› added 8 years ago

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TIL Stockholm, Sweden tested a “Speed Camera Lottery” where speed limit-abiding drivers were automatically entered into a drawing to win a prize pool funded out of fines paid by speeders.

9wvVD TIL "Wacky WallWalkers" were a fad in the early 1980s. The toys were molded out of a sticky elastomer and shaped similar to a spider. When one was thrown against a wall, it would then "walk" its way down. Over 240 million were sold. They were also free in specially marked boxes of cereals.
wLDoY TIL Gambler's fallacy, the erroneous belief that if a particular event occurs more frequently than normal during the past it is less likely to happen in the future. In 1913, in a game of roulette, the ball fell in black 26 times in a row, the probability of the sequence is 1 in 66.6 million.
wLMN8 TIL that the main sample in Fatboy Slim's 'Gangster Trippin' was used without permission. It took 3 years in court for the original artist to get any royalties back
Ooal1 TIL that every Autumn a fungus epidemic kills off 75% of house flies. It attacks their brain forcing them to land on a surface and climb to the highest point, stand up on its front legs and spread its wings. The fungus then erupts from its abdomen to be spread to other flies.
e7B6 TIL that Peter Popoff, a popular televangelist was caught using a wireless ear piece in which his wife would tell him information about the person he was “healing” in order to create the illusion that he was really healing people. He was exposed by James Randi in 1987 and has since been bankrupt.