Fact of the day

Fact of the day

Information is the most powerful weapon.

Fact N° 1352
The first industrial robot went to work at GM in 1961.
Named Unimate, General Motors put it to work in the spring of 1961 without fanfare -- not because they were worried about an uproar over it one day taking the jobs away from so many people, but because they were concerned that it wouldn't work out. It did, of course, and today robotics is a multibillion-dollar worldwide industry. The original Unimate is at the Smithsonian in Washington D.C.
Fact N° 1353
French fries are likely of Belgian origin.
The history of the french fry (notice that "french" isn't capitalized) is somewhat murky, but most historians -- especially Belgian ones -- attribute its birth to that country. Legend says Thomas Jefferson brought the french fry to America, but it was returning veterans from World War I, previously stationed in Belgium and Northern France and exposed to the food, that made it huge in America.
Fact N° 1354
Experts estimate that 90% of celebrity autographs currently for sale are forgeries.
In 2000, the FBI, along with the IRS and the U.S. Attorney's Office, concluded Operation Bullpen, an investigation into forgery within the collector's memorabilia market. They uncovered forgery rings featuring forgers, authenticators, wholesalers, and retailers, flooding the market with as much as $100 million in forged merchandise -- much of which is still for sale on sites like eBay. One conspirator was caught on tape joking about how guys like Wilt Chamberlain were "available for [autograph] signings" despite being dead for weeks or even years.
Fact N° 1355
The world's best-selling toy began as a means of explaining geometry.
Erno Rubik first developed the Cube in 1974 while he was an architecture professor in Budapest, to help his students better understand geometry. Six years later, his Cube hit the shelves, and since then over 300 million have been sold worldwide. For 27 years, nobody could solve the Cube in under 10 seconds. Then, in 2007, a Frenchman did it in 9.86 seconds. Today, Yu Nakajima of Japan holds the world record, with a time of 8.72 seconds.
Fact N° 1356
Charles Darwin married his first cousin.
Few people in Darwin's time were as aware as he was of the potential dangers of limiting a gene pool through inbreeding. The famed naturalist had 10 kids with his first cousin Emma, and when they became sick, he would worry that inbreeding was the source. Marrying one's cousin was more common and more acceptable in Darwin's time than it is now. In fact, for wealthy families, one's cousin was long regarded as the perfect mate since such a union kept wealth in the family.
Fact N° 1357
The inventor of the karaoke machine made almost no money on it.
Karaoke was born in 1971, compliments of a young Japanese man named Daisuke Inoue. Back then, he played the drums in a band that worked the Kobe nightclubs. They would often accompany businessmen from the audience who wanted to sing along. Then, Inoue provided one of those men with a taped recording so the man could sing along while on a business trip. Seeing how well that worked out, Inoue and his band created the first 11 karaoke machines and leased them to Kobe bars. Unfortunately, he did not secure a patent, and the machine was quickly copied by bigger companies.
Fact N° 1358
Only 3,000 people attended Nirvana's final concert.
In the winter of 1994, Nirvana was among the biggest bands in the world, touring in support of 1993's In Utero. The North American shows were in far bigger venues then any they had played before, such as L.A.'s Forum, and they were regularly playing in front of 20,000 fans. They began the European leg of the tour in Paris on February 4th. They played 15 more shows across Europe before playing what turned out to be their last concert, a sold-out March 1st show at Terminal 1, Flughafen Munchen-Riem -- a Nazi-era airplane hangar that held 3,050 people. The band cancelled the rest of the tour due to Kurt Cobain's various health issues. He committed suicide five weeks later.

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