Isn't the point larger than there are certain sites that are timesucks but that in general surfing the internet is counter productive? It's not about whether you are looking at HN, it's whether you're browsing aimlessly.
I have a question: what percent of the time is needed to be online or even just on a computer for doing all the pieces of a web software startup? I'd go with 20%, maybe less. And it would probably work better that way without a browser just a click away, ready to steal countless hours that would make the difference between making progress on a project and learning about HN members' workspaces.
(I have a theory that HN is really a devious ploy by pg to divert the attention of wannabe web entrepreneurs from getting stuff done so that his YCers don't have competition.)
I just wasted 20 minutes looking at that, chuckling, tweeting the link, emailing it to everyone on my contact list and then having short "that was funny, ROTFL" conversations with the people who responded. Thanks a lot, pal.
I am conceptualizing a personal home page that is a version of this but it fetches a task for me to do (from gmail tasks or Things) or it recommends me to read my most recently added boomark to delicious with tag todo. Any ideas on how to do this?
RescueTime comes with a Focus mode and a pre-seeded but configurable list of distracting websites: http://www.rescuetime.com/tour
You don't set hours of the day, but you specify how long you want to "Get Focused". And you can't close the utility via the GUI to keep you honest; it takes a manual SIGTERM to close while in Focus mode.
I've found it very useful, though unfortunately browser support can be flaky. It seems like every major browser release breaks the website tracking and blocking functionality and it takes a few weeks to a few months for the RescueTime utility to catch up. If you don't like using uncommon OS/browser configurations, you'll probably have better luck, though.
I have a question: what percent of the time is needed to be online or even just on a computer for doing all the pieces of a web software startup? I'd go with 20%, maybe less. And it would probably work better that way without a browser just a click away, ready to steal countless hours that would make the difference between making progress on a project and learning about HN members' workspaces.
(I have a theory that HN is really a devious ploy by pg to divert the attention of wannabe web entrepreneurs from getting stuff done so that his YCers don't have competition.)