Although I struggle with focus myself, I can't help but feel jaded about things like this. To paraphrase some stuff Merlin Mann said, the real issue is seeking out things that you care enough about that you don't need to trick yourself in to staying on track.
This is true. I spent the last week almost completely absorbed in an interesting UI design/implementatiom problem, keeping me online but crazy productive for the time. That, combined with a scuba diving course meant I was practically out of blogs and microblogs the whole week.
But of course sometimes you also have to do the boring stuff, and then tricks like this can help.
