Feedback is our weekly column of bizarre stories, implausible advertising claims, confusing instructions and more
RANKING internet search results according to how well they reflect "facts the web unanimously agrees on" (28 February, p 24)? What could possibly go wrong?
Adrian Ellis wrote to ask about something the web is unanimous on: that glass is really a very thick liquid (14 March, p 54). Well before the ink was dry on his letter, a colleague asked a FWSE (famous web search engine) about this.
It shot back: "Antique windowpanes are thicker at the bottom, because glass has flowed to the bottom over time... Glass is a supercooled liquid. Glass is a liquid that flows very slowly."
At first glance, the web page it was quoting seems to exemplify a core Feedback hypothesis: that the internet holds many false beliefs, the more fruitloopy of which we catalogue. ...
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