› added 5 years ago

59

TIL about the naming of Nintendo's character Kirby. In 1982, Universal sued Nintendo claiming Donkey Kong was illegally based on King Kong. Attorney John Kirby fought won the case for Nintendo and they, in thanks for the help provided, named their (then) next character in honor to him.

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6XLZ TIL A 20 year-old woman was kept as a (sex-)slave in a box for 23 hours a day between 1977 and 1984; at one point she was permitted to even visit her family, yet still returned to her captors.
v1pQr TIL of "hunger stones": the Central European practice of marking river levels with carved stones during droughts, to warn future generations that there will be a famine if the water level again gets low enough to see the carving. This has been done at least since 1115, and as recently as 2018.
VBp14 TIL those who pay off their credit card balance each month are known as “deadbeats” in the financial world
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gwm7 TIL that ITT Tech has been investigated for claims of widespread grade inflation. In one instance, a student got a 100% on a computer forensics assignment for turning in a noodle recipe.