Problem

It’s no secret that Big Tech-induced screen addiction is hollowing out the lives of entire generations of young people.  It is deliberately replacing achievement, learning, and positive social relationships with hours of pointless videos, obsessively checking for new content, and a sense of self-esteem based solely on strangers liking our posts.  Years of habitual screen-based stimulus-and-response are leaving millions of young people lonely, isolated, depressed, and without real-life skills or achievement.  The average American teen now stares at screens for more than eight hours every day.  Since smartphones became ubiquitous in 2011, the percentage of girls (ages 12-17) suffering from major depression has more than doubled – from 12.1% in 2011 to 25.2% in 2021. Facebook itself estimates that 380 million people are addicted to its platform worldwide.

Solution

At DoCurious, Inc., we have devised a novel, science-based strategy for moving people away from screens and back into challenging, real-world activities.  It uses a “goal-oriented challenge” (GOC) approach.  Rather than simply telling people to “get off your phone”, people are specifically persuaded to achieve engaging, tangible and specific tasks that are appropriate for their existing skill set.  (E.g., drive a stick-shift car, weld a table, sew a backpack, learn the tango, identify 30 birds in the wild, orienteer from point A to point B, and thousands of other possible missions across the whole range of human endeavor.)  To accomplish this, we combine applied behavioral and positive psychology, technology, and the resources of small local businesses in a way that exploits the inherent human desire for exploration, autonomy, accomplishment, and positive relationships.  In short, we use a combination of psychology and technology to make it more rewarding to do interesting, educational things than stare at a screen.  

The DoCurious model is straightforward to implement, scalable, benefits local communities, and can be implemented worldwide.  There is every reason to believe that this approach will work; virtually all video games consist of conquering goal-oriented challenges on-screen.  Their goal-oriented nature makes video games highly addictive and a $65B industry in the U.S. alone.  We can use specific psychological tools to help make a lifetime of “real-life” goal-oriented achievements equally rewarding.

Market

We're initially targeting members of GenZ (about 62 million people in the U.S. alone), but we'll eventually serve customers of all ages.  Although GOCs will create a whole new segment of the "experience" and "activities" marketplace, we know people already spend a great deal of money on products that are less compelling.  Global “destination activities” alone booked with micro-to-medium-sized vendors in 2019 totaled $40B (276K locations, $22M transactions).  $22B of that was in North America.  Eventbrite’s best estimate of the community event and experiences market, circa 2009-2014 was $81B.  It's now over $100B.  We believe that our serviceable addressable market in the U.S. alone is over $1 billion, and that we'll be highly profitable within 3-4 years with gross margins of 80+%.

Our Goal

Our goal is to create a highly profitable company with worldwide operations and a multi-billion dollar valuation, while creating an entirely new market segment in the real-life "activities and experiences" space.  Our underlying business model is very similar to Uber, Etsy, and Airbnb.  Like them, we expect to create similar high valuations with market-changing growth.  However we have a further goal.  That is to be the first company to mass-produce good mental health and well-being for billions of people worldwide.  In contrast to many Big Tech companies, we're committed to producing products and services will create a virtuous cycle in people's lives.  Our customers try our GOCs =>They feel happier and more satisfied with life => They meet new people and remember their experiences fondly => They want to use our services again.  In fact, one very specific goal is to create a company that will be used and valued by large numbers of people all of their lives as they grow from childhood to old age; now and for generations to come.  We'll look back, point to our work and the company we've created and proudly say to our families, children, and grandchildren, "We did that!"