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Comment by jktzes | Hacker News Reader

I don't think a to-do app that could effectively help ADHDers ever existed. Never heard of one, probably never will. If such a tool exists you will def see it in r/ADHD or similar communities. When you have no competitor in a market probably the problem is the market. I don't think a niche market for ADHD todo apps exists. Because the problem is not solvable by a todo app. Just like you can't effectively help austic people by offering social manner courses.

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I also think the same - a to-do app will not help. Specially if you plan to add deadline information, difficulty and value scores. These will turn into distractions themselves which will require thinking and making decisions about.

There's AI that can do all this now.

Habitica has been around for a long time. There's papers written on it, and people are still writing papers on its effectiveness on ADHD and depresssion. Something like Finch is around for depression.

I think it's more that people who have ADHD have been gaslighted by people who insist they were just lazy. If it can be fixed with a todo app, it's "not a real illness".

There's low carb apps and there's diabetes apps. Both do essentially the same thing and yet they're almost never in the same market. Low carb is marketed as weight loss.

The other problem is that every app targeting mental health will gaslight you and call it CBT. It started with Noom. Many of them don't just feel clinical, they feel outright manipulative. Nobody wants to do a ton of surveys, but if you want something to prove successful, the only methodology they have is a ton of surveys.

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