I use Self Control from time to time, too, but I wonder if you've experienced the same problem that I have: namely, that some sites which you haven't blacklisted stop functioning, too. For example, often when I block HN, reddit, and MacRumors, and then visit apple.com, none of the images on apple.com will load. Random other sites that apparently have nothing to do with my block list are often blocked altogether.

Last time I had this problem, I took a look at my Mac's firewall rules, using ipfw, and discovered that several of the IP addresses used in the block list belonged to popular CDNs (e.g., Akamai). This could explain why static assets (like images) on unblocked sites don't load, but I haven't gotten to the bottom of the other issues.

I think, in my case, anyway, a simple /etc/hosts solution would probably work better than Self Control. Anyone know of one, something more elegant than hacking the file by hand?

I use one called "stayfocusd".

It's a chrome plugin that allows me block certain sites. I usually give myself about 10 minutes/day on all of my favorite news sites (including HN).

Got to love that "Shouldn't you be working?" black out page, means more work will be done in those hours. That said I found ways to circumvate the black out page and stepping away from the screen with a notebook and pen in hand is really key to productivity for me.

...isn't this all covered by /etc/hosts ? Seems like reinventing the wheel..

Self control also makes more modifications to your computer than just modifying /etc/hosts, which in turn makes it a lot harder for me to disable than just commenting out the lines in the hosts file, which I could rationalize myself into doing.

Self Control has a timer.

Steve Lambert, author of SelfControl, was our resident artist at our Highschool. Awesome guy :)