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🔗 1957 German Grand Prix
The 1957 German Grand Prix was a Formula One motor race held on 4 August 1957 at Nürburgring. It was race 6 of 8 in the 1957 World Championship of Drivers. The 22 lap race was won by Juan Manuel Fangio, and is often cited as one of the greatest victories in racing history. It was Fangio's fourth victory out of the seven races in the season contested by Formula 1 cars - excluding the Indianapolis 500, in which only US drivers competed, using USAC Championship cars. Furthermore, due to the number of points he had accumulated in the season (34 to Luigi Musso's 16), his victory at the Nürburgring mathematically clinched Fangio's fifth World Championship title with two races to go. The race was also notable for being Fangio's 24th and last victory in F1; his career still stands as having the highest win percentage ever, with 46.15% of his 52 race entries being wins.
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- "1957 German Grand Prix" | 2019-08-09 | 14 Upvotes 3 Comments
🔗 1593 Transported Soldier Legend
A folk legend holds that in October 1593 a soldier of the Spanish Empire (named Gil Pérez in a 1908 version) was mysteriously transported from Manila in the Philippines to the Plaza Mayor (now the Zócalo) in Mexico City. The soldier's claim to have come from the Philippines was disbelieved by the Mexicans until his account of the assassination of Gómez Pérez Dasmariñas was corroborated months later by the passengers of a ship which had crossed the Pacific Ocean with the news. Folklorist Thomas Allibone Janvier in 1908 described the legend as "current among all classes of the population of the City of Mexico". Twentieth-century paranormal investigators giving credence to the story have offered teleportation and alien abduction as explanations.
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- "In 1593 a soldier of the Spanish Empire was teleported from Manila to Mexico" | 2024-07-02 | 16 Upvotes 4 Comments
- "1593 Transported Soldier Legend" | 2020-10-27 | 67 Upvotes 8 Comments
🔗 WWII: Failed novelist becomes a spy for Germany, makes up a fake spy network
Juan Pujol García (Spanish: [ˈxwan puˈʝol ɣaɾˈθi.a]; 14 February 1912 – 10 October 1988), also known as Joan Pujol i García (Catalan: [ʒuˈan puˈʒɔl i ɣəɾˈsi.ə]), was a Spanish spy who acted as a double agent loyal to Great Britain against Nazi Germany during World War II, when he relocated to Britain to carry out fictitious spying activities for the Germans. He was given the codename Garbo by the British; their German counterparts codenamed him Alaric and referred to his non-existent spy network as "Arabal".
After developing a loathing of political extremism of all sorts during the Spanish Civil War, Pujol decided to become a spy for Britain as a way to do something "for the good of humanity". Pujol and his wife contacted the British Embassy in Madrid, which rejected his offer.
Undeterred, he created a false identity as a fanatically pro-Nazi Spanish government official and successfully became a German agent. He was instructed to travel to Britain and recruit additional agents; instead he moved to Lisbon and created bogus reports about Britain from a variety of public sources, including a tourist guide to Britain, train timetables, cinema newsreels and magazine advertisements.
Although the information would not have withstood close examination, Pujol soon established himself as a trustworthy agent. He began inventing fictitious sub-agents who could be blamed for false information and mistakes. The Allies finally accepted Pujol when the Germans expended considerable resources attempting to hunt down a fictitious convoy. Following interviews by Desmond Bristow of Section V MI6 Iberian Section, Juan Pujol was taken on. The family were moved to Britain and Pujol was given the code name "Garbo". Pujol and his handler Tomás Harris spent the rest of the war expanding the fictitious network, communicating to the German handlers at first by letters and later by radio. Eventually the Germans were funding a network of 27 agents, all fictitious.
Pujol had a key role in the success of Operation Fortitude, the deception operation intended to mislead the Germans about the timing, location and scale of the invasion of Normandy in 1944. The false information Pujol supplied helped persuade the Germans that the main attack would be in the Pas de Calais, so that they kept large forces there before and even after the invasion. Pujol had the distinction of receiving military decorations from both sides of the war – being awarded the Iron Cross and becoming a Member of the Order of the British Empire.
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- "WWII: Failed novelist becomes a spy for Germany, makes up a fake spy network" | 2024-03-08 | 79 Upvotes 41 Comments
🔗 Golden parachutes: Record severance payments at Wikimedia Foundation
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- "Golden parachutes: Record severance payments at Wikimedia Foundation" | 2023-05-22 | 412 Upvotes 394 Comments
🔗 Spaceship Earth
Spaceship Earth (or Spacecraft Earth or Spaceship Planet Earth) is a worldview encouraging everyone on Earth to act as a harmonious crew working toward the greater good.
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- "Spaceship Earth" | 2021-03-14 | 127 Upvotes 95 Comments
- "Spaceship Earth" | 2020-08-23 | 11 Upvotes 3 Comments
🔗 DataHand
The DataHand keyboard was introduced in 1995 by DataHand Systems, Inc. It was invented by Dale J. Retter and was produced by Industrial Innovations as early as 1992. The keyboard consists of two completely separate "keyboards", one for the left hand and one for the right, that are molded to rest the user's hands on. This allows the user to place each hand wherever it is most comfortable to them. Each finger activates five buttons, the four compass directions as well as down. The thumbs also have five buttons, one inside and two outside as well as up and down. The button modules in which the fingers rest are adjustable to best fit the user's hands—each side can be independently moved up and down, towards the palm or farther away.
This ergonomic layout allows for all typing to occur without any wrist motion, as well as without any finger extension. The keyboard layout is initially similar to a QWERTY keyboard, but the middle two columns of keys (i.e. H,Y,G...) have been delegated to sideways finger movements, and all of the keys outside of the main three rows are accessed through two additional modes, including a mode for mousing. There are three primary modes all together: letters, number and symbols, and function / mouse mode. Some practice is required. However, eventual typing speedups are possible.
Also of note is the button design—instead of being spring-loaded, the buttons are held in place with magnets and are activated using optical sensors. This was done in order to dramatically reduce the finger workload while optimizing tactile feedback.
This unconventional keyboard was seen in the Jodie Foster movie Contact (1997) as the pilot's controls for the futuristic spaceship; and the spy movie Stormbreaker (2006). The Industrial Innovations version was featured on the television series Mighty Morphin Power Rangers. A black model is used by Agent Grasso while searching for Amanda Givens' Jeep in Shadow Conspiracy (1997), starring Charlie Sheen.
After the initial prototype was released in 1995, DataHand has released the Professional and Professional II with new bodies. The Professional II also has extended programming capabilities over the Professional, being able to record macros of keystrokes for convenient use.
DataHand Systems, Inc. announced in early 2008 that it was ceasing to market and sell its keyboards. The company web site states that due to supplier issues, the company will not sell the DataHand keyboard "until a new manufacturer can be identified". However, the company plans a final, limited production run to satisfy existing customers. In January 2009, the company's website started taking orders for a "limited number of new DataHand Pro II units".
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- "DataHand" | 2020-01-18 | 81 Upvotes 52 Comments
- "DataHand" | 2014-01-29 | 111 Upvotes 63 Comments
🔗 Stenotype
A stenotype, stenotype machine, shorthand machine or steno writer is a specialized chorded keyboard or typewriter used by stenographers for shorthand use. In order to pass the United States Registered Professional Reporter test, a trained court reporter or closed captioner must write speeds of approximately 180, 200, and 225 words per minute (wpm) at very high accuracy in the categories of literary, jury charge, and testimony, respectively. Some stenographers can reach 300 words per minute. The website of the California Official Court Reporters Association (COCRA) gives the official record for American English as 375 wpm.
The stenotype keyboard has far fewer keys than a conventional alphanumeric keyboard. Multiple keys are pressed simultaneously (known as "chording" or "stroking") to spell out whole syllables, words, and phrases with a single hand motion. This system makes real-time transcription practical for court reporting and live closed captioning. Because the keyboard does not contain all the letters of the English alphabet, letter combinations are substituted for the missing letters. There are several schools of thought on how to record various sounds, such as the StenEd, Phoenix, and Magnum Steno theories.
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- "Stenotype" | 2019-12-18 | 29 Upvotes 18 Comments
🔗 Gödel, Escher, Bach
Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid, also known as GEB, is a 1979 book by Douglas Hofstadter. By exploring common themes in the lives and works of logician Kurt Gödel, artist M. C. Escher, and composer Johann Sebastian Bach, the book expounds concepts fundamental to mathematics, symmetry, and intelligence. Through illustration and analysis, the book discusses how, through self-reference and formal rules, systems can acquire meaning despite being made of "meaningless" elements. It also discusses what it means to communicate, how knowledge can be represented and stored, the methods and limitations of symbolic representation, and even the fundamental notion of "meaning" itself.
In response to confusion over the book's theme, Hofstadter emphasized that Gödel, Escher, Bach is not about the relationships of mathematics, art, and music—but rather about how cognition emerges from hidden neurological mechanisms. One point in the book presents an analogy about how individual neurons in the brain coordinate to create a unified sense of a coherent mind by comparing it to the social organization displayed in a colony of ants.
The tagline "a metaphorical fugue on minds and machines in the spirit of Lewis Carroll" was used by the publisher to describe the book.
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- "Gödel, Escher, Bach" | 2019-11-17 | 56 Upvotes 37 Comments
- "Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid" | 2014-05-16 | 65 Upvotes 72 Comments
🔗 Shave and a Haircut
"Shave and a Haircut" and the associated response "two bits" is a seven-note musical call-and-response couplet, riff or fanfare popularly used at the end of a musical performance, usually for comedic effect. It is used melodically or rhythmically, for example as a door knocker.
"Two bits" is a term in the United States and Canada for 25 cents, equivalent to a U.S. quarter. "Four bits" and "Six bits" are also occasionally used, for example in the cheer "Two bits, four bits, six bits, a dollar." The final words may also be "get lost", "drop dead" (in Australia), or some other facetious expression. In the UK, it was often said as "five bob" (slang for five shillings), although words are now rarely used to accompany the rhythm or the tune.
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- "Shave and a Haircut" | 2024-02-29 | 224 Upvotes 142 Comments
🔗 Doomscrolling
Doomscrolling or doomsurfing is the act of spending an excessive amount of screen time devoted to the absorption of negative news. Increased consumption of predominantly negative news may result in harmful psychophysiological responses in some.
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- "Doomscrolling" | 2022-02-27 | 24 Upvotes 3 Comments