› added 10 years ago

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TIL in 2012 a charity dropped off boxes in a remote African village containing Xoom tablets with no instructions. Within 4 minutes a child turned one on. Within 5 days, kids were using 47 apps per child, per day. Within 2 weeks they were singing ABC songs. Within 5 months they had hacked Android.

grxgy TIL I learned that there was a suspected fifth flight on 9/11 that was thwarted by the nationwide ground stop. When the captain said the flight was returning to the gate, several first class passengers got very upset and demanded to speak to the captain. Back at the gate, they ran off the plane.
8kdV TIL that Tim Curry, who is an avid Scooby-Doo fan, was originally cast to be in the 2002 film Scooby-Doo, but dropped out when he learned that Scrappy Doo would be in the movie.
vNjL TIL “Killing Season” is a British medical term for the time in August when newly qualified doctors join the National Health Service. Patients admitted as an emergency during “killing season” are six per cent more likely to die.
W8GX TIL that Finland once accidentally built a lighthouse on the Swedish side of their border. Instead of simply transferring the lighthouse to the Swedes, the two countries redrew the border, so that the lighthouse ended up on Finnish soil.
06m5 TIL that Season Two of “24” featured a terrorist plot that originated from a London mosque. A few months after the season ended, authorities raided the mosque and found that it was indeed a terrorist hub.