How to curb my facebooking?!!

[tektonnic]

Right, I am trying to write my dissertation but certain websites are distracting me, I need the internet whilst I work but I need to filter out certain sites, is there a program i can run to block out myspace and facebook?

It just needs to be something i can turn on and off? is this possible?

I know this sounds ridiculous...! haha!

 

[OwlsAndApples]

Right, I am trying to write my dissertation but certain websites are distracting me, I need the internet whilst I work but I need to filter out certain sites, is there a program i can run to block out myspace and facebook?

It just needs to be something i can turn on and off? is this possible?

I know this sounds ridiculous...! haha!

Haha! it does a bit

Sorry, cannae help, I thought that was just a part of student life...
You could get a Nanny Filter of some sort

 

[fistful]

I believe you can use the parental controls built into the system to block these sites.

 

[Doctor Q]

Rather than use software, you can use informal techniques such as these:

1. Go to Facebook and MySpace, but then minimize the windows. You'll feel like you have the sites open, but you just don't happen to be looking at them at the moment.

2. Set aside a time that you can use Facebook and MySpace. Set an alarm to alert you when it's that time. That lets you use them as a reward, but only once the clock says it's ok. After a time limit, you have to get back to work.

3. Have a friend in charge of checking on you periodically, without notice, and rapping your knuckles with a ruler, or maybe charging you a dollar, if you are on Facebook or MySpace.

As a technical solution, I thought you could prevent your web browser from finding the sites by putting lines like these:

0.0.0.0 www.facebook.com
0.0.0.0 www.myspace.com​

in file /private/etc/hosts (which you can edit in Terminal if you know how), but that trick didn't work for me when I tried it just now. I even tried to flush the cache with the "lookupd -flushcache" command, but that didn't help. I'm puzzled and looking for clues why that didn't work.

 

[devilot]

Give a trusted friend your password. Have him/her change the p/w and stick to a very set time or goal that you must reach before s/he will give you that new password.

That's what I do w/ MR sometimes.

 

[Doctor Q]

Privoxy may be overkill, but it's a free Mac compatible web proxy with a "deny-access" feature that can be used to block particular sites. It's not trivial to configure, i.e., you probably need to read the manual, but perhaps that's good so that after you go to the trouble of setting it up you'll be less tempted to reconfigure it to cheat.