The basic insight behind DigiPromise is that people make promises to themselves and to others. In everyday life, promise-making is well engrained. Yet promise-breaking is an easy trap to lapse into. A promise to oneself is not a legal contract. Nor does breaking a promise to oneself lead to the kind of anger, frustration, or sadness that a broken promise to a friend or relative can cause. This is where DigiPromise comes in. Through the website, people make a public promise and the public nature of the promise makes it stronger than a promise made to oneself. The user receives daily or weekly email reminders which act as a direct nudge on the user.
The idea of promise-keeping is generally thought to be part of an optimal society. We regard promise-breaking in a negative light, a sign of weakness perhaps. When a company says that it will stop buying or selling a certain product but continues to do so, we instinctively feel let down. When a politician or Government makes a promise to enact such and such a law, failure to stick to that promise breeds cynicism and distrust of the whole political system. DigiPromise would encourage individuals to make promises and to keep them.
The aims of DigiPromise
- The website will encourage people to make and keep promises made to themselves, e.g. I will give up chocolate for Lent.
- The website will encourage people to make and keep promises made to others, e.g. I will support some charitable organisation.