#TIL The sun is a huge high-gain antenna due to gravitational lensing. A hypothetical Voyager 3 can supposedly reach its >= 550 AU focal point in 50 years, which would allow a high-resolution optical scan of an exoplanet, or to receive alien livestreams from Alpha Centauri at 10 Mbps/watt with just a 1-meter telescope. https://arxiv.org/abs/1706.05570https://arxiv.org/abs/2002.11871
Hm, #TIL about the "most widespread security incident in the history of the Web", when in 1999 a security flaw in Hotmail was revealed that permitted anybody to log in to any Hotmail account using the password "eh".
TIL about a quarter of the registered hosts on Airbnb own nearly two thirds of the listings. Wealthy users buying multiple houses to rent out is a significant contributor to the current housing crisis.
TIL - In the 1970s East Germany in effort to create an export invented nearly unbreakable glass. Attempting to export no one wanted a product that doesnt break. 120 million glasses were made before reunification, they are still used 50years later. Today the technology is used to make Gorilla glass.
TIL during the making of Toy Story 2, a technical error nearly erased the entire film and all its assets, however an animator working remotely had a backup copy that rescued it. That animator, Galyn Susman, was laid off earlier this year.
TIL Judith Love Cohen was American aerospace engineer who helped create the Abort-Guidance System that rescued the Apollo 13 astronauts. When she went into labor, she took a printout of her problem to the hospital. She called her boss and said she finished it before giving birth to actor Jack Black.
#til#Baumwolle wird teuer werden, erzählte mir die Verkäuferin im bevorzugten Stoffgeschäft. Ich suchte danach, kaum zu Hause
Laut Prognosen werden bis 2040 die Hälfte der weltweiten Baumwollanbaugebiete von Klimarisiken wie Dürren, Überschwemmungen und Waldbränden betroffen sein.
Über die Hälfte der globalen Baumwollanbaufläche ist auf Regen angewiesen. In den USA und Indien, zwei der größten Produzenten, sind es sogar 65% der Flächen.
Baumwolle wird oft in trockenen Regionen angebaut, die besonders anfällig für Dürren sind. Eine Dürre in Texas führte bereits zu deutlichen Preissteigerungen bei Baumwollprodukten wie Tampons.
Der Klimawandel führt dazu, dass sich die für den Baumwollanbau geeigneten Regionen in Richtung Norden verschieben, wo er bisher nicht üblich war und sich dort erst etablieren muss.
TIL during the 1920 trial of Elmer Fisher for the illegal ownership of alcohol, the jury took 1 of the bottles submitted as evidence when they went to deliberate to make sure that it was whiskey. After some time passed, the jury asked for a 2nd bottle. A short time later, it found Fisher not guilty.
TIL that the reason that Mr. Rogers told viewer that he was feeding his fish as he was doing so was because a five-year-old fan who is blind was concerned that he wasn't, so he wanted to put her mind at ease.
TIL that for centuries, tuberculosis was thought to be hereditary, or caused by malnutrition, harsh climate, etc. It wasn’t until 1865 that French military doctor Jean-Antoine Villemin proved that TB was an infectious disease by inoculating lab rabbits with material from infected humans and cattle
TIL about Dame Jocelyn Bell Burnell, an astrophysicist who discovered pulsars in 1972, had her boss not only take credit for the discovery but also win a Nobel prize for it.
TIL that from 1742 to 1752 the city of Tallin, Estonia, was governed by a former African slave named Abram Gannibal. His grandson, Alexander Pushkin, is considered to be the father of the Russian literature and the greatest Russian poet. Abram's son Ivan Gannibal founded Kherson, Ukraine
TIL Making a living writing books is more or less as rare as becoming a billionaire ( www.theintrinsicperspective.com )