Read the title again- this is not a list of the top-selling fast food chains. That ranking would rely heavily on the number of outlets, advertising, and longevity. You can see that list here, and as you might guess, McDonald's is on top. But a new list at Eat This, Not That ranked fast food by what people think of the chains.

According to YouGov, popularity is "calculated by taking the proportion of people who view something positively and showing it as a percentage of all of the people who have given any opinion about that thing, including 'have heard of.'"

This kind of calculation allows a higher ranking for a chain that does not cover the entire nation, and is less weighted toward customers that eat there often as opposed to once in a great while. So which chains benefit from opinions rather than sales? McDonald's came in at #14 in this list. The top chains in favorability lean heavily toward sweets! In fact, five of the top six are chains that specialize in sweet treats. Guess what they may be, then take a look at Eat This, Not That. -via Digg 

(Image credit: Daniel Barcelona)

Occasionally we have posted a nighttime satellite image that shows where the lights are on in one country or another. But now we have a composite image that shows the entire world on a Mercator projection and how it is lit up at night. Yeah, of course it would have to a composite, because it's never nighttime for the whole world. The huge number of individual images used to make this map also allows us to zoom in and see what the light -or lack of it- tells us about different regions. For example, there are no lines normally visible from space to tell us where national borders are, but the policies of different countries can make it seem that way when one nation has plenty of light, while its neighbor has none. Comparing images taken over time can show population growth, economic growth, or the effects of war.  -via Digg

Shawn Bradley played center in the NBA from 1993 to 2005. He is 7' 6" tall, making him one of the tallest NBA players in history. After retiring from basketball, Bradley became a coach and administrator at a school for at-risk youth in Utah. Then in January of 2021, he was struck by a car while riding a bicycle. Bradley suffered spinal injuries and was left a quadriplegic.

His life since then has been a struggle to return to any kind of normalcy. It is a paradigm shift for anyone to adjust to life in a wheelchair with professional aides for everyday activities, but for Bradley there are a few extra challenges. His very size makes everything more difficult. At 300 pounds, he must have a special crane to lift him from a bed to a wheelchair. His custom-built, 500-pound wheelchair causes his oversized van to list to the side when its lift is in use. During Bradley's initial hospitalization, the staff rigged up a padded table for his feet because he was too tall for the biggest bed they had.

There are also extra psychological challenges. Bradley's entire identity was centered around his height and his athletic ability. He went from looking down on everyone to looking up at anyone. His three-story home has a pool and gym he can't use and custom eight-foot tall doors he no longer needs. Read Bradley's story at Sports Illustrated. -via Damn Interesting

Watching a craftsman make something beautiful by hand out of raw materials can be so calming and satisfying. Watching omozoc build a milk crate is even more so, because he makes it look so easy! Don't tell anyone, but the secret is stop-motion animation, which can also be calming and satisfying. I particularly like the finishing, just as smooth as butter! He tells us this involved 2854 still photos. That's a lot of work, but the upside is that he ended up with a cool video and a really nice milk crate. -via Metafilter

Rubber hose animation is an animation style that arose in the 1930s, named for the characters' long rubbery limbs that bend in an exaggerated comic manner. The term became a catchall for the early animation style that so many cartoonists used. Younger people today might call it "Cuphead style."   



Artist Kev Craven draws in many different styles, including rubber hose vintage style. Lately, he's been redesigning modern cartoon characters in rubber hose style. Of course you recognize Samurai Jack at the top, and Cow and Chicken from the late '90s cartoon above. And this is what Johnny Bravo would look like if he were in an early Popeye cartoon.



You can see the process of Craven creating these characters in videos featuring Phineas and Ferb, Ren and Stimpy, and even Spider-Man. Follow Craven's artwork at Instagram. He's asking for suggestions on which modern characters should be given the rubber hose treatment. -via Boing Boing

The billboards will tell you that you can see seven states from atop Lookout Mountain in Chattanooga. However, three states meet where the mountain is, and when you look out from the summit, there are no boundary lines telling you what's out there. How far you can see from any particular place is normally limited by the curvature of the earth. Gaze out on a flat ocean or prairie land, and you can probably see about five kilometers away. However, if you are on top of a mountain, that sightline is exponentially longer. The same if you are looking at a faraway mountain jutting up from the earth. But air pollution also interferes with what we can see. The pandemic lockdown shut down factories and took so many vehicles off the streets, that one day people in Punjab were astonished that they could see the Himalayas, a sight that was normal for residents of the state some years ago when the air was cleaner.

There are other factors involved in how far one can see. Still, geographers have determined where the longest line of sight on earth is. Strangely, it is not the place where a person has actually taken the furthest photograph. Read about sightlines and where those places are at Amusing Planet.

(Image credit: Flickr user Sitoo)
 

Humans have laws that govern our interactions with others. Animals don't, but since they live with and among us, they sometimes get involved in human crime. Sometimes they are the perpetrators, and in a few cases are treated as such: jailed, put on trial, fined, or otherwise punished. Sometimes they are unwitting accomplices. Sometimes an animal can be a witness to a crime, or even the evidence that solves it. And at least once, a bird got right in the middle of a human crime scene.

In Canada, police had the opposite problem: Instead of dealing with an animal who fled the scene of the crime, they had to deal with one who wouldn’t leave their crime scene alone. A bird believed to be a crow named Canuck had already earned a reputation as a beloved troublemaker in Vancouver. In 2016, his antics got him in a tussle with the law. When police were dispatched to a car fire, they encountered a man wielding a knife. Canuck, who had been spotted sitting on the burned car, scooped up the knife and flew away with it. A cop had to chase him for a bit before the bird finally dropped his shiny evidential treasure.

So, did the bird save the day by stealing the knife, or was he tampering with evidence? The original account makes it clear that the police had already arrested the perpetrator and Canuck then made off with the evidence. This is just one of 25 stories of animals involved in real crimes that you can read about at Mental Floss. Or if you prefer, you can watch a video at the same link.

(Image credit: Shawn Bergman)

The Matrix Resurrections is the fourth installment of the Matrix franchise that started in 1999. It premiered less than a month ago and suffered from high expectations. Oh, people went to see it, mostly due to the franchise's history and the star power of Keanu Reeves, but The Matrix Resurrections underperformed both at the box office and in critical reviews. Fans didn't really want to see Neo as a senior citizen, or see the fate of the Matrix hanging by a love story. Screen Junkies has plenty of other thing to nitpick in The Matrix Resurrections, as you'll see in this Honest Trailer. Does this video contain spoilers? I don't know, I have yet to see any of the Matrix movies, so I would assume it does if I were you.

Is a hotdog a sandwich? How would a dog wear pants? Could Jack have fit on that door? People online will argue about the big things and the little things. Some of these arguments return again and again, and it's time we settled them. Neal Agarwal (previously at Neatorama) put up a page called Let's Settle This. It currently has 22 of the arguments you've heard on the 'net, and you have a chance to vote on each and then see how your opinion holds up against everyone else's. Yeah, there's a problem there. Just because the majority of people say something is so doesn't mean it is so. But then again, these aren't questions that will make or break your life. As silly as they are, people will continue to argue over these questions. But at least here you can register your opinion without getting trolled in reply. -via Kottke 

Geography can confound the life of a sea turtle. Turtles will migrate any place where the water is warm, and many end up in New England during the warm summers. When the waters off Cape Cod Bay quickly turn cold in the fall, they find returning to the sea difficult. Stunned by the cold, they become disoriented and end up stranded in the cape, often injured by waves bashing them against the land. These sea turtles include Kemp's ridley sea turtle, the most endangered sea turtle species. The stranding is natural and has happened for thousands of years, but climate change has worsened the problem, and when a species is critically endangered, every turtle counts.



To help these turtles make it back to their semitropical nesting grounds, turtles airlifts were organized, involving conservationists, volunteers, turtle rehab facilities, several organizations, and a group of pilots who run the organization Turtles Fly Too. The effort involves the public finding distressed turtles, rehab centers keeping them alive, flights to the Gulf of Mexico, more wildlife rehab for the turtles, and finally, freedom in the warmer waters near the turtles' nesting areas. Read how all that comes together to save Kemp's ridley and other sea turtles at Atlas Obscura.

Famous author Ernest Hemingway had a brother who was 16 years younger. Leicester Hemingway was a writer who always lived in his older brother's shadow, but he had some small share of the Hemingway brashness and creativity. Leicester once founded his own micronation called the Republic of New Atlantis. He was the president, and the "land" consisted of a bamboo raft anchored off the coast of Jamaica. New Atlantis had a flag (shown above), a constitution, and its own currency called the Scruple.

The definition of scruple is to hesitate on a moral basis, which was intended as a joke that those with too many Scruples should question their ethics. Additionally, the Scruples used in New Atlantis would not be printed paper bills. Instead, Scruples were shark teeth and other specially-marked nautical items.

New Atlantis has a purpose, which was marine research, and a money-making scheme in postage stamps. But it still didn't last long. Read the story of Leicester Hemingway's New Atlantis at Cracked.

(Image credit: Hyméros)

For years, David Bird was a designer for LEGO. After going freelance, he still designs characters, but these are his own. Bird makes small woodland creatures he calls "becorns," made from acorns, pine cones, sticks, and other natural materials. He sets the becorns outside and waits for real woodland creatures to approach, and then photographs the encounters. Bird says this technique requires lots of patience and birdseed. You can see some of the process in a promotional video.



For this one, the frog was already there, and stayed still while Bird placed the becorns around him. Continue reading to see more of Bird's delightful becorns and their new friends.

Three years ago, Morgan Cooper made a short film reimagining The Fresh Prince of Bel Air as a drama that delved into the social issues that caused Will to relocate from Philadelphia to southern California. It was so good that it caught the eye of Will Smith, the original Fresh Prince, who pushed to make the concept into a real movie or possibly a TV series. That series is now a reality. Bel-Air will premiere in February on NBC's Peacock streaming service. Cooper is the co-producer, co-writer, and director of the series, along with T.J. Brady and Rasheed Newson. Will Smith is the executive producer. The first three episodes will drop on February 13.

This is a message to all those who make internet fan films- keep on working at it; lightning may strike for you one day. Or else you'll get better with experience and might get noticed. -via Boing Boing

Redditor TheTonz lives in Minnesota where the high temperature was -2F (-19C) on Friday. He wet a set of his kid's pajamas and set them outside to see how they would freeze. The result was a yard sculpture that was easier than building a snowman. On Saturday, the temperature had risen to 26 degrees (still below freezing) and the pajamas had melted "Matrix-style."

An update on Sunday found the pajamas once again frozen hard. How hard?



Hard enough for a child to stand on it. An adult trying that may have left them with broken pajamas. There may be more updates coming, you'll find them at The Tonz' reddit archive.

Sir David Attenborough is 95 years old, and has spent a lifetime teaching us about the wonders of nature. Yet he's not retired, and is still risking life and limb to bring us more Mother Nature. He is filming a new BBC Earth series called The Green Planet, which is about plants. You'd think that the subject matter would be a little safer for a man his age than chasing after animals, but no. Attenborough has been injured by a cactus. It's far from the first time he's been injured on the job.

Why would you want to touch a cactus? To prove how dangerous they are.

Point proved, I guess. And also because Attenborough is as hard as nails. He was once in a boat that got caught in an Indonesian whirlpool. He trapped a caiman in Guyana. He’s been crawled over by a bunch of wild mountain gorillas. He has met cannibals, and was knocked unconscious while filming dolphins in the Bahamas. There’s tough, and then there’s Attenborough.

A cheeky yet reverent article about Attenborough at the Guardian implies that Attenborough is expected to be okay. -via Nag on the Lake

The Green Planet premiered Sunday night on BBC.

(Image credit: Paul Williams)