› added 11 years ago

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TIL in 2000, if Al Gore had been granted the recount he asked for, he still would have lost by several hundred votes. But if Florida had recounted every ballot in dispute, he may have won by as few as 60 votes.

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MerwV TIL the email provider "Hotmail" chose it's name because it included all the letters "HTML". Originally it styled it's name as "HoTMaiL".
J1XKj TIL about the phenomena of polyandry or “wife-sharing” in Qing Dynasty China. Due to practices such female infanticide and concubinage there was an overall gender imbalance in society that poor husbands would exploit via renting their wives out to other, unmarried men for a fee.
VBnKQ TIL Laconia incident during WWII. A U-boat sank RMS Laconia mistaking it for a Supply vessel horrified, the Germans tried helping survivors, but Allies attacked, leading to the "Laconia Order" restricting aid to survivors.
7VWr TIL Tiririca, a Brazilian Clown, used slogans including “What does a federal congressman do? I really don’t know – but if you vote for me, I’ll tell ya” and “It can’t get any worse, vote Tiririca”. He became the second-most-voted congressman in Brazil’s history, with 1,348,295 votes.
NX7BN TIL the ancient city of Hieropolis in modern Turkey was thought to be the location of a Gate to Hell by the Romans. This was likely due to toxic levels of CO2 from gas vents that killed animals with noses close to the ground. The vents are bricked up today for tourists' safety.