FiveClose Focus: phones face-down, together

A focus group is a few people from your circle, such as a family, classmates before exams or flatmates, who put their phones face-down together for 25, 45, 60, 90, 120 or 180 minutes, on a schedule they agree on or started on the spot. Everyone starts with an egg that hatches and grows into a hen while the phone stays down; over the weeks the group rears its own flock. A small reason to meet without screens.

How it works

1. Nominate a group from your circle and set a schedule, say Mon to Thu at 20:00 for 90 minutes. Everyone you nominate says yes before they hear anything.
2. At session time each person taps "I'm in" and puts the phone face-down. The app keeps the screen awake and black and watches the motion sensor; pick the phone up or leave FiveClose for too long and your chick wanders off.
3. Afterwards everyone feeds their bird: one handful of grain for every 5 minutes focused, and a stroke for free. Friends can stroke each other's hens too.

Little surprises, nothing to set up

• Golden hens when everyone makes it, a rooster for two hours, an early bird before 8am.
• The yard grows with the flock: flowers, a tree, a fence, a duck pond, a coop.
• A bar of the hours you've focused together, and a picnic when friends were in the same place.
• A weekly postcard of the yard, with no names, to share in the family or class chat.

Kind by design

• Only people in your own circle can be nominated, and only those who said yes get notifications.
• Anyone can mute a group without leaving it. Group sessions run between 07:00 and 23:00 in the group's time zone.
• Results name the people who made it ("4 of 5 made it"), never who didn't.
• Where tracking can't work (a laptop, no motion sensor, permission refused) you're on the honour system.

On your own

"Just me" is a focus group of one: the same sessions and feeding as a personal focus timer, no circle needed, at any hour. Back-to-back 25-minute blocks are fine.

Free, part of FiveClose. Sign in with your FiveClose account to start, and add this page to your home screen to keep Focus as its own app. Questions and answers

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