› added 11 years ago

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TIL that b/c most prevailing winds in the Northern Hemisphere blow west to east, east-sides of cities during the Industrial Revolution would often be inundated with polluted-air from factory smoke. This created in many cities the still-present divide of affluent ‘west-sides’ and poor 'east-sides’.

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gMoRy TIL that in 1997, CircuitCity developed DIVX, an alternative to DVDs, that could only be viewed for 48 hours before paying addition cost to continue viewing using phone lines to detect whether disc were still valid, it was estimated to be a $337 million dollar loss
4Nj6 TIL of Anatoliy Golitsyn a KGB agent who defected to the US in 1961. He claimed the Soviets planned a long term deception strategy to lull the West into a false sense of security by appearing to break apart predicting the fall of the Berlin Wall, formation of the EU and financial problems in the US.
MedpA TIL Taras Shevchenko was born a serf in 1814 occupied Ukraine, became an orphan at 12, bought his freedom with a help of a famous painter who recognized Shevchenko's talent, and rose to become the most famous Ukrainian poet and painter with unmatched cultural significance for the Ukrainian nation.
Z9eY TIL In Saudi Arabia women are allowed to fly aircraft, though they must be chauffeured to the airport because it’s illegal for them to drive a car.
EgK6V TIL that the drinking age in Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands is 18