From The Economist: It's not 42. It's 148. The magic number for social networks.

Even on the Interweb, we cannot escape our evolutionary past. According to The Economist article: "Primates on Facebook", some of things that we do to/for each other on the social networks over the Internet can still be defined as "Grooming": you need to ping your peeps, follow up on their status, read their Tweets, comment on their Tweets, reply to their Wall because they have left something on yours. These all take time. So does monkeys' grooming each other.

A while back ago, Dr. Robin Dunbar concluded that our brains simply cannot support a social network with unlimited size: think of having to memorize all the names! Probably only Mr. Monk will be able to do that, but of course, he probably has the tiniest social network known to man... Irony, isn't it? Anyway, Dr. Dunbar suggested that the magic number of network limit any animal will be able to maintain is: 148.

Even though in the virtual world, it seems that we can grow our social networks indefinitely, to a certain extent obviously (say, like, 6 billion, the number of entire population...), the average number of "Friends" on Facebook turns out to be 120. And the number of Friends with which Facebookers interact with on a regular basis by leaving comments on their "Wall" is even smaller: 7. That's it. For men. Women are more social, 10.

Even for Facebookers that have more than 500 friends, the number remains relatively low at 17 for men, and 26 for women.

Here is a nice way of explaining this:

"[P]eople who are members of online social networks are not so much 'networking' as they are 'broadcasting their lives to an outer tier of acquaintances who aren't necessarily inside the Dunbar circle'... Humans may be advertising themselves more efficiently. But they still have the same small circles of intimacy as ever."

This also concisely explains what a "social network" such as Twitter represents for a lot of its users, or Tweeple, as they call themselves. Only that it is even beyond the "outer tier of acquaintances", all the way into the nether.

Mankind's reach for the sky - The Tower of Babel apparently did not teach us anything...

Instead, we seem to pride ourselves on it. Free will. The power to accomplish the unthinkable. The art of one-upmanship.

Many did not realize that the 2300-foot tall Burj Dubai is "only" the world's Tallest Structure, and not the Tallest Building yet. Until Burj Dubai is completed and occupied, the honor of "The World's Tallest Building" currently still rests with Taipei 101. The grand opening of Burj Dubai is slated for September 2009. Hurray!

The Empire State Building held the title for over four decades, The Sears Tower, 24 years; yet they seemed to be the exception: Chrysler Building was the tallest for only one year before the Empire State Building took the honor away; The World Trade Center, 2 years; The Petronas Towers, 6 years. It has been almost five years since Taipei 101 was open in 2004, and the world cannot wait for a new Tallest Building. Here is a compiled list of timeline of the world's tallest skyscrapers.

But wait! There is something in the making to top Burj Dubai even before Burj Dubai is officially crowned:

According to the latest issue (March 2009) of Popular Science, or as they are known on the street, Pop Sci , (sigh... as if they didn't give themselves a cool name, the young kids would stop reading them...), Burj Mubarak al-Kabir, at the height of 3,284 feet, is being planned by the Kuwait government on the Tigris and Euphrates river delta, as part of its "the City of Silk" city development. In comparison, Burj Dubai is merely 2,684 feet tall (as originally planned; nobody knows how tall it will actually be until this September when it is finished). In order to withstand the high wind at that height, Burj Mubarak al-Kabir is designed as "three interlocking towers, each twisting 45 degrees top to bottom to help stabilize it... [The tower overlap in the center to form a triangular core.] No matter which way the wind blows, two of the three towers will always brace the building."

Like the Washington Monument with a height that is easy to remember: 555 feet, Burj Mubarak al-Kabir will be 1001 meter tall, "One thousand and one meters for One Thousand and One Nights. It's the difference between bragging rights and telling a story."

Take that, Burj Dubai. Ouch!

By the way, the supposedly 2nd tallest building to be built, The Chicago Spire? Not gonna happen, if ever, any time soon. It is currently a big giant ugly hole in the ground both literally and figuratively... construction has been put on indefinite hold because the developer have not been able to secure additional financing, at the same time when the world-renowned Spanish architect, Santiago Calatrava, filed a lien against the developer. Such a shame.

The London Beer Flood of 1814

After I learned about the Boston Molasses Flood of 1919, I quickly got wind of a rival event that happened more than a century before the Bostonian food disaster: the London Beer Flood.

In short, on October 14, 1814, heavy metal hoops that held a larger vat broke and ignited a chain reaction that smashed the other surrounding vats. In total, 1,224,000 litres of beer under pressure exploded through the twenty-five foot high brick wall of a London brewery and literally flooded the crowded area nearby. Two houses were destroyed in its path and nine people lost their lives because of the unusual flood.

Although the death toll was not as high as the Boston Molasses Flood a hundred years later, there were several fascinating details that if reenacted in the movie today, would have been accused as sensationalism, but life, alas, sometimes does ring stranger than fiction. Read on:

"Fearful that all the beer should go to waste, though, hundreds of people ran outside carrying pots, pans, and kettles to scoop it up - while some simply stooped low and lapped at the liquid washing through the streets. However, the tide was too strong for many, and as injured people began arriving at the nearby Middlesex Hospital there was almost a riot as other patients demanded to know why they weren't being supplied with beer too - they could smell it on the flood survivors, and were insistent that they were missing out on a party!"

One of the victims actually died some days later of alcohol poisoning!

"Because of the poverty of the area, relatives of the drowned took to exhibiting their families' corpses in their homes and charging a fee for viewing. In one house, though, too many people crowded in and the floor gave out, plunging them all into a cellar half full of beer."

(source: BBC)

I guess too much food really CAN kill ya...

Again, the best succinct retelling of the event is by Tony Sakalauskas, a free-lance writer, on 3AmMagazine.com.

Today is the 90th anniversary of The Great Boston Molasses Flood

It happened on January 15, 1919: a giant vat containing thick heavy molasses exploded, and the heavy goo flooded the streets of Boston's North End, reportedly clocking at 35 miles an hour. In the end, 21 people died from this tragedy and hundreds of people were injured. It took many days and efforts afterwards to clean up the mess and put people's lives back together.

The cause was surmised to be the drastic rise in temperature from the day before: the molasses expanded too quickly and the structure simply couldn't withhold the sudden expansion.

Amazing!

I found the best retelling of the event by Tony Sakalauskas, a free-lance writer, on 3AmMagazine.com:

"Chunks of metal flew everywhere, piercing into people and buildings for hundreds of feet around. One huge chunk of steel smashed through a massive stone pillar supporting an elevated railroad. A piece of the railway sagged and fell. An alert train driver had his locomotive come to a screeching halt just moments before it would have plunged over.

The disappearance of that huge tank sent out a blast of air that pushed people away. But seconds later a counterblast rushed in to fill the vacuum and pulled them back in.

But most of the damage was caused by the molasses itself. It splashed onto city streets in all directions, speeding as fast as a man could run. The molasses smashed freight cars, plowed over homes and warehouses and drowned both people and animals. A three story house was seen soaring through the air as well as a huge chunk of the shattered vat that landed in a park 200 feet away.

Rescuers were bogged down in the stuff and were scarcely able to move as the molasses sucked the boots right off their feet. Trapped horses couldn't be removed so they had to be shot to death. The black sticky stuff filled cellars for blocks around and it took months for the hydraulic syphons to pump it out. Salt water had to be sprayed on cobblestone streets, homes, and other buildings because fresh water would just wash off the stuff. For months afterwards, wherever people walked, their shoes stuck to the goo. Some people even claimed that on a hot day one could still smell molasses even after thirty years."

The following is a mesmerizing account taken when it was happening: (Courtesy of Bostonist)

"[Boston police patrolman Frank] McManus picked up the call box and began his report to headquarters. A few words into it, he heard a machine-gun-like rat-tat-tat sound and an unearthly grinding and scraping, a bleating that sounded like the wail of a wounded beast. McManus stopped talking, turned, and watched in utter disbelief as the giant molasses tank on the wharf seemed to disintegrate before his eyes, disgorging an enormous wall of thick, dark liquid that blackened the sky and snuffed out the daylight."

I would love seeing a computer-generated re-enactment of the whole event. Who'd have thunk that molasses can do such damage?!

Questions from your kids: How many people are there in the world?

Here is your answer, as of January 13, 2009 (US Time)

 

U.S. 305,610,552

 

World 6,753,669,055

 

This is pretty neat, courtesy of U.S. Census Bureau's Pop Clocks. 

 

At my boys' insistence, here is the counter part: Statistics on death... 

 

(Yes, my kids are naturally morbid, considering how many comic books and movies inspired by comic books they have had encountered.  Neil Gailman is to be blamed, IMHO...)

 

Number of deaths: 2,448,017 (2005 U.S. census data)

 

Pondering when is the right time and age to explain to my 6-year-old the plights of people around the world, and how much to tell him...