› added 4 years ago

50

TIL The Battle of Leyte Gulf was, by some criteria, the largest naval battle in history, with over 200,000 naval personnel involved. The Japanese lost 1 fleet carrier, 3 light carriers, 3 battleships, 6 heavy cruisers, 4 light cruisers, 11 destroyers, 300 aircraft, & 12,500 killed

Read more wikipedia.org

via reddit.com

NOvN TIL in 2015 an EVE Online player known as “Non Erata” stole 600 Billion ISK (in game currency) - equal to $13000 USD in reality. This was accomplished by working his way up the ranks for over 6 real months in an in game corporation and stealing everything while the leadership was offline
9Y8RX TIL you rarely hear Happy Birthday on TV because the song was copyrighted from 1935 to 2014. In 2014 Time Warner paid 14 million to release the song to the public domain rather than face a lawsuit over their aggressive ownership of it which was netting them 2 million a year.
mxeXv TIL that there are no wild snakes in New Zealand.
yVGjv TIL that sparkling water was invented by Joseph Priestly, who also discovered oxygen; he speculated that CO₂ might treat gastrointestinal infection (taken rectally) and even cancer
m1lxP TIL that Putrescine a chemical that "is largely responsible for the foul odor of putrefying flesh" is also a component of semen.