Brick for desktop
You want a Brick for your computer
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The short answer
Brick is a physical NFC tag. You tap your phone against it to block apps, and you have to tap it again to unblock them — so the off switch lives on a piece of plastic instead of in a menu. There is no way to tap a Brick with a desktop computer.
Talysman is the desktop version of that trade. It blocks distracting websites and desktop applications on Windows, macOS and Linux, and ending a focus session early requires a paired USB drive to be physically plugged into the machine. Leave the drive in another room and the session outlives your motivation. Nothing to buy and nothing to wait for in the mail — any drive in your desk drawer can be the key.
What the tap becomes on a desktop
The same bargain, made with a USB port instead of an NFC tag. Here is the whole interaction.
- Pair
Plug in any USB drive. Talysman lists the removable drives it can see, you pick one, and it becomes a key for this computer. Pair a second drive as a spare if you want.
- Start
Choose what to block — websites, desktop apps, or everything except a short allow list — and start a focus session.
- Unplug
Take the drive out and put it somewhere that costs you a walk. Another room, a drawer downstairs, your car.
- Relapse
Forty minutes in, the work gets hard and you click End session. Talysman asks the background service to check for a paired key. There isn't one plugged in, so focus stays on.
- Decide
You either go get the drive — deliberately, on your feet, awake — or you go back to work. In practice most people go back to work.
That is the entire mechanism. It is not clever and it is not trying to be: the point is that the cheapest available action at the moment of weakness is finishing the sentence you were writing.
Phone tag versus desktop key
Two takes on the same insight, aimed at different machines.
| Brick | Talysman | |
|---|---|---|
| Where it blocks | Your phone | Your Windows, macOS or Linux computer |
| The physical object | An NFC tag you buy | A USB drive you already own |
| How you unblock | Tap the tag with your phone | Plug the drive into the computer |
| What gets blocked | Apps and sites on the phone | Websites and desktop applications, including the browsers you didn't install the extension in |
| If you left it behind | Blocked until you go get it | Blocked until you go get it |
| Cost to start | Buy the tag, wait for delivery | Free for 5 blocked sites, no card |
Talysman isn't affiliated with Brick, and this compares the two mechanisms rather than two feature lists — check their site for what Brick does today. The two also aren't mutually exclusive. If your phone is the problem and your computer is the problem, they solve different halves of it.
Why a desktop blocker has more doors to close
A phone is a locked-down appliance. A computer is not, which is why blocking on one takes more than an app.
Quitting the app can't lift the block
Enforcement runs in a privileged background service, not in the window you see. Closing Talysman changes nothing, and killing the service just makes it start again.
Rebooting isn't an escape hatch
Session state is written to protected storage and the service starts with the machine. You come back to the session you left.
Uninstalling is key-gated too
The uninstaller refuses to remove the service while a focus session is running unless a paired key is present.
A second browser isn't a loophole
Chrome and Firefox get the extension. During a locked session, browsers without it are closed rather than left standing open as the obvious way around.
Desktop apps count as distractions
Discord, Steam and the rest are blocked as apps, not just as tabs. On a computer, the tab is only half the problem.
What a key can't do
Anyone with administrator rights on their own machine can eventually force their way past any blocker, this one included. We aren't going to pretend otherwise. The goal is to make cheating cost more effort than doing the work — a walk down the hall beats an impulse, and that turns out to be enough on the ordinary Tuesday when the task is just boring.
If you want the version that even the key can't end, mark a scheduled window locked. It releases on its own when the window is over, and nothing else ends it early. That's opt-in, and you should mean it.
Frequently asked questions
Do I have to buy hardware?
No. Any USB drive you already own works. Talysman identifies it by the hardware serial or volume ID it already reports, so normally nothing is written to the drive at all — and the drive keeps working as a normal drive.
Can I use one drive for several computers?
Yes. Pair the same drive on each machine. Each computer keeps its own list of paired keys, so one drive can unlock your laptop and your desktop.
What if I lose the drive?
Pair a spare now and keep it somewhere safe — any paired drive unlocks, so losing one isn't a lockout. You can pair as many as you like.
Does it block my phone too?
No. Talysman is desktop-only: Windows 10 and 11, macOS on Apple Silicon and Intel, and Debian/Ubuntu Linux, with extensions for Chrome and Firefox. If the phone is your main problem, a phone-first tool is the honest answer for that half. See the downloads.
Put the off switch in another room
Pair a drive you already own, start a session, and find out what happens when you try to quit.
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