Posted On February 10, 2014 By In Internet, The Scene

This Website Will Change Your Life: IFTTT.com

 
 
Technically this should be volume two, since Writtalin itself is obviously the #1 website in your life. But alas! Introducing… volume one of This Website Will Change Your Life. This column will introduce you to pages that will help you function more efficiently, stay up-to-date more easily, and most of all, procrastinate.

First website up to bat: IFTTT.com. The acronym stands for “If This, Then That,” and is generally referred to as “ifttt,” pronounced like “gift” without the “g.” IFTTT allows you to command the internet to follow rules that you set up. You connect two actions. If one action occurs, then a second action will occur. The “if” triggers the “then.”

IFTTT refers to itself as a recipe that connects two ingredients, and the ingredients could be almost anything: being tagged in a photo on Facebook, checking in on Foursquare, receiving an email, etc. These actions can span across basically every piece of technology you own that’s connected to this internet, including all of your social media accounts, phone, email addresses, and profiles on websites like Dropbox and the New York Times. For example, a common “recipe” is: IF I’m tagged in a photo on Facebook, THEN text me.

But IFTTT can do more than just give you a heads up when that photo of you making out with the bartender last night makes its way to Facebook. The site offers an entire gallery of popular “recipes” that range from emailing you the weather each morning to notifying you when your country wins a gold medal in the Sochi Olympics.

With IFTTT, the internet is your oyster. Get started by making an account on the site and choosing your ingredients. Before long, you’ll no longer need to log in to multiple accounts every time you need to save a photo to Dropbox, tweet breaking news, or download the latest free audiobook. It’s like having a personal assistant (or as I like to picture it, a million invisible elves) to do the busy work for you.

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Sophie Tahran is a lifestyle writer for Writtalin. Sophie suffers from extreme FOMO. While this results in no sleep or money, it has led to adventures through Asia, Africa, and a tumultuous year of evacuation amidst Egyptian uprisings. Sophie is a California native currently living, eating, and exploring music shows in San Francisco. While she works 9-5 at an art school, she fantasizes about making a living by telling people where to put their commas, semicolons, and apostrophes. You can email Sophie at: [email protected]