Sticky Idea is a free, ad-supported way to learn the world's best ideas — and actually remember them. The most useful ideas from great books and thinkers, distilled into five-minute lessons, then locked into memory with spaced repetition.
Most of what we read fades within days. You finish a great book, nod along, and a week later you can barely recall its central idea. The ideas were worth keeping; the problem was never your intelligence — it was that reading once isn't remembering. Sticky Idea is built to close that gap: learn a powerful idea in a few minutes, then keep it for good.
Each lesson teaches one idea in plain language — with a real example, why it matters, and a question to test yourself. Then active recall and spaced repetition bring the idea back at the exact moment you're about to forget it, so it moves from "I read that once" to "I actually know that."
The web app is free with no signup, supported by unobtrusive ads — knowledge shouldn't sit behind a gate. An iOS and Android app is on the way, with daily review reminders so the habit sticks too.
Every idea is distilled from a named, widely-respected book or thinker, and clearly attributed — you always see the source. We aim for faithful summaries, not replacements for the originals: a lesson is a doorway to a great book, not a substitute for reading it. Each idea carries a "last reviewed" date, and we welcome corrections at [email protected].
Sticky Idea is made by Paulo de Vries, an independent maker who builds small web products. He started it for a simple, personal reason: he kept reading great books and forgetting their best ideas within weeks. Each lesson is curated from a named source, written in plain language, and reviewed for accuracy before it goes live — you can read exactly how on the methodology page. Questions and corrections always reach a real person at [email protected].