› added 10 years ago

145

TIL that George C Scott refused to accept the Academy Award for Best Actor in 1971, and described the Oscar ceremony as “a two-hour meat parade”.

Read more news.bbc.co.uk

via reddit.com

5E0B TIL Although GPS is free for the entire world to use, its operating cost alone is $2 million a day.
PYNYg TIL There is an airport in germany which is under construction since 2006. Before that, planning alone took over 15 years. It was supposed to open in 2011.
WmKX TIL Danish philosopher Søren Kirkegaard published his works using amusing pseudonyms (perhaps best of all, Hilarius Bookbinder). Everyone in Copenhagen knew that Søren was the author, so at times he added to the title page of a book the scholarly note that it had been “edited by Søren Kierkegaard.”
xa75 TIL someone bought a Tibetan Mastiff puppy in China for $1.5 million.
jNVea TIL about the Mathematician Fry Lewis Richardson who discovered that it is impossible to measure the length of coastlines in a meaningful manner. This so-called Coastline Paradox later led to the creation of the field of Fractal Geometry.