#445 Goldman Sachs has released a font - Goldman Sans - that is free for all to use.
Except, you can't use it to criticise Goldman Sachs - and they can terminate the license with "no reason at all".
#446 The term retifism for shoe fetishism is named after Nicolas-Edme Rétif, a French novelist.
He wrote a plan for regulating prostitution (Le Pornographe from 1769) which is said to have been actually carried out by the Emperor Joseph II.
#447 Pupils in France have Wednesdays off, and instead (many places) lessons Saturday mornings.
(It was dropped in 2008 but since reinstated.)
#448 Giulia Tofana was an Italian professional poisoner.
She was famous for selling poison to women who wanted to murder their abusive husbands.
The poison Aqua Tofana is named after her.
#449 Perry Rhodan is a German science fiction novel series which has been published each week since 8 September 1961.
Having sold approximately two billion copies worldwide alone, (including over one billion in Germany), it is the most successful science fiction book series ever written.
Bonus info:
Matthias Rust, the then-19 year old aviator who landed his Cessna 172 aircraft on the Red Square in Moscow in 1987, has cited Perry Rhodan's adventures as his main inspiration to penetrate Soviet airspace.
The "hearts and minds" - to prevent starvation in areas that were too difficult to access from the ground (like areas with landmines and mountains).
It included a lot of other things, of course, like lentil stew and peanut butter.
They were labeled "Food gift from the people of the United States of America".
#451 In 1676 Ole Rømer was the first person to make quantitative measurements of the speed of light.
Before then light speed was seen as infinite. His view that the velocity of light was finite was not fully accepted until measurements of the so-called aberration of light were made by James Bradley in 1727 (51 years later!).
#452 In 2011 a Wonder Woman TV show was planned with a pilot that never aired (NBC turned it down).
Adrianne Palicki starred as Wonder Woman. Critics didn't like it, and the costume was also criticised ...
#453 Last year the book Alcohol in Space was published.
Among many things it tells of how astronauts routinely smuggle alcohol on board the ISS (which has a zero alcohol policy).
The production and consumption of alcohol has played a significant role in human society since the dawn of civilization. Will this still hold true when humanity is exploring and settling the outer reaches of space? This first book on the topic examines the history of alcohol in space, as well as...
#454 Poland has one of the world's highest numbers of blasphemy and insult laws.
According to a 2017 OSCE report looking at insult and defamation laws among 57 countries, Poland had the joint highest with nine, and all carried potential prison terms.
Old democracies are probably still repealing obsolete blasphemy laws.
Poland's case is even worse than it looks since they needed to pass their blasphemy laws fairly recently.
#455 The top secret project Iceworm was a network of mobile nuclear missile launch sites under the Greenland ice sheet.
The electricity supply was provided by means of the world's first mobile/portable nuclear reactor.
It also provided scientists with some of the first ice cores, still being used by climatologists today.
Interesting! At the end of the article, it briefly outlines environmental concerns:
"When the camp was decommissioned in 1967, its infrastructure and waste were abandoned under the assumption they would be entombed forever by perpetual snowfall. A 2016 study found that the portion of the ice sheet covering Camp Century will start to melt by 2100, if current trends continue. When the ice melts, the camp's infrastructure, as well as remaining biological, chemical and radioactive waste, will re-enter the environment and potentially disrupt nearby ecosystems. This includes 200,000 liters of diesel, and radioactive waste."
Is it funny that the first thought I had, looking at the floor-plan, before I even read the opening paragraph was "Heh, that reminds me a bit of Echo Base," or just sad?
Anyhow, was there ever an engineering project where the assumption of "Yeah, that'll never get uncovered and **** **** up," didn't age like fine milk?
#456 In Denmark there's a public piece of art called The Treasury.
It contains a gold bar - worth about €47,000 - behind bullet proof glass.
Since 1992, when it was made, numerous people have tried to rob it (with no luck), which is part of the artwork, according to the artist.
#457 In 2005 the influenza virus behind the Spanish Flu was reconstructed. It had taken 8 years.
It was found in the body of a woman whose lungs were preserved in the Alaskan permafrost.
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