About Oi-U!
The Realisation
I’m Richard, a product manager who discovered something broken about modern work: we treat our attention like it’s infinite when it’s actually our scarcest resource.
I could go deep for hours, shipping features and solving complex problems. But the constant context-switching between deep work and meetings was destroying my best thinking. Sound familiar?
The Insight
Traditional time management assumes all hours are equal. They’re not. A focused morning hour can be worth three distracted afternoon ones. Yet we have no way to track, improve, or protect our cognitive performance.
That’s when I realized: we need a fitness tracker for our minds.
What I’m Building
Oi-U! creates the feedback loop that’s missing from every calendar:
- Intentional transitions between different types of work
- Real reflection on what actually worked (or didn’t)
- Personal insights based on your patterns, not generic advice
Starting with a simple iOS Shortcut, evolving based on what actually helps people work better.
Why I’m Building This
Alerts are broken – most of them aren’t in your interest, they’re there to grab your attention for someone else’s gain. I had become numb to alerts – they no longer worked for me. I built the Oi-U! Shortcut so I could have my own alerts – different from all the other things vying for my attention. But these alerts were alarms. They were created by me and for me. And it worked spectacularly. I could let myself go into really deep work – but trust that I had a system to get my attention when I needed it. It was so good that I use it every day and believe that I’m not the only one who would benefit from this. I think as a society we’re slowing down our evolution and discovery of new things, and creativity is being stifled by the noise of alerts that aren’t in our interest. I want to find a new way that lets deep thinkers and creatives focus on their own terms.
Join the Experiment
I’m looking for 100 people who:
- Already use their calendar religiously
- Want to focus deeply but make sure they are on-time for the next event
- Want data on their planned use of time
- Believe time management is a skill you can improve
Ready to train your time?
I’d love to hear from you – message me on LinkedIn or email me richard@io-u.com
