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You know you do it. You have those URLs that you save in your bookmarks for the websites you hate. You know you shouldn’t do it. You know your hate-reading actually supports the websites you loathe… but fuck. It’s so hard! Self-control, man. I don’t have it. Do you?
When it comes to hate-reading though, there’s an easy technical solution that can save you from yourself: browser-based URL blockers. There are a ton of options for this, but my personal favorite is one called StayFocusd, which you can use to block any time-wasted website. Let’s be honest though: wasting time is one thing. Goading yourself into a sneak hate-spiral by reading a website that you KNOW you hate, that you KNOW makes you angry? That’s straight up flank-biting. It’s bad for your soul.
Using a browser-based extension like StayFocusd forces you to think twice before you dip your toe into the loathing and intellectual self-harm that is hate-reading. For me at least, having to think twice is usually all it takes. (Your mileage may vary, of course.)
There are similar extensions for Firefox (BlockSite) and Safari (WasteNoTime). If you use Internet Explorer… I’M SORRY! *snork* Just kidding! You don’t even need an extension, you can use built-in parental control tools to parent yourself.
Oh, and if you REALLY need to save yourself? Consider the internet kill-switch.
I need to check this out when I am home on chrome and off the ancient IE….which will be gone soon 🙂
…is it weird to be excited to see websites as they should look since well only maybe hipsters still use IE 7 with how ancient it is in technology years?
You’re up to IE7? Wow, we’re still on 6 at work 😛
Correction actually it might be 6…the one when tabs were first introduced. I can’t keep track of all the versions of software since it’s all behind in varying stages.
I’m lucky enough to work four 9-hour days M-F, so I try to designate my weekday off (which varies) as my chores-doing day. I figure if I’m working 4 hours less than my fiance, I could at least do 4 hours more a week chores than him. I could really use something like these products to keep me off of Candy Crush. (Now to find a time-based app-blocker…)
This is extreme, but I recently switched to doing most of my writing on a typewriter, in VERY large part to stop myself from browsing the internet when I really NEED to be editing that short story for my writer’s group/working on my poetry/writing a letter to a friend.
If I leave my smartphone across the house, this actually works for me. And it’s the only thing that does.
Why you no tell me this before I spend two years trapped in a room writing my dissertation!?!
I wonder if writing a dissertation can be considered a form of masochism? *she asked with a half laugh and half sob*
I found LeechBlock, a plug-in for Firefox, to be very helpful in keeping me off distraction sites while studying for my medical boards! You can set it to either block entirely during certain hours, or to block once a cumulative amount of time (ex: 30 minutes) has been spent on said sites during blocking hours. LOVED it. Plus, severely limiting my interneting (seriously, I was only un-blocked from any and all social media and shopping between 10:30pm and 7am) AND having the internet only available during times when I’d much rather be sleeping meant that what little internet time I did spend, I made sure to make it count. No hate reading for me!
I’ve been using StayFocused for a while now for school. I love it.
Additionally, we had an issue for a while where my fiance’s sister and her fiancee were living with us and not looking for jobs despite frequent promises that they would (I checked the browser history and discovered that in a week’s time, they had looked at job stuff for a total of 2 minutes, and at that, that was only when I snapped at them). After that I installed Stayfocused on all computers in the house (they did not own their own). It was a lifesaver for my sanity.
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