› added 10 years ago

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TIL In 2005, after a controversial eminent domain law was passed, allowing corporations to seize private land for their own use, an entrepreneur cited the new law in an attempt to confiscate the home of the judge who ruled in favor of it, generating wide support.

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wpxP TIL The Egyptians, not Julius Caesar, were the fathers of the modern calendar. The Roman calendar was lunar and had 355 days. Egyptians knew it was 365 days because the Nile would peak on the same day each year. Caesar learned this from his affair with Cleopatra and created the Julian calendar.
1PPX TIL that the current Donkey Kong character is not the same as the villain that appeared in the 1980’s arcade games. The original DK is the character now known as Cranky Kong.
R7964 TIL that the Berlin Wall was destroyed by civilians because in a press conference one Official mentioned future regulations on transit of people, assuming and saying it was valid immediately. People then started destroying the wall and the police didn't stop them because the press was filming
kOjJg TIL Shakespeare invented the “yo momma” joke. In his play Titus Andronicus, one of the characters, Chiron, exclaims “Thou has undone our mother” to which another character, Aaron, replies “Villain, I have done thy mother.”
5Y8vR TIL that Linux operating system Ubuntu, is named after the Nguni philosophy of ubuntu, which Canonical indicates means "humanity to others" with a connotation of "I am what I am because of who we all are".