UselessFacts

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Useless facts everyone should know

White Castle Locations in the U.S.
USA Most Common Means of Transportation to Work by County
AI models sometimes struggle with simple tasks, like counting the number of “R’s” in the word “strawberry” (the answer is 3 😜 ). This happens because AI models first tokenize input, converting words into numeric IDs before processing. Since the model doesn’t see the actual word “strawberry,” it often makes random guesses. To get a more accurate response, breaking down the word into individual letters can help the AI model better understand and analyze the data.
CAPTCHA stands for "Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart."
Japan is farther north, south, east, and west than South Korea
The longest walkable route in the world stretches from Cape Town, South Africa, to Magadan, Russia. There’s no need for planes or boats, as there are bridges along the way. The journey spans 22,387 kilometers and takes 4,492 hours to complete. It would take 187 days of non-stop walking or 561 days of walking for 8 hours a day. The route passes through 17 countries, crosses six time zones, and takes you through all seasons of the year.
Is everything really reversed in Australia and New Zealand?
Not everything, but the name of the popular game "Rock, Paper, Scissors" is indeed reversed, and before showing their hand, they typically call out "Scissors, Paper, Rock."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rock_paper_scissors
The queen in chess was originally just an advisor and was later promoted to queen. Chess originated in the region of India/Persia and spread throughout the world thanks to Arab conquests and traders from around the 11th century onward. When the game reached Queen Isabella (known for establishing the Inquisition), she noticed the piece positioned next to the king, which was then called the "advisor," and she transformed it into the "queen," declaring it the most powerful piece in the game. With this simple decision, she forever changed the rules and history of chess. As a general rule, in languages where chess spread before this change, the piece next to the king is still called the "advisor" (for example, in Arabic, it’s called "Wazir"), while in languages where chess became established after the change, the piece next to the king is called the "queen."

https://www.uschesstrust.org/the-emergence-of-two-powerful-queens-queen-isabella-of-spain-and-the-chess-queen/
The national anthems of Uruguay and Paraguay were written by the same person.

Bonus fact:
Uruguay and Paraguay do not share a border.
Any number composed solely of the digit 1 (e.g., 1, 11, 111) that falls between 1 and 111,111,111 squared will yield a palindromic number (a number that reads the same forwards and backwards). For example: 111,111,111 x 111,111,111 = 12345678987654321.

Another property is that any palindromic number with an even number of digits (e.g., 4 digits 5665 ) is divisible by 11, and the result of the division will also be a palindromic number. For example: if we divide the number 2234554322 by 11, we get the result 203141302.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palindrome
France's longest border is shared with Brazil
Try folding your tongue like Daniel Radcliffe in the picture. Couldn't do it? No worries. The ability to fold the tongue is a hereditary trait, so it's not a skill that can be learned.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tongue_rolling
In 1974, Gerber tried to market a special baby food for single adults and college students. The product failed and was quickly taken off the shelves.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerber_Singles?fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTAAAR1mK_ihiayHoySYjq62HhEPlY6jByeYd19mNILbktW5LQ50SmN9SrV_YpQ_aem_diCMGuXDWkjIU8WAsR5aWw
In the 2024 Paris Olympic Games, which will start this coming Friday, each Olympic medal will be embedded with an original piece of iron from the Eiffel Tower. You might be asking yourself, “But how? Did they cut iron from the tower for this?” The answer is yes and no. While they didn’t cut anything from the tower in preparation for the games, during the 20th century, modernization work was done on the Eiffel Tower’s elevators. As a result, parts of the tower were removed and carefully preserved over time. Now, those parts will find a new home within the medals themselves.

https://olympics.com/en/news/paris-2024-medals-how-metal-from-eiffel-tower-was-incorporated?fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTAAAR0aNJ9U2iQmoK1dCAB6jqGUd6T0Fad6LGxCei3CCHJrjREwMIT4WZYOnos_aem_IyH25SsGiOnEM402sopvxw
Radiohead might not exist today if it weren’t for the country of Israel and a DJ named Yoav Kutner. After releasing their first album, Pablo Honey, the band faced a major setback as it was a giant flop and they considered breaking up. However, their fortunes changed when Yoav Kutner began playing one of their songs, “Creep,” incessantly. The song resonated deeply with the Israeli audience, and the entire country fell in love with it. “Creep,” a song about feeling like an outcast. This unexpected popularity in Israel gave Radiohead the boost they needed to continue as a band.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiohead
Did you know that purple doesn’t actually exist in the physical world? There are no purple photons, and it doesn’t appear on the light spectrum. Purple is entirely a psychological creation. When your brain receives both red and blue light, it should logically interpret the mix as green, which lies halfway between red and blue on the spectrum. However, there’s a catch: your green sensors in the eye don’t pick up any signal when they receive both red and blue.

So, rather than generating a “system error,” your brain invents a new color—purple—to represent this unique combination. Purple essentially stands for “not green,” filling in the gap created by the absence of green signals. In the realm of physics, purple doesn’t exist; it’s a fascinating color created entirely by your brain.

https://grantsonnex.com/why-purple-doesnt-exist/
Roughly every 6 days in the world, a country celebrates its independence from Britain. It’s the most widely celebrated holiday in the world. Britain does not have an independence day.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_that_have_gained_independence_from_the_United_Kingdom
Japan has a unique tradition called Jimi Halloween, where "Jimi" means "mundane" in Japanese. For the past 10 years, people have celebrated this by dressing up as extremely specific everyday situations. Here are some examples:
- Guy reading in bed who accidentally drops his smartphone on his face
- The person who has to hold the ribbons and scissors at ribbon-cutting ceremonies
https://www.core77.com/posts/126161/Best-Costumes-from-Japans-Mundane-Halloween#:~:text=in%20Object%20Culture,that%20illustrate%20boring%20everyday%20situations.
Broadway is the only road that runs the full length of Manhattan and breaks across the street grid, making it a defining feature of both New York and American culture. Originally called the Great Highway, it was a road through the small village of New Amsterdam, running north from the Dutch Fort to the wall at Wall Street. Initially a rural dirt road, its width earned it the name Broadway. Parallel to it was Broad Street. Even when it was only a mile long, Broadway was spoken of differently from other streets, contributing to its mythology. The streets from Broadway down to the East River curve to reach the important docks, which accelerated the development of Broadway’s stores due to its proximity. The docks in Lower Manhattan led to the creation of the Financial District, establishing Broadway as the epicenter of trade in New York.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broadway_(Manhattan)
After the Civil War, around 100,000 Confederate soldiers moved to Brazil and established a city called Americana. They aimed to keep the Southern culture alive in a new country. Every year, a festival commemorates the Confederate soldiers there. It's surprising to many who visit and learn about its unique history. Americana is known for its mix of Southern accents with Portuguese, and the older residents roll their R's. The settlers initially planted crops like tobacco and cotton, but many left within ten years due to the difficulty of maintaining the farms.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Americana,_S%C3%A3o_Paulo
There is a town in the U.S. that has been on fire for 60 years and will continue to burn for another 250. Centralia is a small town located in the heart of Pennsylvania’s coal region, dotted with numerous coal mines. Every year before Memorial Day, the town burned all the trash in the landfill, but in 1962, a fire spread into a nearby mine. Attempts to extinguish the fire were unsuccessful, and it expanded into a vast network of coal mines. The fire spread to a depth of 300 feet and across 4,000 acres, with flames bursting out of the ground, releasing toxic gases, and causing houses to collapse. In 1984, Congress allocated more than $42 million to relocate residents, and most people left their homes. Today, Centralia is a ghost town. Since 2002, the zip code has been removed, and Highway 61, which ran through it, is blocked off and covered with tons of dirt to prevent attracting tourists. The fire is expected to burn for at least another 250 years.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centralia,_Pennsylvania
The word "soccer" was actually coined by the English? The etymology of "soccer" dates back to the 1800s. Originally, the sport was known as "association football". The term was shortened to "assoc," which was then colloquially transformed by adding "er" to the end, a common practice at the time, particularly in Oxford. Thus, "assoc" became "soccer." Around the same period, football was gaining popularity in America. However, American football was already an established sport there. To avoid confusion, Americans adopted the term "soccer" to refer to association football. Meanwhile, in England, the term "soccer" fell out of common use by the mid-20th century, and people reverted to calling it "football." However, the change wasn’t communicated to the Americans, who continued to use the term "soccer." Today, while "football" is the preferred term in most parts of the world, "soccer" remains the standard term in the United States.

https://time.com/5335799/soccer-word-origin-england/
The popular PDF file format has no inherent size limit. Currently, the most common PDF reader, Adobe Acrobat Reader, restricts the size of a single page to 15 million inches by 15 million inches, which is approximately 145,161 square kilometers, an area large enough to encompass an average European country.

In the image: the mentioned area compared to the continent of Europe.

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