Unexpectedly Intriguing!
09 May 2014

Once upon a time, the Internet was a really cool place to search out and learn useful information about the real world. Keep that in mind as David Tufte reveals a shocking discovery of what's lurking just a few pages of search results away from you are right now....

You've probably heard about the mass kidnapping in Nigeria? (If not, Islamist terrorists raided a girls school, kidnapped a few hundred teenagers, and are threatening to sell them for … you know …).

This week there’s news that the Islamists may be hiding out in the Sambisa Forest.

This forest is a topic that is basically … not on Google. (I know, you thought everything was on the google these days). The linked article above is one of the few items with any content.

After some sleuthing I was able to find, what I think is this forest, on Google Maps. I circled it in red. The dark green with a little blue above it is what is left of Lake Chad — the big lake you always see on maps in the middle of the Sahara.

Sambisa Forest Map

Anyway, the linked article says that the forest has huge crustaceans on the forest floor. That caught my eye: crustaceans in the Sahel?

So I went to Google and found … pretty much nothing about crustaceans in the Sambisa Forest. After a few minutes I concluded that English was not the primary language of the person who wrote the article. This makes me think that maybe they meant arthropod (millipedes) rather than crustaceans (crabs).

What does all this have to do with Kim Kardashian, the center of all media? It's that if you enter "sambisa forest crustacean" into Google, you get only 5 pages as the default response. Most of them are uninformative, but when you get to the 4th page, you find a link to this:

Kim Kardashian Shows Off Her Big b*tt in Sexy

Hits like this start increasing. So Google has very little on the Sambisa Forest, but eventually you get to photos of Kim Kardashian's butt because she happened to go to an LA restaurant called Crustacean.

Go figure.

As best as we can tell, the Internet has degenerated into a massive electronic wasteland that is increasingly being overrun by cats. And Kardashians. And countless other empty distractions with precious little room to communicate useful information about real life unfolding in the real world in real time.

Labels: ,

About Political Calculations

Welcome to the blogosphere's toolchest! Here, unlike other blogs dedicated to analyzing current events, we create easy-to-use, simple tools to do the math related to them so you can get in on the action too! If you would like to learn more about these tools, or if you would like to contribute ideas to develop for this blog, please e-mail us at:

ironman at politicalcalculations

Thanks in advance!

Recent Posts

Indices, Futures, and Bonds

Closing values for previous trading day.

Most Popular Posts
Quick Index

Site Data

This site is primarily powered by:

This page is powered by Blogger. Isn't yours?

CSS Validation

Valid CSS!

RSS Site Feed

AddThis Feed Button

JavaScript

The tools on this site are built using JavaScript. If you would like to learn more, one of the best free resources on the web is available at W3Schools.com.

Other Cool Resources

Blog Roll

Market Links

Useful Election Data
Charities We Support
Shopping Guides
Recommended Reading
Recently Shopped

Seeking Alpha Certified

Archives