› added 6 months ago

20

TIL about Pearl Hart, an infamous female outlaw who committed one of the last stagecoach robberies in history. Hart would become a local celebrity while imprisoned and ended up living until the age of 84, dying in 1955.

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Qopk TIL The sudden startled jolt awake sometimes experienced when on the verge of sleeping is known as a hypnic jerk, and is likely a vestigial reflex selected to help primates avoid falling while resting or asleep in trees.
V0y0 TIL in 2007, the Israeli Ambassador to El Salvador was recalled after being found outside the Israeli Embassy drunk, hands tied, and wearing only a corset and bondage gear. The police only discovered his identity after removing the ball gag from his mouth.
Z85lR TIL The first computer virus 'Creeper System' (1971) was an experimental self-replicating program. It was not designed to cause damage, but left a message "I'm the creeper: catch me if you can". It moved between mainframe computers on ARPANET (US Advanced Research Projects Agency Network)
XKKQ TIL that a new radio telescope being built in Australia and South Africa will generate so much data about space that it will exceed global internet traffic by a large margin. An exabyte per day of raw data, which could be compressed to around 10 petabytes.
RYg9 TIL that Cinco de Mayo is in celebration of the day Mexico defeated the French, at the Battle of Puebla. Where France were trying to collect on previous loans Mexico stopped making payments on.