The world is more interesting than you think.
Unexpected facts, big ideas, and little discoveries. Find something that sparks your curiosity today.
A little more wonder
Xbox 360's movie add-on lost a format war without taking the games with it
Microsoft sold an external HD DVD drive while Sony put Blu-ray inside the PlayStation 3. When HD DVD lost the contest, the Xbox accessory was discontinued.…
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Moving platforms broadcast endless warning loops
A moving walkway has no natural starting line: passengers step on all along its length. Repeating the warning gives each rider a chance to hear it, even if…
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The composer who counted leaves on trees
Composer Anton Bruckner's arithmomania led him to count everything from colleagues' coat buttons to leaves on trees.
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Dream yoga focuses on controlling nocturnal plots
Practitioners train to maintain spiritual awareness while the body sleeps, with the aim of controlling what happens in their dreams.
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Dorothy Parker left her estate to Martin Luther King Jr
Though they had never met, Dorothy Parker left her estate and literary copyrights to Martin Luther King Jr. in 1967. After his assassination, the rights…
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Superimposing light waves measures microscopic changes
An interferometer splits a beam along two paths and recombines it; tiny changes in path length alter the interference pattern, revealing shifts smaller than…
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Light waves wiggle strictly perpendicular to their path
As light travels, its electric and magnetic fields rise and fall sideways rather than along its path. The two fields oscillate at right angles to each other,…
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Switch Lite literally cannot connect to a television screen
Unlike the standard Switch, the Lite lacks the video-output hardware needed to send a picture to a TV, so it works only as a handheld.
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Perfectly flat surfaces can fuse without any glue
If two metal surfaces are exceptionally smooth and clean, their atoms can touch closely enough to form metallic bonds across the join. The pieces fuse without…
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New York developers can buy the air above buildings
A developer can pay a neighbor for building space the neighbor isn’t using. Those air rights add to the project’s allowable area, letting the new building…
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When visa fees become a geopolitical tit-for-tat
When one country imposes high visa fees on visitors, another may respond with comparable charges on its citizens, leaving travelers to bear the cost.
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Sherlock Holmes finally entered the public domain
A creator in the United States can now use Sherlock Holmes without sending the estate a check. The last of Arthur Conan Doyle’s original stories entered the…
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Your passport has a hidden sentence under your signature
The tiny continuous sentence beneath your signature is microprint: a magnifying glass is needed to read it, and ordinary consumer printers can't reproduce it…
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The missing word that told readers to commit adultery
In 1631, London printers accidentally left “not” out of the Seventh Commandment in a reprint of the King James Bible, changing it to “Thou shalt commit…
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Tapas involves intense self-discipline to clear impurities
The practice treats hardship as a spiritual workout: enduring difficult circumstances is meant to strengthen discipline and clear impurities.
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This artist let gravity make his collages
He dropped squares of colored paper onto a canvas and glued them where they landed, letting gravity determine the composition.
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A preserved philosopher attended a university meeting
Jeremy Bentham's dressed skeleton and wax head form the 'Auto-Icon' kept at UCL. In 2013, it made a special appearance at a council meeting for the outgoing…
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E. E. Cummings turned rejection into an urn
After 14 publishers rejected No Thanks, Cummings borrowed money from his mother to self-publish it in 1935. He dedicated the book to the publishers, arranging…
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Pranayama restricts your breathing intentionally
Pranayama uses deliberately timed inhales and exhales; practitioners regard breath control as a path toward enlightenment.
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New Zealand is the tip of a sunken continent
Most of Zealandia lies beneath the Pacific; New Zealand is the part high enough to stay above water. Nearly all of this continent is hidden below the ocean,…
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Why your body decides when you feel productive
You can make a plan at midnight, but your body still sets the conditions for carrying it out. Sleep, hunger, and the daily rhythm of alertness affect how much…
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Microsoft dropped Xbox One's mandatory camera before launch
The announced design required Kinect to remain connected even if players weren't using motion controls. Microsoft reversed that requirement in August 2013,…
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The original PlayStation 3 borrowed Spider-Man's lettering
Designer Teiyu Goto said Ken Kutaragi insisted on the typeface used for Sony's Spider-Man films. The console therefore carried a visual link to a movie…
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Forklifts carry a hidden iron counterweight
The load hangs in front of the front axle, so a heavy iron weight at the back balances the forklift like the other end of a seesaw. Without that…
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