Damn Interesting Additions

damn interesting is evolviong????!!!!

E-V-O-L-V-I-N-G I can spell. Really, I can.

Anchor a link for “http://www.damninteresting.com/wp-randompost.php” between ‘previous article’ and ‘next article’ at the top of your page – I find it really great to use for a quick “gee, wow” when I have a couple of spare moments in my day!

A section devoted to pie the making of, history, and information about pie, to supplement the damn interesting articles. What else do you need?

Okay, I have pie. Would you like recipes? How about the history of pie in America. I don’t know who invented pie in the first place, but the person or persons are obviously of godlike stature, as is the website Damn Interesting.

Incidentally, if you haven’t seen the Discover Network TV program about the relics off Yokazuna-jima, find a copy. You will be amazed and want to slap a phony-acting, self-absorbed scientist.

I would personally like to see more articles about space exploration. Let’s all go to Mars and beyond. My spacecuit is packed and ready.

Doc

I’m still waiting for a damn interesting book combining some of the best old articles and some new stuff come on I’ll definitly buy it….. I’ll buy it even if its all old stuff (give me something to read in bed)

Forums. Period.

Hi,

I would like to buy some books mentioned on your site. However the link take me to Amazon.com. I stay in UK and would like to support it. Is it possible that I can buy them of Amazon.co.uk.

P.S: Great site…..First thing I read in the morning.

solitas said: “Anchor a link for “http://www.damninteresting.com/wp-randompost.php” between ‘previous article’ and ‘next article’ at the top of your page”

Funny, my original design had exactly that… but the top-center position of the link made it appear to be the most important thing on the page. I’ll take another look at it, and see if I can find a way to add it without giving the link exaggerated importance.

Gizmo The Cat? said: “Forums. Period.”

We do hope to add something forum-like as soon as we have a little time. It’ll be a big project to integrate it into the site, but it would be spiffy.

tintin said: “I would like to buy some books mentioned on your site. However the link take me to Amazon.com. I stay in UK and would like to support it. Is it possible that I can buy them of Amazon.co.uk.”

Sadly, it appears that Amazon UK is a totally separate system from Amazon US, so it won’t allow us to create a UK version of our reading list. But even though we won’t get our nickels, I’d still recommend buying any of those books or DVDs– they’re all excellent.

Out of curiosity- is there an article on deja vu?

This is quite possibly the most beautiful anouncement of all time! It’s like walking through the coffee section of Central Market. Or, eating a whip cream topped slice of Pumpkin Pie! Perhaps many of the world’s problems could be solved with something as simple as a good slice of pie. mmmhmm

Thanks to Alan and the entire DI staff for putting fourth great effort to bring Damn Interesting stuff to the masses! There should be some double scooped whip cream topped, fresh baked on a snowy Christmas Eve day pie. sweet.

Curses, Floj. You and your pie related anecdotes are the bane of my existence. Please, talk about any other food than pie.PLEASE.

I did make a suggestion. I’ll make it again here, just in case it went unheard. I think someone should do a story on the theory that time does not exist. The physicist Julian Barbour has pioneered this theory. It’s fascinating and I think it would do Damn Interesting justice.

I feel like I’ve already read an article about Deja Vu?

Prince, sorry, it’s just such an incredible treat. I really do believe that the world could come to peace if we could enjoy something so simple. Einstein once defined time as the what the clock reads. It’s funny cause time is hard to comprehend because it’s not a physical dimension. We can’t hold time in our hands but a clock tracts it’s progression. Oh this is to lostindustrial; the ‘E’ in Einstein had to go at the start of that sentence. That would be an interesting article, it could even compare the difference in theories between Einstein and Barbour.

You could even have a fundamentals week where you covered various hypothesis relating to the nature of time and space. Start out with the holes and peculiarities in the current set of theories and carry on with articles on things like variable speed of light and the no time hypothesis.

Out of curiosity- is there an article on deja vu?

I LOVE THE PIE REFERENCES THAT FLOJ MAKES!!

I don’t even care if this sparks a huge debate. It’s great for every commenter to have a quirk of personality to their comments. Floj’s pie always adds a certain anecdote to the readings. Floj, may you AND your pie live on.

Floj said: “This is quite possibly the most beautiful anouncement of all time! It’s like walking through the coffee section of Central Market. Or, eating a whip cream topped slice of Pumpkin Pie! Perhaps many of the world’s problems could be solved with something as simple as a good slice of pie. mmmhmm

Thanks to Alan and the entire DI staff for putting fourth great effort to bring Damn Interesting stuff to the masses! There should be some double scooped whip cream topped, fresh baked on a snowy Christmas Eve day pie. sweet.”

Couldn’t have said it better myself!
I know this is not the norm; and ask your sweet endulgence; but I want to send you all an early holiday gift: Oh and excuse the pun :^)
Pumpkin Pie Cheesecake
Crust
1 3/4 cups graham cracker crumbs (about 24 squares)
2 tablespoons granulated sugar
1/2 cup butter or margarine, melted
Filling
1/4 cup Gold Medal® all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice
2 tablespoons brandy, if desired
1 can (15 oz) pumpkin (not pumpkin pie mix)
4 packages (8 oz each) cream cheese, softened
1 cup packed brown sugar
2/3 cup granulated sugar
5 eggs

1. Heat oven to 325°F. Grease 9-inch springform pan with shortening. In small bowl, mix cracker crumbs, 2 tablespoons granulated sugar and the melted butter. Press crumb mixture in bottom of pan. Wrap foil around outside of pan to prevent drips. Bake crust 8 to 10 minutes or until set. Cool 5 minutes at room temperature. Refrigerate about 5 minutes or until completely cooled.
2. Meanwhile, in another small bowl, mix flour, pumpkin pie spice, brandy and pumpkin; set aside. In large bowl, beat cream cheese with electric mixer on medium speed until smooth and creamy. Gradually beat in brown sugar and 2/3 cup granulated sugar until smooth. On low speed, beat in 1 egg at a time just until blended. Gradually beat in pumpkin mixture until smooth.
3. Pour filling over crust. Bake 1 hour 15 minutes to 1 hour 25 minutes or until set but center of cheesecake still jiggles slightly when moved. Turn oven off; open oven door at least 4 inches. Let cheesecake remain in oven 30 minutes.
4. Run knife around edge of pan to loosen cheesecake. Cool in pan on wire rack 30 minutes. Refrigerate at least 6 hours or overnight before serving.
5. To serve, run knife around edge of pan to loosen cheesecake. Carefully remove side of pan before cutting cheesecake. Store covered in refrigerator.

Can you please write ONE article on “pie” then ban it from ever being talked about again.

Lighten up, Man. :-) A little light-heartedness is good for you–even light-heartedness about pie!

Never, this is like my crusade.

PIE!!!

~ ~ ~ hopefully.
~ ~ ~ this
~ ~ ~ “drawing”
,,….mmmmm……,, will
” …’;';’;';’;';’;';’;';’;';’;'…” turn out
“‘=’='=’='=’='=’” okay.

Boy, I wish I were better at these computer symbol “drawings”… hopefully the website’s AI won’t eliminate the spaces before the symbols, and flatten out one side of the pie..

argh!

OH! Just in case anyone is still reading this comment section… I have a few suggestions myself. I will not feel at all bad if none of these get put into practice, but, here goes. A nice addition might be to have a few options in the comments section, such as buttons where I can embolden, italicize, or underline parts of my text. Perhaps the tiniest of things here could be to have a small number next to each individual comment to show what number comment they are on the list (that might help when someone is referring to certain comments or are just looking for one they remember reading). Hmmmmm let’s see… oh also, for when people post extra long links, have them “wrap around” (so-to-speak) to the next line down so nobody has to worry about breaking the website anymore. Let’s see… what other ideas??? Oh and I’ll bet it would be nice to have a small button somewhere where people can pull down a menu and see where the 15? 20? or even 25 most recent comments have been located.. I know I’m worried (especially here) that when I put a comment in an article that’s even two or three articles old, it won’t get read. If there were some way for people to see that a new comment has arisen in ANY article’s comment section, it would make it much much easier for it to be recognized.

Oh, and maybe perhaps have a couple more writers on staff? Just a thought. I’ve noticed that the current writers, Alan and Jason especially, have been working their asses off to get much of the articles that we’re seeing lately. And yes, I know that the process of getting new writers itself requires the strength of a lumberjack, but it might pay off in the end, who knows? Just puttin’ it out there.

Hopefully someone will read this, I know it’s been almost a day since anyone’s written a comment in here, and I should know; I wrote the comment previous to this one!

If I think of any more ideas, I’ll let you know.

Great ideas! I especialy like the #ing idea and the comments up-date idea! As for more writers Alan has an open call here:

http://www.damninteresting.com/?page_id=317

You can also suggest a story/article here:
http://www.damninteresting.com/?page_id=350

And you can see the profiles of the other writers at the About Us page.

Happy Thanks Giving (USA) every one! May your plates, and hearts be full this season.

Agreed, and that pumpkin pie cheese cake sounds amazing! (it was really hard not to say sweet instead of amazing). I like the comment update idea too, it would be a great substitute for the forums that seem to be a popular idea. Anyway, nothing beats some good home cooking on the holidays. Thanks Misfit and Tink, happy Thanksgiving!

eeeeeeeewwwwwwwwwwwwwwww

Man said: “Can you please write ONE article on “pie” then ban it from ever being talked about again.”

Pie Hater! Quickly guys, throw your pies at him!

Alan Bellows said: “We do hope to add something forum-like as soon as we have a little time. It’ll be a big project to integrate it into the site, but it would be spiffy.”

Very spiffy, since we’ll be able to talk to each other besides responding to your DI articles.

Misfit said: “A nice addition might be to have a few options in the comments section, such as buttons where I can embolden, italicize, or underline parts of my text.

Yeah I’ve got no idea how easy/difficult or bandwidth-consuming this would be, but it would definitely make commenting more user friendly. I’ve managed to work some minimal html tags to format my posts with bold, emphasis and quote, but the list of other html tags that pop up in the window that tells me I’ve made an html mistake suggests there are further secrets for me to unravel.

Perhaps the tiniest of things here could be to have a small number next to each individual comment to show what number comment they are on the list (that might help when someone is referring to certain comments or are just looking for one they remember reading).

I agree. This would be extremely useful for both the reasons that Misfit mentions, as well as for returning to where I left off reading the comments to article with many comments.

Oh and I’ll bet it would be nice to have a small button somewhere where people can pull down a menu and see where the 15? 20? or even 25 most recent comments have been located.. I know I’m worried (especially here) that when I put a comment in an article that’s even two or three articles old, it won’t get read. If there were some way for people to see that a new comment has arisen in ANY article’s comment section, it would make it much much easier for it to be recognized.”

Or maybe if there was a page we could see with a table that lists all the articles and when they were last commented upon. Since so many new people are continuously discovering the wonder and joy that is DI, and it is often hard to resist commenting, even on a very old article, this would allow us to see at a glance if our post is still the most recent. (When I discovered DI I spent several weeks going back through all the old articles, and occassionally commenting, so I’m particularly interested in being able to check easily if someone else retracing that well-worn journey of fascination has anything to add to my very belated comments.)

Or perhaps an even better idea is if we could subscribe to certain articles so that we get an email alert with every new post. If this would cost too much bandwidth, maybe such subscriptions could be limited to articles that are no longer on the first page or two.

Keep up the excellent work Alan et al! I believe your integrity and constant desire to improve are strong influences on the overall culture that has developed here, including the usually respectful, relevant and insightful comments posted.

PS: Even though I’m used to it by now, the fact that the preview window doesn’t show paragraph breaks correctly continues to freak me out :)

Haha, wow nobody has commented in this area for a WHILE (well, okay maybe four days *has it really only been four days? I thought I remembered reading that last comment a week and a half or so ago* hmm)! Anyway, like I said in my last post, if I come up with more ideas, I’d let you guys know, and HERE I AM! haha.

I agree with that last comment by Mez, in terms of the comment preview thingy… it does continually freak people out (although I thought I remembered once seeing it having been fixed some time ago, hmm). Anyway, what would also be nice is to be able to put spaces in front of new lines of text. That way, people can indent paragraphs, etc.

I think that the comments update thing could be really neat, but a page with ALL of the articles and when the last comment appeared would be a little difficult to keep track of, as opposed to the twenty or so previous comments menu. In addition to that menu there could be some other things as well. Forinstance, I know that once a new article comes out, it rakes up comments lickety split, quickly eliminating any comment placed elsewhere that might be represented in the list… so maybe there could be either another button showing a more extensive list of the last fifty or so comments given OR OHH OOH! EVEN BETTER than the last twenty comments idea (and what would help out the quick elimination due to new articles thing) would be to have a menu that, instead of showing the twenty most recent comments and their location, would show the past two or three days worth of comments and their location. I’ll put these two ideas together here for people to ponder over which they prefer.

The other addition to the comments update thing is to maybe have an option to keep an ‘eye’ on certain members’ comments. This could help in a number of ways. First of all, I know that a few select members here continually post the most (hey that rhymes) fascinating comments and intriguing questions. A few members here always have coments that I enjoy reading. If there could be a list of where those individuals have posted their last twenty comments, then I could continually enjoy their input.———The other way this could help is a little less fun. Forinstance, I understand that in the Norwegian dog article, someone (I won’t say who) posted an ad for World of Warcraft, I believe. I’m not sure how well you guys in the background of DI keep an eye on comments posted in old articles, but this tool might help with making sure that none of that crap shows up anywhere you might have missed.

Along with those suggestions (wow, I’m really churning out a lot of ideas here) is something that I noticed in a chat room (which wouldn’t be a bad idea, either. Kind of a compliment to the amazing forums idea). In that chat room, there was an option to ‘ignore’ certain individuals who you were just tired of reading their stuff (it might be the most pointless thing here, not to mention difficult to work around if you did integrate the #ing comments thing and whatnot)… just putting it out there. Oh, and *this could be a cool thing to do* is to make it so that you could put in a comment that would only be visible to certain people. Obviously this comment wouldn’t fit into to numbering system either. (wow I’m getting really sick of the word ‘comment’). It would be kind of like an e-mail, messaging, or “private commenting” system right inside of DI.

The only other thing I can think of is to maybe let us be able to put pictures in the comments, although that’s the most risky idea of mine, I could easily see that going in a bad direction, even if there were restrictions put on inapropriateness and such. While on the other hand, it could also prove useful. Hmmm.. maybe it would be better to just stick to posting links of the pictures in question. I’ll leave this paragraph up for the scrutiny of fellow commenters.

Oh, and is there a complete, simple list of every DI article somewhere?

Boy I hope somebody might still be stickin’ around to read this…

Misfit said: “Oh, and is there a complete, simple list of every DI article somewhere?”

Yeah that would definitely be useful. A method of browsing past DI articles, where they can be arranged chronologically or alphabetically would be a very useful way of finding particular articles to complement the search and section functions.

A list such as this with a number next to each articles title showing the comment number is what I was envisaging when I said:

Or maybe if there was a page we could see with a table that lists all the articles and when they were last commented upon.

Misfit said: “Haha, wow nobody has commented in this area for a WHILE (well, okay maybe four days *has it really only been four days? I thought I remembered reading that last comment a week and a half or so ago* hmm)! Anyway, like I said in my last post, if I come up with more ideas, I’d let you guys know, and HERE I AM! haha…

The only other thing I can think of is to maybe let us be able to put pictures in the comments, although that’s the most risky idea of mine, I could easily see that going in a bad direction, even if there were restrictions put on inapropriateness and such. While on the other hand, it could also prove useful. Hmmm.. maybe it would be better to just stick to posting links of the pictures in question. Oh, and is there a complete, simple list of every DI article somewhere?

Boy I hope somebody might still be stickin’ around to read this…”

Yes! You are amazing, these are great ideas. (Forgive my editing of your comment,plz.) I would love to be able to pop in a few smilies or emotion thingies, that could be fun; huh? And like your pie you tried to bake above ;) we could just pop in a little pic instead ya know. Kool like ade!