounts of money my parents have invested in me. Of course I liked (most)
of the subjects I was studying and certainly that helped a lot.

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manish_gill
Umm...why does the delete account button links to /checkout, and asks me for
my credit card info?

