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Proposal: Lifehacks

What isn't a "life hack"?

Moreover, what space would "life hacks" fill that Personal Productity, Philosophy, Super User and Personal Productivity do not?

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    This is the question that will bring down this proposal I believe. Everyone has their interests/concerns. Specific interests/concerns will lead to specific SE sites and those interests/concerns with enough people sharing and caring about them will carry them over. I can't see how you're going to get a significant groundswell for Miscellaneous.SE.
    – Geoff Pointer
    Feb 12, 2014 at 1:04
  • Your Web Applications link goes to Personal Productivity
    – Zach Saucier
    Oct 14, 2014 at 13:26
  • Now that the site has been in beta for some time, it's become all too clear that the answer to "What isn't a life hack?" is "Any good solution to a problem".
    – Jason C
    Mar 17, 2017 at 1:34

5 Answers 5

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What isn't a "life hack"?

Good question, but has no answer.
Alternatively try to answer: What isn't "math" and/or "philosophy"?)
(and remove all other forums of SE ;)

What space would "life hacks" fill?

Yes the sites you mentioned cover a part of life hacks. However, there is a sort of questions which don't fit on the sites you mentioned.
Examples:
How to reduce eye strain?
How to easily win an argument?
How to stay awake at night effectively?
...and so on

So the site can contain such interesting questions about very different things in life, which don't fit on another sites.

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    So ergonomics and psychology?
    – virtualxtc
    Jun 6, 2014 at 17:59
  • If it's impossible to decide what isn't a life hack (and therefore is off topic), this site will close as a duplicate of other sites.
    – Cullub
    Nov 7, 2014 at 13:12
  • There are words that doesn't make sence at the end of your post. They are: "another sites".
    – Rikri
    Nov 23, 2014 at 9:42
  • How is it a good question, if it has no answer? In life, this would be possible. On SE, all good questions have answers. We should find out what the answer is.
    – Mast
    Dec 1, 2014 at 13:39
  • How to pass my math test.
    – tox123
    Dec 2, 2014 at 0:32
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That's a good question and we don't actually know the answer. I'd strongly suggest looking at the recently closed Life Improvement proposal. Figuring out what would be off-topic would be very useful for the future of this proposal.

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  • @virtualxtc: I've undeleted that post for you. Sorry about the trouble.
    – Jon Ericson
    May 27, 2014 at 15:03
  • so, the example questions are still missing, thus I'd recommend copying over the relevant details of why Life Improvement was closed. (Also I cannot change my vote until your answer is edited)
    – virtualxtc
    Jun 6, 2014 at 18:03
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What this proposal needs are example question that are bad because they are off-topic. And I don't mean off-topic just because there exists another site that already covers them, that would just turn this in a "everyting that doesn't fit in other sites" site. That is what would help to define the site adequately.

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Let me try to provide a better, more discrete answer to this question, one that also hopefully addresses some of the concerns raised above. Again referring to wikipedia, the key concept when it comes to Lifehacks is ingenious, inspired solutions to everyday problems. The distinction here between Lifehacks and Personal Productivity, to put it succinctly, is something along the lines of, Personal Productivity questions are about things you could probably list on your résumé, Lifehacks questions are about things you probably couldn't. So to answer the main question directly: if it's not about an everyday problem, it isn't a “life hack.”

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Shouldn't there be a general community for just questions about life that don't immediately fit in one obvious, narrowly-defined SE site? There ought to be a General site, where questions which are off-topic to everything else can be moved to, yes? I mean, it's similar to Personal Productivity, but whereas Personal Productivity is basically only about lifehacks for your life's “output quality,” so to speak, this site would be about lifehacks for your life's “internal quality,” I suppose, or overall quality? Personal Productivity is too narrow of a topic. Or, to put it another way, think of it like this: Parenting is about taking care of your children, Lifehacks is about taking care of yourself.

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    No, stack exchange is not the place for general and broad questions. I think making a hard distinction between "output quality" and "internal quality" might make a good dividing line, however, a lot of personal productivity magic comes from deciding what not to do based on your personal feelings about what you want to do with your self/life, and thus it's hard to divide the two subjects so strictly.
    – virtualxtc
    Nov 2, 2014 at 22:24
  • Well, that is why I gave several different points of view, because different users will have different ranges of opinions about what does and doesn't belong. In any event, I would agree that “output quality” and “internal quality” might make a good dividing line between what belongs in Personal Productivity and what belongs in Lifehacks. Though I would strongly argue that if Parenting is within the purview of what belongs as a SE site, then some form of “self-care” topic should be too.
    – Josh Zmijewski
    Nov 3, 2014 at 15:56
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    You should also make a solid definition of internal and external, etc.
    – Cullub
    Nov 7, 2014 at 13:15
  • Yes, true. And I welcome everyone's input, I alone don't necessarily know the answers to all of these questions. I would define external as something that contributes towards a large, concrete goal, (Personal Productivity) like how do I finish writing a book, or get a new job; whereas internal is something more minor or less tangible, (Lifehacks) like the question I already saw, how do I win any argument, or make my tea or coffee drinking experience more enjoyable? Etc.
    – Josh Zmijewski
    Nov 8, 2014 at 11:19

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