I started learning German on Duolingo last year. A few friends were doing it and I kept getting notifications showing their streaks. That was enough to pull me in. It was genuinely fun at first. The lessons were short, the progression felt natural and I was actually picking up the language. Then my streak got long enough to matter. At some point I stopped thinking about German and started thinking about the streak. I’d open the app last thing at night, half asleep, do the shortest lesson possible and close it. Job done. Streak intact. German not learned. The final straw was finding out that Duolingo teaches other things alongside languages. Things like chess and music. And those count toward your streak too. I spent a week doing that instead of German lessons. I wasn’t using the app for what I downloaded it for anymore. The gamification had quietly become the product. I kept thinking about this when I was building SecondStep. It’s a mental wellness app.…