Courtesy of Collin Junus
Yale student Collin Junus ’27 last month launched a new productivity app called Monk, named after a general category of productivity apps dubbed “monk mode” apps.
Monk helps users set goals and restricts access to other, distracting apps, such as social media. Junus said he aims to help users “fight back against brainrot.” Junus launched Monk with a small team of designers and editors and hosted a launch event on campus in September.
“Attention collapse is probably one of the biggest problems of our generation, and I felt it myself, right?” Junus said. “Honestly, I built Monk for myself first.”
However, Junus hopes that Monk will become a status symbol.
“If you just want to drive a car, you can drive a Toyota Prius. But then why do people buy Ferraris? Right?” Junus said. “I don’t want people to use Monk just because they need it, but I want them to use it because it makes them feel hotter, richer and more elite, right?”
Junus — whose website calls him a “Worldbuilder,” “Polymath,” “Genius” and “Asian Batman” — also has a YouTube channel under the name “Collin The Chad.” Some of his videos include “how to glow up in 2025” and “how to be confident AF as a guy.”
Just as he aims to influence social consciousness through his online presence, Junus hopes that Monk will launch a “cultural movement.” He sees Monk as more than just a utility app but a “ritual” that users will come to rely on and connect with.
“I call it the mental renaissance, and that’s the cultural aspect of it, right?” Junus said. “And what is the mental renaissance? It’s the idea that stillness is rebellion.”
Like other productivity apps, Monk uses time restrictions to limit usage of distractions such as Instagram or Youtube, in theory allowing users to have more productive time.
Josh Chen ’27, a friend of Junus’ who has used Monk, said that because users pay for it, the app is more likely to impact their behavior.
“That investment into yourself and your own behavior makes you more likely to stick to it,” Chen said.
Junus frames Monk as a cultural ritual. Chen explained where he believed Junus came up with that marketing approach.
“I think framing Monk as a sort of revolution fits into the general trend of combatting screen addiction,” Chen said. “Collin likes to say that brain rot was kind of fathered by Facebook and it rabbit-holed into social media in the early 2000s and 2010s. And in the past few years, you’ve seen many people in Gen-Z seeing and experiencing for themselves the detrimental effects of screen addiction.”
Another user, Proud Ua-arak ’27, also spoke about the screen addiction she deals with. When using other productivity apps, she said, she was likely to just bypass the time restriction set on her phone. However, she found Monk more effective at encouraging her to be more productive.
Ua-arak added that though she has few issues with the functionality of Monk, she might enjoy some added elements to the app.
“I’m someone who’s a sucker for inspirational quotes or, you know, morning affirmations,” Ua-arak said. Maybe, she added, the app could “notify me every morning to like, log in, or something like that.”
Ua-arak finds Junus’ approach to marketing his app — the cultural movement technique — interesting.
“Obviously, you know, when you sell a product, you don’t just sell the product for itself,” she said. “You sell it for the emotions and everything involved in it.”
Ua-arak said this framing likely would not impact her use of the app in any way.
That being said, Ua-arak emphasized the value she has found in using a productivity app like Monk.
“Just reclaiming that time in the mornings and nights where I can’t be doing something else,” Ua-arak said, “I can wake up with a refreshed brain, or go to sleep without these distractions.”
Junus’ YouTube channel has 711,000 subscribers.