Accidental Inventions
While trying to create an new strong adhesive, a chemist at 3M instead made a much weaker glue. Now over 50 billion of these common office supplies are made each year using that 'mistake.'
Post It Notes
1.44mb
capacity of a floppy
The Lisa
Apple
"Do or Do not, there is no try"
Empire Strikes Back
Judson Laipply starred in this early viral video by showing off his 'moves', including "the twist," "The moonwalk," and "the macarena."
After a radar engineer noticed a candy bar melting in his pocket, he invented this - the first commercial one was called the "Radarange."
The microwave
56 kbit/s
Most common dialup Speed
Betamax
Sony
"Danger Will Robinson"
Lost In Space
These may sound like three short English words, yes, but they're also the basic operators of boolean logic.
AND, OR, NOT
This playground favorite was initially created as a potential synthetic rubber substitute during WWII.
Silly Putty
1.21 Gigawatts
Zip Disk
Iomega
"On Wednesdays, we wear pink."
Mean Girls
There's some debate if the Sahara desert is the largest desert on earth or if it's the Arctic - but there's no debate about this desert for number three, it covers almost an entire continent!
Great Australian Desert
This popular pink-hued artificial sweetener was discovered accidentally in 1879 when a chemist didn't wash his hands before lunch.
Saccharin
4.77 Mhz
CPU speed of first PC
TRS-80
Tandy
"I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion."
Blade Runner
In 1997, this search engine, named after a P.G. Wodehouse character, invited you to use natural language when searching.
Ask Jeeves
This product was initially meant to protect the paint on rocket ships - now it's used to break loose rusty bolts, and it's blue and yellow can is found in toolboxes around the world.
WD-40
15 Megabytes
Amount of storage Geocities gave for free
Speak-n-Spell
Texas Instruments
"I Feel the Need - the need for speed!"
Top Gun
The aurora borealis are commonly called the Northern Lights, while these are usually referred to as the Southern Lights.
Aurora Australis