Introducing BrainSafe - Design that Respects your Cognition

Introducing BrainSafe - Design that Respects your Cognition

From The Dopamine Slot Machine by Andrew Wilmot

April 30, 2026 · 29 min

About this episode

This episode discusses the UK government's actions on addictive design and introduces the BrainSafe Standard for assessing interfaces.

The UK government has finally named the problem — Keir Starmer's crackdown on infinite scroll and autoplay is the most concrete UK action on addictive design we've ever seen. But naming features is whack-a-mole: ban infinite scroll today, and the platforms ship something functionally equivalent under a different name tomorrow. In this episode, Andrew walks through what the government's getting right, what's missing, and introduces the BrainSafe Standard — a six-dimensional certification framework that asks the structural question rather than the feature-by-feature question. We cover the six dimensions of the BrainSafe Addictive Interface Assessment Framework, share scores from worked assessments of Snapchat, Netflix, Times Tables Rock Stars, and Signal, and explain how businesses can join the 2026 pilot programme. Find the framework and pilot details at https://brainsafestandard.co.uk/, and follow along as we unpack each dimension in depth on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/company/brainsafestandard/.

People in this episode

Host: Andrew Wilmot

Topics covered

  • addictive design
  • cognitive respect
  • BrainSafe Standard
  • interface assessment
  • government action
  • social media
  • pilot program

Keywords

  • addictive design
  • BrainSafe Standard
  • Keir Starmer
  • interface assessment
  • social media
  • cognition
  • government policy

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: UK government, Snapchat, Netflix, Times Tables Rock Stars, Signal, BrainSafe Standard

Places: UK

More episodes of The Dopamine Slot Machine

Explore listener stats, chart rankings, contacts and more on the The Dopamine Slot Machine podcast page.