Virus Spreading Across The World... Of Warcraft

Happy HumpDay!

Happy HumpDay! Do you love learning something new each week? Maybe your friends and family would like to learn some cool stuff too?! If you know someone who has a thirst for useless but entertaining knowledge, feel free to forward this email to them and have them subscribe!!!! As always, check out the HumpDay website at HumpDayNewsletter.com and follow the official HumpDay Instagram!

History

In times of trouble in our country, the president of the United States is viewed as a symbol of stability and strength. After the bombing of Pearl Harbor, President Roosevelt rallied the nation’s spirit with his “Day of infamy” speech, and during the Cuban missile crisis JFK’s television address carried the nation through the anxiety of a potential Armageddon. But of all the president’s that projected great strength, only one actually had the muscle to back up his talk, and that was Abraham Lincoln. Lincoln is of course known for leading the country through a civil war and reestablishing the union but, he also possessed superhuman strength. The legend of Lincoln’s strength goes back to his days growing up in a log cabin in Illinois. The locals in Lincoln’s town would hear what sounded like a group of men chopping down trees but when they looked closer, they saw it was just a young Abe Lincoln chopping trees twice as fast as any other man. With his 6’4” long muscular body, Lincoln could swing an axe with so much force that he could take down full grown trees in just a few swings. Another story says that Lincoln was once harassed by a notorious street gang while working as a lawyer. The leader of the gang tried to hit Honest Abe but Lincoln caught the punch, picked the man up off the ground, and threw him 12 feet across the room. The sight of their leader getting hurled like a rag doll scared off the entire gang of outlaws and they were never seen in town again. Abraham Lincoln was actually ashamed of his incredible strength and saw it as a remnant of his days as a poor boy living in a log cabin. When asked to demonstrate how strong he was he would refuse out of embarrassment, although some situations required him to show his strength. Like when a fight broke out at one of his early political rallies and he had to wrestle both the fighters into submission before continuing his speech. Although he is know known for being a great speaker, and an even better leader, Lincoln deserves more credit for being the herculean freak of nature that he was. John Wilkes Booth is lucky that Lincoln didn’t get a hold of him in that theatre. National Football Federation- Gerald Ford How to Build A Log Cabin

Music

Remember those little plastic tapes that people used to listen to music in their car with? If not, you are likely younger than 30 years old and never had a car older than 1998. If you do remember them, you likely had a glove compartment full of cassette tapes in your car at one point in time. Those who know remember, know that each cassette had two tracks on one side and two tracks on the other side. But how did a tape with one strip of film contain 4 whole songs on two different sides? The concept of music devices having an A side and a B side goes back to the very beginnings of recorded music. The 1800’s featured cylindrical records and later flat vinyl records that could only hold one track per record. In 1908, Columbia records released the first double sided record that featured two songs, one on each side, on one record. Double sided records became more and more popular and eventually most of the records that had two sides known as the A side and the B side. In the late 1970s, records sales began to decline with the invention of audio cassettes. Audio cassette tapes used a magnetic film strip connected to two reels. When the film passed through the cassette player, the magnetic pattern on the tape was translated into music. Like vinyl records, cassette tapes had two sides but unlike records, tapes had two songs per side which would play one after the other. When you put a tape into the cassette player, the film reel rolls and the cassette player plays the first two songs. When you flip the tape, two more songs play from the same magnetic film strip but how does the same strip play multiple songs? Why doesn’t the first two songs just play in reverse? The cassette film’s magnetic signature was printed on just one half of the tape (the whole length but just one half the width). Two songs are printed on one half of the tape and two songs are printed on the other half of the tape. When the reels spin and the tape plays, the cassette player only reads one half of the tape facing the inside of the cassette player. Who knew there was so much technology such an outdated way of playing music. Top 40 Best Selling Cassettes Why Cassette Tapes Are Fashionable Again

Video Games

Right now, the world is dealing with the spread of an incredibly infectious disease. People all over the globe are isolating themselves and avoiding contact with other people to prevent further spreading of the disease. Unfortunately, issues like this aren’t just limited to the physical world, they also occur in the virtual world. World of Warcraft is a massive multiplayer role-playing game where millions of people can create a fantasy character and go on adventures with one another in a vast virtual environment. The premise of this incredibly popular game is that players create a character, train to build that character’s skills, and then go on adventures with other players to slay giant monsters and capture rare treasures. Over the life of the game, so many players have become so good that the game developers need to make the game harder and harder. In September 2005, the developers of World of Warcraft released a new mega-boss to challenge high ranking players. The mega-boss was called Hakkar the Soulflayer (pretty spooky name) and unlike previous bosses, Hakkar had a special attack that stuck with the player. The attack was called “corrupted blood” and it would cause low level players to die instantly and stronger players to slowly lose health as if they were infected by a virus. In addition, the corrupted blood attack could be spread from one player to another player by getting to close together, just like a disease would spread from a sick person to a healthy person. Fortunately for players, the effect of the corrupted blood wore off when players left Hakkar’s dungeon, but something happened that the developers never expected. It turns out that players pets (giant wolves and tigers) could also be affected with the corrupted blood virus. Unlike the player’s characters, the pets were able to carry the corrupted blood spell outside of Hakkar’s dungeon and could spread the disease to other players in the game. In addition to spreading disease to other players, the disease could spread to computer characters that couldn’t die. Those non-playable characters that contracted the disease became immortal disease spreaders and infected unexpecting players that came near them. In just a matter of days, the corrupted blood curse spread through the World of Warcraft like a plague killing more than 50 million players all over the world. Terrified players began quarantining themselves in forts and restricting other players movements to prevent the spread of the disease. Players who were infected were isolated from leaders in the community tracked who the players came into contact with and isolated those players as well. On the other hand, other players took a different approach and intentionally contracted the disease so they could spread it to other players. In the end, the developers of the game and no clue how to stop the spread of the corrupted blood disease and the plague almost destroyed the World of Warcraft for good. The company that created the game had to completely reset the game and remove all traces of Hakkar and the corrupted blood disease. The final resolution was quick and widespread but while the disease was still ravaging the online community, it was the actions of those players who set up quarantines and isolated vulnerable players that helped keep the game alive. After the Corrupt Blood plague, infectious disease specialists began studying the outbreak of the disease in World of Warcraft to gain insights into how people would handle the spread of a widespread virus. Turns out, the real world could learn a thing or two from the world of Warcraft.

This Week in History

On this week 1992, riots broke out across the city of Los Angeles after a not-guilty verdict is handed down to the police officers involved in the “Rodney King incident”. Rodney King was an African American man who was pulled over for speeding and suspected drunk driving. During King’s traffic stop, video footage was captured of three police officers beating and kicking Rodney King after pulling him out of the car. The video sparked outrage throughout the country, and the officers in the film were put on trial for assault. Eventually the officers were acquitted of all wrong doing and many people believed that justice had not been served. Riots broke out in the streets as protesters turned violent against he police. Rioting continued for 24 hours until the military was finally called in to end the madness.

Help grow HumpDay! by sharing with your friends & family! Subscribe Today