Author Topic: Your Wikipedia find of the week  (Read 58584 times)

Cudzoziemiec

  • Solar powered, tea fuelled cycle-wol
Re: Your Wikipedia find of the week
« Reply #25 on: January 29, 2011, 12:04:44 am »
D. B. Cooper - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I was slightly too young to remember this.  What a story, and what a mystery.
I learnt about this when I started working in the wonderful world of DVD subtitling. It was given as an example of a reference which may be known to its original target audience but needs explaining or replacing for localisation purposes.
"Pick a flower on Earth and you move the farthest star." Dirac.

Charlotte

  • Dissolute libertine
  • Here's to ol' D.H. Lawrence...
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Commercial, Editorial and PR Photographer - www.charlottebarnes.co.uk

clarion

  • Tyke
Re: Your Wikipedia find of the week
« Reply #27 on: April 10, 2011, 10:18:25 pm »
I have learned something new.
Getting there...

robbo6

Re: Your Wikipedia find of the week
« Reply #28 on: April 10, 2011, 10:46:01 pm »
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tama_(cat)
Sod electrification, lower fares, etc. Pussy increases rail use.

Pingu

  • Put away those fiery biscuits!
  • Mrs Pingu's domestique
    • the Igloo

Cudzoziemiec

  • Solar powered, tea fuelled cycle-wol
Re: Your Wikipedia find of the week
« Reply #30 on: April 10, 2011, 11:42:52 pm »
They played that at a school I taught in in Poland. That is, I taught in the school premises, but my 'pupils' were actually teachers on INSETT rather kids, so I never got to actually see a korfball match. I think the hook for teens was "the only mixed sex team sport".
"Pick a flower on Earth and you move the farthest star." Dirac.

Jules

  • Has dropped his aitch!
Re: Your Wikipedia find of the week
« Reply #31 on: April 27, 2011, 08:20:31 am »
They played that at my son's primary in Twickenham. If I recall there's a UK league but as it doesn't have many members so the team used to have to travel a long way to away fixtures
Audax on the other hand is almost invisible and thought to be the pastime of Hobbits ....  Fab Foodie

a lower gear

  • Carmarthenshire - "Not ALWAYS raining!"
Re: Your Wikipedia find of the week
« Reply #32 on: April 27, 2011, 10:27:22 pm »
A friend from university days played in the UK korfball team in the early or  mid 1990s (maybe this belongs in the 'your tenuous claims to fame' thread?)

Re: Your Wikipedia find of the week
« Reply #33 on: July 23, 2011, 10:33:00 am »
According to the page for "scone", the bakery product:

Quote
The dispute in pronuncation is said to have lain at the heart of the enmity between Gordon Brown and Tony Blair, with Brown adopting the traditional Scottish pronunciation and Blair pronouncing it as if it was the Stone of Scone. Memoranda from Tony Blair's office published in the Daily Telegraph in June 2011 were annotated by Gordon Brown and Ed Balls with scone related comments.

I wonder how much of this is true.
Never tell me the odds.

Andrij

  • Андрій
  • Ερασιτεχνικός μισάνθρωπος
Re: Your Wikipedia find of the week
« Reply #34 on: July 28, 2011, 08:51:06 pm »
In the 1920s some people proposed draining the Mediterranean Sea.  :o

Atlantropa
 
 
;D  Andrij.  I pronounce you Complete and Utter GIT   :thumbsup:

Re: Your Wikipedia find of the week
« Reply #35 on: July 29, 2011, 11:50:15 am »
In the 1920s some people proposed draining the Mediterranean Sea.  :o

Atlantropa

How on Earth does someone with such a grandiose and barking scheme manage to stay out of the loony bin?
[Quote/]Adrian, you're living proof that bandwidth is far too cheap.[/Quote]

Mr Larrington

  • A bit ov a lyv wyr by slof standirds
  • Custard Wallah
    • Mr Larrington's Automatic Diary
Re: Your Wikipedia find of the week
« Reply #36 on: July 29, 2011, 12:47:24 pm »
In the 1920s some people proposed draining the Mediterranean Sea.  :o

Atlantropa

How on Earth does someone with such a grandiose and barking scheme manage to stay out of the loony bin?

Arthur C Clarke used the idea in one of his novels...
External Transparent Wall Inspection Operative & Mayor of Mortagne-au-Perche
Satisfying the Bloodlust of the Masses in Peacetime

LindaG

Re: Your Wikipedia find of the week
« Reply #37 on: July 29, 2011, 12:48:30 pm »
In the 1920s some people proposed draining the Mediterranean Sea.  :o

Atlantropa

How on Earth does someone with such a grandiose and barking scheme manage to stay out of the loony bin?

Arthur C Clarke used the idea in one of his novels...

Ooh, which one?  I haven't read that one!

Re: Your Wikipedia find of the week
« Reply #38 on: July 29, 2011, 12:52:09 pm »
Rendevous with Rama - it's mentioned as an aside.

The bit I don't get is the hydro power station in the dam - won't that just let the med fill back up again? Or are they relying on evaporation?
<i>Marmite slave</i>

LindaG

Re: Your Wikipedia find of the week
« Reply #39 on: July 29, 2011, 12:56:15 pm »
Rendevous with Rama - it's mentioned as an aside.


Thank you.  Now ordered from the library  :D

Re: Your Wikipedia find of the week
« Reply #40 on: July 29, 2011, 03:27:31 pm »
Apparently someone tried to build an aircraft carrier out of sawdust and ice.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pycrete


Kim

  • Timelord
Re: Your Wikipedia find of the week
« Reply #41 on: July 29, 2011, 03:58:37 pm »
The bit I don't get is the hydro power station in the dam - won't that just let the med fill back up again? Or are they relying on evaporation?

Presumably it's tidal, and reverses direction accordingly.  And only a fraction of the med's volume would pass through the turbines, hence the drop in sea level?


Seems like a really good way to generate vast amounts of renewable power reliably.  See also: Severn barrage.

I suspect these ideas will start being taken a lot more seriously when the price of fossil fuel rises sufficiently.
Careful, Kim. Your sarcasm's showing...

Kim

  • Timelord
Re: Your Wikipedia find of the week
« Reply #42 on: August 19, 2011, 12:26:16 am »
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ottery_St_Mary

I was checking that the town wasn't actually named after the patron saint of Devon being nibbled to death by otters (it wasn't), and discovered the above.  Not only is there an endearingly high otter content, but their dubious health and safety record (especially the bit about the town being saved by a stubbed toe) gets a thumbs up from me.

Running through town with barrels of flaming tar on their heads - that's just one-upping the cheese-rollers, isn't it?
Careful, Kim. Your sarcasm's showing...

Mr Larrington

  • A bit ov a lyv wyr by slof standirds
  • Custard Wallah
    • Mr Larrington's Automatic Diary
Re: Your Wikipedia find of the week
« Reply #43 on: August 19, 2011, 11:24:32 am »
I have learned that the Musk Ox is not, as I had previously surmised, an Hairy Northern Bison, but is in fact more closely related to sheep and/or goats(e).
External Transparent Wall Inspection Operative & Mayor of Mortagne-au-Perche
Satisfying the Bloodlust of the Masses in Peacetime

Re: Your Wikipedia find of the week
« Reply #44 on: November 22, 2011, 05:21:02 pm »
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dartitis

As if it's a serious medical condition.
Never tell me the odds.

Re: Your Wikipedia find of the week
« Reply #45 on: November 22, 2011, 10:58:14 pm »
[Quote/]Adrian, you're living proof that bandwidth is far too cheap.[/Quote]

Re: Your Wikipedia find of the week
« Reply #46 on: November 22, 2011, 11:40:42 pm »
I have discovered that if you add the population of somewhere else to that of a city then the total number of people is more than the population of the city alone.

http://en.Wikipedia.org/wiki/Bangor,_Gwynedd


Re: Your Wikipedia find of the week
« Reply #47 on: November 23, 2011, 03:44:34 pm »
I quite like the history pages.

Here's a good one from the song 'Teardrop'.

Scroll down to the Gary Barlow bit,
 ;D
How's my trolling? Call 07700 900999.

Jules

  • Has dropped his aitch!
Re: Your Wikipedia find of the week
« Reply #48 on: November 23, 2011, 07:10:27 pm »
That is brilliant!
Audax on the other hand is almost invisible and thought to be the pastime of Hobbits ....  Fab Foodie

andygates

  • Peroxide Viking
Re: Your Wikipedia find of the week
« Reply #49 on: November 23, 2011, 07:12:10 pm »
SO FLUFFY!  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Fuzzy_Freddy.jpg (from the article on the Red Fox, which I was using to check the Latin name (vulpes vulpes) for tagging purposes).
It takes blood and guts to be this cool but I'm still just a cliché.
OpenStreetMap UK & IRL Streetmap & Topo: ravenfamily.org/andyg/maps updates weekly.

 
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