Munroe expanded on this in his blag. Apparently the delay comes from a self-enforced rebooting of the computer when task-switching.
An alternative is to disable time wasting internet locations (or games) on your PC and install a VMware virtual machine that is not similarly crippled. That takes enforcement out of your own hands—the VM must be loaded if you wish to use the time wasting features, no willpower required.
That would work for your first use of a time waster, but not for repeated uses, unless you self-enforce to shut down and restart your VMware between uses. That doesn’t buy much in terms of willpower, though it could be useful if rebooting disrupts your work environment.
Munroe expanded on this in his blag. Apparently the delay comes from a self-enforced rebooting of the computer when task-switching.
An alternative is to disable time wasting internet locations (or games) on your PC and install a VMware virtual machine that is not similarly crippled. That takes enforcement out of your own hands—the VM must be loaded if you wish to use the time wasting features, no willpower required.
That would work for your first use of a time waster, but not for repeated uses, unless you self-enforce to shut down and restart your VMware between uses. That doesn’t buy much in terms of willpower, though it could be useful if rebooting disrupts your work environment.
It’s no different than the “analog” method—you still have to self-enforce rebooting every time.
An issue might be that VMs (at least the ones I have) boot significantly faster than my real PC, which harms the disincentive.