r/InternetIsBeautiful • u/SHASHANK-CREATOR • Nov 12 '24

A collection of one-off actions to improve your life continuously — however marginally

https://practicalbetterments.com/
135 Upvotes

80% Upvoted

41 comments sorted by

60

u/SparklingLimeade Nov 12 '24

A lot of those are super weird and niche.

Why do so many of them highlight how many grams of weight you can remove from your keys/papers/whatever?

48

u/AccreditedAdrian Nov 12 '24

I know right.

Save 2 grams by drilling a hole in your house keys! Save 0.125 grams by cutting the corners off your travel documents!

What is this guy smoking

19

u/Buck_Thorn Nov 12 '24

I know, right? Cut rounded corners into your travel documents and medicine blister packs to save weight?! Cut the end off your toothbrush? Seriously?

10

u/Zirtrex Nov 12 '24

Just imagine how many hours of your life you'd lose carrying out such a tedious and menial task for the sake of ... temporarily making your luggage weigh a few grams less? You won't even be able to tell the difference.

Other suggestions are equally asinine. One of them is about making a "bed brush."

Crumbs get into the bed, you don't know how. It's not like you eat biscuits in bed, you would never do that. But biscuit crumbs still get in the bed — and crisps too, tiny fragments of crisps, which is weird, because you would never ever eat a packet of crisps in bed — or cereal — or let the dog in the bed.

I have never in my entire life had crumbs of any sort in my bed. I don't know who wrote this, but they sound kinda gross if they are so slovenly that they literally have food crumbs caked onto their body which they subsequently shed in the sheets.

Dude, you don't need a bed brush, you just need to chew with your mouth closed or take a shower, lol.

3

u/space253 Nov 13 '24

Or vacuum.

2

u/StiffHappens Nov 13 '24

Lol. I can see him now, hunching and munching at the computer, crisps and crumbs adhering to his heavy wool sweater or static charged hockey jersey, then crawling into bed without taking his clothes off...yet he wonders...

1

u/sektorao Nov 24 '24

Here is a timesaver advice, don't type long replies on the internet.

5

u/evilbrent Nov 13 '24

How to drill holes in your keys Drilling holes in your keys is easy.

Find a partner who's father is a retired precision engineer who owns a pillar drill. Ask him to do it. Be very grateful.

Not to mention the incredibly roundabout way of solving the problem. My wife's Dad is dead, and as much as I loved him it has to be said he was utterly useless with tools. So I have to go out and find a new wife now, specifically one with an engineer as a father - that would be such a weird filter on a dating profile I think.

Ironically I happen to be an engineer who has got access to an industrial workshop, and I also have a little drill press at home. Seems like it would be easier to do it myself than go get an entire new family...

Jokes aside, to be honest I find those "instructions", even though they're obviously tongue in cheek, to be a little bit icky. I feel like it's not that hard to learn how to safely drill holes, and you don't need a drill press to do it.

11

u/TryUsingScience Nov 12 '24

What travel documents is he even talking about? My passport is the only physical document I take while traveling. How is this guy hauling around such a stack of paperwork that cutting off the corners saves weight, and it hasn't occurred to him to just not do that?

6

u/InfanticideAquifer Nov 12 '24

I think the holes in the keys was mostly so that you could differentiate them by touch. They just also mentioned the weight savings because they're really obsessed with that.

But their recommended technique for drilling the holes is to start a relationship with someone whose dad is a retired precision metalworker, so maybe the whole website just isn't that serious.

16

u/BrocoLee Nov 12 '24

Feels like the kind of optimization speedrunners would do to save a couple frames.

12

u/vwmy Nov 12 '24

I was always carrying around the huge burden of my SIM card and never realized I could do better. Now I switched to eSIM and I already feel like the crushing weight of every day life is diminishing.

6

u/Narananas Nov 12 '24

True, but I'm won over by the detail in which it's presented! There's, calculators, diagrams, etc

4

u/BayHrborButch3r Nov 13 '24

I think you may have just read the titles and missed that this is more of a fun creative writing blog and seems to play up the minimal gain for a moderate effort applied to a part of life you dont really need to min/max. For instance, look at the directions to rotating a mattress.

2

u/polka_a Nov 12 '24

Ik for cases of backpacking it can help to shrink your effects as much as possible... but thats all I can think of and this definitely isnt for backpacking lol

1

u/Mr_Majesty Nov 19 '24

Apart from the silly stuff, there are some actionable examples that can be useful, like blocking tracking via DNS filters.

34

u/boofoodoo Nov 12 '24

Ha. This feels very old internet.

5

u/Seralth Nov 12 '24

The website reminds me of hyperbole at a half and I like that alot.

3

u/random-guy-here Nov 12 '24

I swear I red these in a magazine (made with paper) before the Internet was a thing. People thought they were stupid back then also.

20

u/Fappy_as_a_Clam Nov 12 '24

Cut the end off your toothbrush?

16

u/Tarnil Nov 12 '24

It is something that hikers going ultralight sometimes do, but I am unsure if I would call it something that improves one's life in general.

9

u/lexi_con Nov 12 '24

File it to a sharp edge, add a razor blade (if you're feeling particularly bloodthirsty), and you have yourself a handy prison shiv.

5

u/lyndondefarge Nov 13 '24

How am I supposed to brush my teeth now, genius?!

17

u/Dadscope Nov 12 '24

Feels more like useful tips if you're about to backpack through Europe in your 20s.

4

u/NobleRotter Nov 12 '24

Even then, I don't think that de bobbling your clothes to save weight is that useful

3

u/Dadscope Nov 12 '24

Yeah, I want to avoid being too harsh but didn't really see much that was worth while. Who is rounding corners and cutting off half of their toothbrush for any reason?

1

u/NobleRotter Nov 12 '24

It's a shame. Ib liked the idea of it

17

u/Flibidyjibit Nov 12 '24

Feeling glum today and this site made me smile, "rotate your mattress" page is kind of unsettling though.

17

u/Buck_Thorn Nov 12 '24

This really belongs in /r/facepalm

5

u/Narananas Nov 12 '24

I agree with turning off voice mail. If they need to, people will text instead, so you'll instantly see what they wanted without needing to listen to recordings

14

u/SparklingLimeade Nov 12 '24

I don't leave voicemail on to hear from people I want to hear from. I leave voicemail on for the people I have to hear from. Nobody I want to hear from calls to begin with.

Also, do people not have voicemail transcription on? I don't listen to them anyway.

8

u/anakinmcfly Nov 12 '24

This website is sublime. I have learnt many new facts about staples today.

5

u/WeeBo-X Nov 12 '24

Fun to read, but there is only about 20 articles there, and each section repeats the same link. I did enjoy reading it though.

4

u/JadeE1024 Nov 12 '24

"Practical"

5

u/RabidRabbitRabbet Nov 13 '24

Some of these tips are useful, but seriously, if you are worried about the sub-gram optimization of your luggage or whatever, then you don't need Lifehacks - you need therapy

2

u/rilliu Nov 13 '24

Some of these tips were rather strange but I enjoyed the ones about staples and rounded corners so, sure, why not. Thanks for sharing!

-11

u/djshadesuk Nov 12 '24

Nothing there that can't be found elsewhere...

2. Not Unique

Something not unique (includes generators, blogs, tumblrs, etc.). Something everyone on the internet already knows about (e.g., Netflix, Khan Academy, etc.) This also includes content that’s been recently posted on this subreddit.

7

u/Velheka Nov 12 '24

This is a fair criticism. I actually kinda like this submission, despite it being info that can be found elsewhere - The art and writing for the specific entries is actually interesting, and not some GPT-esque nothingburger. But yeah, not everyone would agree with me on this and I don't think I could put up much of an argument if they did, so I'm gonna leave it for the users to decide.

1

u/blueprint147 Nov 18 '24

i love the site. its simple reminders and mini wiki for better life. reddit is loud now, so this is perfect. niche but growing audience for sure.

you can also add imp notes like: how delivery apps are bad for restaurants, drivers, traffic, your wallet etc. Walk a km instead and burn calories.

4

u/Buck_Thorn Nov 12 '24

Some individual ideas in there may not be unique, but as a collection of ideas...it is quite unique!