Whole Phrases Hidden in English Words
Why say a whole sentence when just a word will do? You might never have noticed that these English words contain whole phrases within them. [Arika Okrent]
Category Archives: Culture
Top 10 Lost Technologies
2000-year-old computers, swords that can slice through steel, death rays, and rain-makers – we may think that we’re at the peak of technological progress, but our ancestors were engineering things that we can’t even begin to understand. Alltime 10s pays homage to these amazing obsolete inventions, in the top 10 Lost Technologies. [AllTime10s]
Museum Displays Thousand-Year GIF
A Finnish museum plans to display an animated GIF for the next thousand years. Its title, As Long As Possible, acknowledges that may be a stretch. The GIF at Kiasma’s Museum of Contemporary Art is the work of artist Juha van Ingen and is designed to celebrate both the 100th anniversary of Finnish independence and […]
Studio Ghibli – A Brief History [Video]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ZDAPOao2X8 With Hayao Miyazaki recently announcing that he was coming out of retirement to work on his new feature film, Boro the Caterpillar we felt it was the perfect time to take a look back at the history of the legendary Studio Ghibli from its early days to its top grossing films in Japan and […]
The Rubber Band: Holding It Together Since 1820
Cheap, reliable, and strong, the rubber band is one of the world’s most ubiquitous products. It holds papers together, prevents long hair from falling in a face, acts as a reminder around a wrist, is a playful weapon in a pinch, and provides a way to easily castrate baby male livestock… While rubber itself has […]
Big Question: Why did we stop going to the moon? [Video]
In this episode of the Mental Floss show, host Craig Benzine explains the reason why we stopped going to the moon. [Metal Floss]
From Basement to Shelves the World Over: The Story of Reeses Peanut Butter Cups
A popular chocolate cup filled with delicious peanut butter, Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups were created by a man named Harry Burnett (H.B.) Reese. Reese was born May 24, 1879 in Pennsylvania to a farming family. He married in 1900 and went on to have sixteen children. (Yes, 16!) By 1903, not surprisingly, he was struggling […]
10 April Fools Pranks That Went Horribly Wrong
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4IOTG-JSW0I It’s that time of year again… April Fools. Once again, Alltime 10s has found you the ten stupidest, most ill-advised pranks of previous years. From pretending to hang yourself to the Google stunt that got its users fired, this is 10 MORE April Fools Pranks That Went Horribly Wrong. [AllTime10s]
5 Things Most People Still Don’t Understand About Star Wars
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BJvdfCfkCCo Over the past four decades, there have been so many Star Wars movies, comics, games, and TV shows that it’s almost impossible to keep track of them all. And that might explain why there are so many misconceptions and misunderstandings about the Star Wars universe. Because no matter how much you think you know, […]
Why Do Some English Speaking Countries Pronounce Z as “Zed” and Others as “Zee”?
It’s not just the British that pronounce “z” as “zed”. The vast majority of the English speaking world does this. The primary exception, of course, is in the United States where “z” is pronounced “zee”. [Today I Found Out]