OT: Favorite Wikipedia Page

Submitted by NFG on

"Wikipedia is the best thing ever. Anyone in the world can write anything they want about any subject, so you know you are getting the best possible information."

-Michael Scott

 

This has been a painfully slow week. So, let's try to stir up some new information that isn't too contriversial, and share what you think is pretty informative or just pretty crazy out there on Wikipedia. Here are some of my favorites:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logarithmic_spiral

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia_Hall

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Azorian

2Blue4You

July 17th, 2015 at 6:46 AM ^

Not a Wiki page but by far my favorite Amazon review of wifi thermostats:

"My former wife loves to take expensive vacations. We live in Ohio, which doesn’t exactly have extravagant places to see unless you like to watch grass growing or interstate construction. While we make OK money, I’m convinced she felt the need to single handedly improve the US economy by taking elaborate vacations: Broadway shows in New York City, gambling in Las Vegas, Spa’s in Arizona, sightseeing in San Francisco. The airlines know me so well they ask about my dog when I call to make reservations. His name is Fred.

In my attempt to try and save whatever I could so the princess could have her nice things I bought this Honeywell Wi-Fi enabled device so I could adjust the HVAC while we were away piling up massive amounts of debt on Mickey Mouse watches. I thought we could save a few bucks by keeping the temp cool in the winter and warm in the summer. The device was easy to install. I did not have the “blue” connector so I had to re-purpose the green one - this required an adjustment to the actual HVAC unit in our home. There are plenty of videos on Youtube to demonstrate how to do this. Within an hour I was up and running.

The device works flawlessly. You can adjust the temp from anywhere you have a Wi-Fi or cellular signal. Little did I know that my ex had found someone that had a bit more money than I did and decided to make other travel plans. Those plans included her no longer being my wife and finding a new travel partner (Carl, a banker). She took the house, the dog and a good chunk of my 401k, but didn’t mess with the wireless access point or the Wi-Fi enabled Honeywell thermostat.

Since this past Ohio winter has been so cold I’ve been messing with the temp while the new love birds are sleeping. Doesn’t everyone want to wake up at 7 AM to a 40 degree house? When they are away on their weekend getaways, I crank the heat up to 80 degrees and back down to 40 before they arrive home. I can only imagine what their electricity bills might be. It makes me smile. I know this won’t last forever, but I can’t help but smile every time I log in and see that it still works. I also can’t wait for warmer weather when I can crank the heat up to 80 degrees while the love birds are sleeping. After all, who doesn’t want to wake up to an 80 degree home in the middle of June?"




Sent from MGoBlog HD for iPhone & iPad

Yo_Blue

July 17th, 2015 at 9:13 AM ^

Of course I think poop is funny, so of course I clicked on your link.  I nearly spit my coffee on my screen.  The questions and reviews are hilarious.  I especially liked the My Dinner with Andrea review - highly recommended!  This may even top the Michael Rosenberg (is it OK to mention his name yet?) review in Amazon Books. LINK HERE

War Daddy

July 17th, 2015 at 3:30 PM ^

The reason that there are currently no reviews for this product is because the people who would be giving this review are all now missing their hands, due to various magnet related accidents. Ok, I'm being dramatic but still, this magnet can lift 890 lbs!!!!!! Need I say more? Ok,how's this? The field strength of even a small Neodymium magnet can make its presence known across a room: Now strike an estimate of what a supermagnet, that is larger than what a human hand can properly get a grip around, can do to a person, with an energy product of 42 Mega Gauss Oersteds and a lift rating of 890 lbs!!!



NEVER EVER introduce this thing to another Rare Earth magnet! If this thing flies out of your hand and shatters, depending on the direction of the shear, this thing can blow apart like a fragmentation grenade.



Believe me when I tell you that, in spite of all this, there's STILL a part of me that want's very badly to buy this thing. Maybe for the same reason we all want to own that cool Hellraiser Cube! "WHAT IS YOUR PLEASURE?!" Seriously I want to buy this magnet!!! It's just that I don't know how to safely approach the damned lovely thing!!! This is the LAMBORGHINI REVENTON OF MAGNETS!! It's every bit as extreme and twice as deadly. Something like this could smash a human hand like like it's made of shaving cream!! SO BE CAREFUL!!!! There should be a special safety manual just for this magnet alone! Seriously, if someone were actually stupid enough to put this magnet together with another 3x3 Neodymium magnet (provided that was even possible to do without these things shattering)it would cause all the other Neodymium magnets from the remotest regions of the world to collide into it and it would become a freakin' black hole singularity of Neodymium magnets WAY BEFORE 2012!!!! A roiling shrieking mass of compacted Neodymium shards and severed arms flailing where nothing but a voice could escape! A voice shrieking in unison "My God!!!! Why didn't somebody STOP me from PUTTING THOSE THINGS TOGETHER!!!"

Magnus

July 17th, 2015 at 4:02 PM ^

I've only edited one Wikipedia entry in my life, and it wasn't a Michigan football-related one. I've thought about editing more, but it doesn't seem like the greatest use of my time when I manage my own website.

ijohnb

July 17th, 2015 at 7:26 AM ^

but I particularly like "the Sinking of RMS Titanic" and A Wiki of Ice and Fire. I also like to read up on a lot of movies. American Bueaty and No Country for Old Men both have really interesting pages.

LSAClassOf2000

July 17th, 2015 at 8:13 AM ^

....but some of the most hilarious fake reviews for a book can be found on Amazon - LINK

Although I get the sense that "How To Avoid Huge Ships" was written by a ship's captain who was "meh" about his choice of career ultimately, his book inspired comedic gold, in my opinion anyway.

Example:

Read this book before going on vacation and I couldn't find my cruise liner in the port. Vacation ruined.

And one that is in iffy taste, but I laughed...

There is one major oversight in this generally well-written book, and that is that it addresses animate readers exclusively. As a large rock in the Tyrrhenian Sea off the coast of Giglio Island, I have recently been confronted with instances in which avoiding huge ships was of fundamental interest to my personal well-being. However, the methods presented in Capt. Trimmer's book were none too useful in my efforts to avoid huge ships, as I was recently struck by a very large ship indeed, a cruise vessel called the 'Costa Concordia'.

DonAZ

July 17th, 2015 at 8:38 AM ^

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traffic_light

Why?

Because I first came across this page when I authored a Wiki article on my mother-in-law's tiny little town in West Virginia.  The article I wrote was really short.  I casually mentioned the town has no stoplight.

Someone later edited the page and made "stoplight" a link to this page on traffic lights.

And there I was astonished to see page after page of information on traffic lights.  In my wildest dreams I never would have imagined so much could have been written about the topic.  But there it is.

The Interwebs ... a place of wonder and marvel.

DonAZ

July 17th, 2015 at 9:02 AM ^

But Wikipedia is full of lies ... so that page on misconceptions is a series of misconceptions.

It reminds me of the Star Trek "I, Mudd" episode:

Captain Kirk: Everything Harry tells you is a lie. Remember that. Everything Harry tells you is a lie.



Harcourt Fenton Mudd: Now listen to this carefully, Norman. I am... lying.



Norman: You say you are lying, but if everything you say is a lie, then you are telling the truth, but you cannot tell the truth because everything you say is a lie, but you lie... You tell the truth but you cannot for you lie... illogical! Illogical! Please explain! You are human. Only humans can explain their behavior! Please explain!

:-)

Maize_Out

July 17th, 2015 at 9:12 AM ^

My schools' wiki page had Sloth Armstrong under the alumni. I guess Mr. Armstrong was the first sloth to goto space with NASA. But sadly someone figured out Sloth didn't graduate from my school, and it has since been fixed.

 

mich_engineer

July 17th, 2015 at 9:34 AM ^

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joan_Pujol_Garcia

 

The guy wanted to be a spy for the allies during WWII, and they turned him down.  So, he decided to just spy on the Germans on his own.  He called up the Nazi's, who told him to move to London to spy on the British - he instead moved to Lisbon, told the Germans that he was in England, and created a whole team of make-believe agents.  He even submitted expense reports on their behalf.  When the British figured this out, they moved him to England for real, and he kept up the charade - even killing off some of his totally made-up spies so that he could collect a widow's pension from the Germans.  He remains the only person during the war decorated by both the Allies and the Nazis.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Churchill

I'll just let some quotes from article speak for itself:

"Mad Jack was a British soldier who fought throughout the Second World War armed with a longbow, bagpipes, and a basket-hilted Scottish broadsword."

"As the ramps fell on the first landing craft, Churchill leapt forward from his position playing 'March of the Cameron Men' on his bagpipes, before throwing a grenade and running into battle in the bay."

"'If it wasn't for those damn Yanks, we could have kept the war going another 10 years.'"

ijohnb

July 17th, 2015 at 10:18 AM ^

now is as good a time as any.  Can somebody give me the scoop on Craig James.  I have heard and seen these jabs for years but I have no idea what they are about.  It is hooker-related, that much I have gathered, but what is the deal with him?

LBSS

July 17th, 2015 at 10:04 AM ^

Those on FB would do well to join Cool Freaks Wikipedia Club, where people post links to all kinds of wonderful stuff from the bowels of Wikipedia.

joeyb

July 17th, 2015 at 10:14 AM ^

What I think is cool is that if you click on the first link to another article (e.g. not the disambiguation links and not the language of origin links) in the description of any wikipedia page and then continue doing so, you will always end up at philosophy eventually.