› added 11 years ago

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TIL that the czech secret police used fake border posts to convince refugees they successfully fled the country. Afterwards they were interviewed by fake US personal to find out who else wanted to flee. A lot of refugees were talked into leaving the country by agent provocateurs to begin with

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via reddit.com

rXBW TIL Microsoft once deliberately made MSN.com look faulty in Opera browsers, pushing Opera users to IE. As a reply, Opera Software released Opera Bork Edition, which made MSN.com look like its text was written in gibberish by Swedish Chef from Muppets Show.
MeEYa TIL NASA as a practical joke played Hello Dolly to wake the Gemini 6 crew in 1965. The astronauts loved it and a tradition was born. Until 2011, families were allowed to choose a favorite song to wake up their loved one in space.
GE4J TIL the song “Radioactive” by Imagine Dragons currently holds the record for most weeks spent on the Billboard Hot 100 at 87 weeks and the record for slowest ascension to the top 5 in chart history.
rbNw TIL Connie Sawyer, the actress who played the old woman who Jim Carrey told, “Don’t you go dying on me!” in Dumb And Dumber, is still alive. She is currently 103 years old.
woYo7 TIL close to 30 percent of apps used at work are duplicative, or add no value to the work process.