› added 10 years ago

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TIL India is launching its mass electronic surveillance program in 2014. It will give 9 Indian govt. agencies—incl. the tax dept—the power to access, in real-time, phone conversations, text, emails, web search data & social media activity WITHOUT the approval of the courts or parliament.

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via reddit.com

nNjY TIL that tumors of the ovaries can cause teeth and hair to grow within it.
4X9rX TIL that there are active subglacial tidal lakes under the ice in Antarctica.
R7EYw TIL that Johannes Gutenberg lost his printing press to a money lender because he couldn't pay back the loan to build the press. The money lender went on to publish the first printed book with his name as the printer. Only after an Archbishop sacked the city, Gutenberg was finally recognized.
1aR0d TIL that WW1 was referred to as "The war to end all wars." Since it's end 100 years ago to the day, there have been a total of at least 224 separate wars around the world. Resulting in a total of around 67,380,966 deaths.
neNVW TIL that Neil deGrasse Tyson sent James Cameron a snarky email saying that, at that time of year, in that position in the Atlantic in 1912, when Rose is lying on the piece of driftwood and staring up at the stars, that is not the star field she would have seen.