this post was submitted on 01 Dec 2023
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Memes

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[–] [email protected] 59 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (1 children)

"Dongles per snongle" sounds like a British person measuring the gender ratio at their local pub

[–] [email protected] 5 points 11 months ago

Americans merely adopted the nonsensical measurements. The Brits were born to them.

[–] [email protected] 34 points 11 months ago (4 children)

Reminds me of an app I downloaded the other day to help plan routes. They asked for my cars "KPL".

Like what? Who in the world says KPL? It's l/100KM.

While I'm aware that some places may use KPL, it just seems very American to go "hey, we use MPG, so they must use KPL".

[–] [email protected] 16 points 11 months ago (18 children)

I grew up with km/L.

I don't mind using whatever scale, but it's somewhat better for comparing the numbers that cars actually use, because with l/100km every car is five something or six something.

Also the higher numbers are better like everything else on the car comparison cards.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 11 months ago (2 children)

Yeah maybe it’s just being an American but mpg makes sense in an intuitive way, so kpl sounds like it would be rightish. I’d never guess that people would use l/100km, and I use metric somewhat regularly in my personal life

[–] [email protected] 8 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Guess the difference is what you grew up with and therefore intuitively prefer:

  • allegedly american thinking: This baby sucks X gallons. Let's see how far I can get with it

  • allegedly non-american thanking: I need to drive roughly X 1/2 hundred kilometers, and that will burn that much fuel.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 11 months ago (5 children)

I’d change the American thinking from that to bigger number goes further for same fuel/how many miles til I refuel.

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[–] [email protected] 5 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (4 children)

Fuel consumption makes more math sense, especially when doing mental math comoarisons. Litres per 100km or the newer Gallons per 100miles for USA makes it easier for linear fuel consumption calculations. This quote explains: "The advantage of measuring fuel consumption this way is that it makes comparisons easier as fuel efficiency improves for a specific vehicle. That’s because the differences are linear. With miles per gallon, efficiency is graded on a curve. For example, for a 15-mpg car, a 5-mpg improvement is a 33-percent gain. But that same 5-mpg upgrade for a 30-mpg car is only a 17.5-percent improvement to a vehicle that is already using half as much gas. " With litres per 100km a 5 litre increase is 5 litres regardless of starting fuel consumption.

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[–] [email protected] 3 points 11 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 2 points 11 months ago

We live in a society. You can't just come into a conversation and start using PDF.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 11 months ago

They use KPL in Japan at least, but I doubt the app was Japanese lol

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[–] [email protected] 27 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Dude it's such an easy conversion between dongles and whatsits, you just don't get how intuitive it is. There are 42.48 whatsits in a dongle, and 17.49 dongles in a shlorp. Europeans are overreacting so much

[–] [email protected] 5 points 11 months ago (2 children)

"Europeans" LOL try the rest od the world

[–] [email protected] 10 points 11 months ago (2 children)

I feel like this is part of the the joke because Americans often focus on Europeans when metric comes up. I'm Australian, and I have been assumed to be in Europe a number of times by US internet commenters on the topic haha

[–] [email protected] 3 points 11 months ago (1 children)

There was this one redditor a few years ago who thought I was European because I held different values than him (I'm American). Man am I glad I don't use Reddit anymore

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago

Pretty sure that makes you a dirty commie

[–] [email protected] 3 points 11 months ago (1 children)

You recognize the monarchy, so it's close enough.

/s

[–] [email protected] 3 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

More importantly they participate in Eurovision so really that says it all. I for one welcome our down under cousins to the continent.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 11 months ago

To be fair, Europeans complain the most about it.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 11 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 16 points 11 months ago (5 children)

I prefer to measure speed in football fields per minute.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 11 months ago (3 children)

As an american, It's easier when you convert football fields to watermelons and seconds to no healthcare. One you start thinking in terms of watermelons per crippling medical debt, everything clicks. You're welcome.

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 11 months ago

Wait, when did Michael Cera play Chekov?

[–] [email protected] 8 points 11 months ago

My preference is yeets per feet

[–] [email protected] 5 points 11 months ago

I'm all for the Scott Pilgrim memes

[–] [email protected] 5 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Not everyone here is stupid.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 11 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 4 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (1 children)

Modern tech makes a lot of this irrelevant. I can drive from US into Canada, spend 5 seconds going through my cars settings, and have everything displayed in km, even the km I have left in the tank. It's like when coders use constants in their program, and only have to remember the constant name while the number it represents can change in a config header or something. The program still runs as normal while silently using the new value.

It's not really worth caring about. Not in everyday life. I'd say differently if you were a scientist or engineer. Metric should be the measurement system of all STEM.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 11 months ago

You could do that in old cars too, without even changing anything. A lot of them had a separate ring inside the speedometer showing KPH. But that doesn't mean the person understands the distance when told that their destination is 47 kilometers away and they're accustomed to miles.

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