46 comments

  • marcodiego 33 minutes ago

    I really wonder how well averse conditioning works... maybe I'll try it if it works on firefox and is open source.

    Something I've done on some periods I was fighting my procrastination was to use pomodoro timers and mantras: "Just for today" and "one day at a time". Interestingly, these simple tools worked very very well.

  • ancientstraits 3 hours ago

    This is a very unexpected way to try combatting addiction. I don't know how well it will work, but I will consider it.

    • mordechai9000 2 hours ago

      Negative reinforcement. There's a strategy for smoking where you put a wad of hair in your cigarettes. I used nicotine patches myself, so I can't speak to the efficacy.

      • spoonfeeder006 13 minutes ago

        There's also Allen Carr's books about treating addiction, and they don't use negative reinforcement, at least the ones I've read

        Rather it helps you learn to recognize the fallacies behind the addictive cravings themselves, and to thus resolve the core of why you turn to that in the first place

        Still have to make the decision to recall those in the moment, but when you do you do neutralize the cravings

        His first book was Easy Way to Stop Smoking

        For digital addiction there's Smart Phone, Dumb Phone

        For internet porn there's easypeasymethod.org (based on EasyWay to Stop Smoking)

      • 3PS 17 minutes ago

        Nit: that's not what negative reinforcement means. Negative reinforcement is about removing a negative stimulus, like inducing someone to go to a desirable website by improving their initially bad text contrast whenever they go there.

        In this case, jumpscaring yourself would just be considered punishment (or "positive punishment").

      • thfuran 2 hours ago

        As someone who has smelled burning hair, it at least sounds plausible. On the other hand, cigarette smoke already doesn't smell good.

        • yapyap 2 hours ago

          people who smoke on the daily have already tuned out cigarette smoke mentally, the burning hair however is rancid to anyone.

          • junon 31 minutes ago

            Definitely not always true. I smoke, I hate it, I've tried to quit several times. The smoke smell has never repulsed me but I find it to smell terrible. Many people I know who smoke are the same.

            It's a constant reminder that you're killing yourself for miniscule amounts of Feel Good chemicals at a time.

            • t-3 6 minutes ago

              I've always enjoyed the smell of tobacco smoke. It's nowhere near as astringent and repulsive as woodsmoke and good tobacco often has a nice nearly floral scent or a sweet smell. The taste and the tearing up my throat and making my breath bad and the expense are all things I can do without though.

              Does anyone else get seasonal nicotine cravings? In the warmer months, I don't even think about smoking unless I drink, but in winter I often can't sleep for craving a cigarette, even when it's been literally years since the last one.

        • danielbln an hour ago

          Cigarette smoke is vile, but burned hair is another level.

          • Tade0 an hour ago

            To that I raise: crude oil

            Unbelievable how its products separately don't smell nearly as bad.

  • duxup 14 minutes ago

    The animation on the home page does a great job giving you all you want to know.

    Granted it's a simple app but I wish other apps were as easy to understand.

  • throwup238 44 minutes ago

    I really hope that the demo video on the frontpage uses the referrer (referer?) HTTP header to select the URL!

    I bet you can do that with Chrome’s puppeteer and cache the domain to optimize it. You won’t get the personalized pages of Facebook et al but it would be really fun.

    The name is genius.

  • aceazzameen 5 minutes ago

    I love the name and idea. Bravo!

  • telesilla an hour ago

    Oh warning please! I got a demo jumpscare and almost had a household of very upset kids from the scream and my almost-heart attack reaction. Well done!

    For those with stronger stomachs this is a fantastic idea.

    • nickvec a few seconds ago

      I'd say the tagline of "add random jumpscares to sites you're trying to avoid" is a fair warning of what the demo entails.

  • jmkd an hour ago

    I have absolutely no use for this, but the name oh my god!

  • iammrpayments 3 hours ago

    Combat addiction with PTSD

    • chrislongss 2 hours ago

      I know this is a joke, but iirc there used to be certain procedures that would surgically implant something physically harmful into an addicts arm to scare them into soberness. Like a capsule maybe?.. Can't remember the details. And if the person were to start drinking alcohol again, the capsule would break down and release a chemical into their bloodstream.

    • mariopt 2 hours ago

      Not really, MeatSpin is missing

  • ashton314 2 hours ago

    I love that the example video shows someone adding HN to the jump-scare list. I should probably do that…

  • IncreasePosts 2 hours ago

    A fun idea, but I am so hesitant to install extensions that have access to any URL. I don't know who this developer is, so how can I know they won't accept $10k to sell their extension to some malware group that will try to exfil all of my banking credentials after updating this extension?

    • CobrastanJorji an hour ago

      It's worse. Even if you DO know and trust the developer, in a year or two, they're probably going to get an email from a nice man who will want to buy their extension for $10,000, and they've long gotten bored of it, so why not?

      • ok_dad an hour ago

        I would hope that these days the popular extension devs would know about this type of attack and would guard against it by perhaps selling the extension code but shutting down the original extension page under their control so users have to choose to install the new company's extension. As a matter of fact, why won't Google/Mozilla prevent this by making an extension and a person's account inseparable, and have legal language in the ToS that says they can't sell the extension as-is with the install base to a new company? It would prevent so much.

        • alasarmas an hour ago

          I remember reading somewhere that, in times long past, if a company name was of the form “Johnson and Sons” (for example), it would be considered fraud to sell that company outside of the named family.

          I personally think you’re on to something with tying companies to the reputation of specific natural persons, but I don’t think that is where we are going anytime soon.

    • patrickhogan1 2 hours ago

      This is a good point and I haven’t read the manifest as I’m in a bit of a rush. Chrome did do a lot of work improving the manifest for conditions like this in v3. I know with webRequest you have to specify urls but not sure if there is a separation of duties here in terms of

      1. Permission to operate on any url page loaded locally and being able to modify the html/insert html like the clown image

      2. Being able to webRequest http outbound to <any_url> where you could exfiltrate data.

      I thought there was a way to insert html into any loaded page without having access to send outbound network requests.

      If that is the case that it’s separate if the chrome extension were to be sold and the manifest were changed to allow nefarious behavior you would know.

    • renewiltord 2 hours ago

      This is quite the problem with the chrome extension ecosystem. It is rife with malware. How does someone build an extension that can promise better behaviour. There doesn’t seem to be a way to restrict oneself.

      Even manifest changes aren’t “scary enough”.

    • moralestapia an hour ago

      Easy solution. Don't install it.

  • taeric 19 minutes ago

    I haven't laughed so hard at a story headline in a long time. Kudos and thanks for that!

  • ants_everywhere 2 hours ago

    What if it just makes me addicted to jump scares? :-P

  • Willingham 3 hours ago

    Also works great for low blood pressure issues

  • valorzard 2 hours ago

    Five Nights at Freddie's - browser extension mode

  • BJones12 2 hours ago

    Great name, with two accurate meanings. TabBoo -> taboo, tab boo

  • Cortex5936 2 hours ago

    I love the idea ! Is there also a way to make sure you cannot remove these types of extensions ? Something open source and not sketchy that makes it possible to either set a password (that you'll not save) or be removed only if you reinstall the browser. Something to this liking ?

    • chippiewill 2 hours ago

      I don't think any browser vendor would expose an API to allow this.

      I think the best you could manage is a system administrative profile that forces the browser to install the extension

  • d3rockk 2 hours ago

    Babe wake up, new hacker prank just dropped.

  • msobriquet 2 hours ago

    oh my god is there a firefox version?

  • Funes- an hour ago

    This is getting ridiculous.

  • nottorp 2 hours ago

    I wonder if a kitty or puppy of diabetes inducing cuteness would have the same effect.

  • djtango 3 hours ago

    Love this.

    The example wasn't scary enough but it's pretty fun

  • unethical_ban 2 hours ago

    This is so goofy, I assume the clever name was the genesis of the idea. Old school, off-the-wall.

  • Tepix 2 hours ago

    Great, can we please have it for Firefox, too?

  • yapyap 2 hours ago

    love it

  • yumraj 2 hours ago

    Only for Chrome?