I'm roughly 100 days into my use of "Beeminder" and wanted to provide an update. If you recall from my earlier post on Beeminder, it is a "put your money where your mouth is" kind of commitment tool. I committed to blogging at least 4 times per month and, if I don't, I owe money. Yep, cash money.
I got into this base purely on curiosity, but I am now a huge fan. There is nothing like a commitment to someone else to keep you honest, and nothing like a commitment of money to get you to take things seriously. When I first found out about Beeminder, it was relatively unknown. Last month, the Beeminder team (now located in lovely Portland, Oregon along with me) received some well-deserved publicity from LifeHacker.
Here is how my progress is going so far:
Basically, the yellow line is my "yellow brick road" and my goal is to stay above it - below it, I owe money. This is a great system and I am growing addicted to it.
They do a great job of providing you with updates via an email from the Beeminder Bot. You can provide updates via email or on the Beeminder site, and provide data to make your graph go, as mine has. Rumor has it they are working on even more mobile-friendly ways of updating your status.
Got a goal that could use some pressure / encouragement? Head on over to Beeminder and give it a try. You'll love it.