Ending the year with pure excitement can put a bit of pressure on content creators who are trying to please their followers. One of them is YouTuber Alex Apollonov of I Did A Thing. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EOy0f_fGKAg&ab_channel=Ididathing With the pure intent to connect more with his subscribers, he did what any self-respecting content creator would do – he solicited some ideas from his fans and tried his best to produce them. First was a treadmill belt sander. Treadmill Belt Sander The project was easy enough for Alex. He just replaced the running belt of an old treadmill with a custom-fit roll of sandpaper. This process directly turned the treadmill into a functional…

You’re either a Lord of The Rings fan or a Harry Potter fan. There is no “both” or “neither”; magic fans only deal in absolutes. That said, this LEGO-domino creation by Lily Hevesh is for the Harry Potter stans. Released last June to coincide with LEGO Harry Potter’s 20th anniversary, this hodgepodge combined 25,000 dominoes with the new LEGO Harry Potter set into a giant screen link. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pkPEONmNdyY&ab_channel=WizardingWorld According to Lily, a screen link is a video editing trick where multiple shots are made to look connected. Using a similar red and gold color scheme for the dominoes and LEGOs helps sell the illusion that the single line continues throughout the 3-minute video. Multiple Harry Potter scenes can…

Whether you are the best boy scout in town or just regular folk, it’s always good to know at least one good knot that can keep things tied together. YouTuber FIRST CLASS AMATEUR has a ton of valuable tips and tricks videos you can use in your daily life, but arguably one of the most helpful is this tutorial on making a panic knot: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HaCg4FOQH_A&ab_channel=FIRSTCLASSAMATEUR Panic knots are fastenings you can tie when strapped for time and don’t know which one to make. They’re easy to remember and can be handy in a pinch. Most importantly, they are just as secure as some complex knots. The panic knot First Class Amateur teaches…

Even without a medical degree, the healthiest thing you can provide others has to be water. Forget all that chia seed and kale nonsense: you won’t survive a week without water. With this mindset, Kara Pure has got to be one of the healthiest things you can invest in. It’s a water harvester, purifier, and dehumidifier all in one. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dz201BcZwa8&ab_channel=KaraWater Like any water harvester, Kara Pure takes in surrounding water vapor and condenses it into drinkable H₂O. Depending on the humidity, it can make up to 2.5 gallons (10 liters) of water a day. But before water can be dispensed through the middle of the machine, it undergoes a ton of filtration.…

My eyes light up at anything with a sleek design, so you can bet they were as wide as golf balls when I saw that square tube knife by YouTube knife maker Koss: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x_M-ChNcArg&ab_channel=Koss Koss used 01 high carbon alloy steel (non-shrinking steel which hardens in oil) for the blade of his project. He started shaping it by cutting out a rectangle-shaped piece and using his belt sander to cut out the knife edge. Shaping the Knife Interestingly, he used the natural shape of the metal as a guide to making the knife. One edge of the rectangle was given a blade curve, while the opposite edge became the spine. The…

While I’ve written about my fair share of dangerous products, none of them are inherently made to harm people. That changes right now, as science man and YouTuber Steve Mould covered an assassin teapot too cool to pass up. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJL0XoNBaac&ab_channel=SteveMould Originating in China, the assassin’s teapot was made to poison your enemies. It does this using two hidden chambers: one housing your standard drinkable drink and another holding your enemies’ just desserts (in drink form, of course). Each chamber has a hidden hole somewhere near the teapot’s handle. To pour a specific drink out, you need to keep the hole connected to the chamber uncovered. You’ll want to keep your finger over…