68
votes
Did Donald Trump call Alicia Machado "Miss Piggy" and "Miss Housekeeping"?
This is Machado's own claim, as she confirmed to the New York Times today.
Ms. Machado recalled the taunts from Mr. Trump that Mrs. Clinton invoked on Monday night, as well as another sobriquet: “...
- 44.9k
60
votes
Accepted
Will tuning your TV to a channel that isn't the presidential inauguration lower its ratings?
No, unless you're part of one of the relatively small number of pre-selected households whose viewing habits are measured (the "Nielsen families")
There's not a lot of clarity about how many ...
- 4,360
51
votes
Accepted
Mythbusters tested a material that was so explosive they didn't release the episode and contacted DARPA
It's true, according to what Adam Savage (i.e. one of the MythBusters) said at Silicon Valley Comic Con 2016, as can be seen in this video here. This is what he said:
The biggest disaster we had was ...
- 30.7k
45
votes
Accepted
Did Donald Trump call Alicia Machado "Miss Piggy" and "Miss Housekeeping"?
Machado made the same claims in an interview with Inside Edition in May 2016:
Machado, who claims she actually gained closer to 15 pounds, told IE
she felt publicly shamed. She said he called her ...
- 610
40
votes
Accepted
Have any versions of "Who Wants to be a Millionaire?" had to remove the Ask the Audience lifeline due to the audience purposely voting wrong?
The Ask the Audience lifeline was removed from the show, but the reason is straightforward: they had to get rid of the audience due to COVID concerns. According to the Millionaire wiki, this change ...
- 30.7k
26
votes
Accepted
Was National Geographic just filming a snake attack a child and not helping?
The image is not from National Geographic, but from the TV show Nature's Deadliest (image 3 in the slideshow) from Animal Planet.
Waffelsatnoon.com and hoaxorfact.com both describe it as ...
tim♦
- 51.9k
20
votes
Accepted
Does Arabic graffiti in "Homeland" criticise the show?
According to Google Translate, "Homeland is Racist" will translate to "الوطن عنصري", which you can compare to the graffiti:
From this article
These do look very similar. In fact, the only ...
- 3,865
18
votes
Accepted
Do Chevrolet commercials feature "Real people. Not actors."?
Summary: Chevrolet explain that they took some effort to avoid actors, but further investigation found that some had appeared in the adverts.
The "Real People, Not Actors" is a ad campaign which is ...
- 22.7k
18
votes
Accepted
Is the diner slang in this scene real?
I'll take a...
Double Triple ("Super Double Triple Patty" is on the menu, or possibly it's asking for two "triples", which would have 3 patties each)
Bossy (beef)
Deluxe (double ...
- 30.7k
17
votes
Accepted
Is "the funniest interview you will ever see" genuine?
It turns out it's a sketch, part of the Flemish series of mockumentaries "In De Gloria".
In 2006 one of the sketches, "Boemerang" (Boomerang) gained notoriety on YouTube. It features the host of a ...
- 78.6k
15
votes
Accepted
Is Russian TV airing a "hunger games" like reality series where contestants can rape, kill or be killed?
The BBC reported on this in a little more detail a little while back: http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/article/38342421/russia-does-the-hunger-games-for-real-in-siberia-but-no-guns-are-allowed
A Russian ...
- 3,044
15
votes
Have any versions of "Who Wants to be a Millionaire?" had to remove the Ask the Audience lifeline due to the audience purposely voting wrong?
Is this claim true for Russian [...] version of "Who Wants to be a Millionaire"?
Can't say for all nations, but that particular screenshot doesn't match the claim in any way.
That Reddit ...
- 251
14
votes
Will tuning your TV to a channel that isn't the presidential inauguration lower its ratings?
EDIT:
From the most up to date source I could find:
"Families are asked to track their viewing habits for a certain period of time. A small collection of these families makes up a sample size that ...
- 251
13
votes
Accepted
Was the U.S. government responsible for Popeye's dependance on spinach?
No.
The 'eat your vegs' campaign as an established social norm is older, started with World War One, not during the Depression. Further, spinach is no meat substitute, whether you look for any iron ...
- 44k
13
votes
Accepted
Did Bear Grylls see Rob Hall's body on Everest?
Is Rob Hall's body still on Everest...
Yes. (Unless something very unusual has happened very recently.)
Virtually all the people who died on Everest (or other extremely high mountains) are still up ...
- 19k
12
votes
Will tuning your TV to a channel that isn't the presidential inauguration lower its ratings?
Yes (but no)
There are two parts to the Nielsen ratings, the total number of viewers (Points) and the Share.
A Ratings Point is 1% of the total number of households.
The Share is the percentage of ...
- 990
11
votes
Accepted
Does using the computer before sleeping affect sleep patterns?
Make your own conclusion from the sources mentioned
This is evidence showing that using face-to-screen electronics before going to bed could harm your sleep.
For instance, this study, published in ...
- 30.3k
11
votes
Accepted
Is this metric system video, apparently taken from Fox news, a deep fake?
The original question asked whether the video is satirical. The answer to this is no. We can prove this on the strength that the arguments made by Tucker Carlson's guest have been published non-...
- 44.9k
10
votes
Is this metric system video, apparently taken from Fox news, a deep fake?
This link, titled "Can the US continue to stand alone against the metric system?", is from foxnews.com, and has been there for several days that I know of. It is apparently the same video as the ...
- 5,550
10
votes
Accepted
Are North American children adopting British accents because of Peppa Pig?
The Guardian did a short piece on this and the bottom line is straightforward:
American kids may have picked up a Britishism or two, but the claim that they’re developing a whole accent based off a ...
- 7,352
9
votes
Does Arabic graffiti in "Homeland" criticise the show?
Yes, it does.
The German newspaper Die Zeit (The Times) has also covered this event by interviewing the Arabic artist Caram Kapp, who was asked by the creators of the show to spray the graffiti.
...
- 18.7k
8
votes
Accepted
Was there ever a cable channel called The Puppy Channel which broadcast for three years?
According to this episode of This American Life, Dan FitzSimons started the Puppy Channel in June 1996, and worked on the concept for 5 years. Unfortunately, no cable distributor bought the show.
- 344
7
votes
Does watching television damage the eyes?
No, watching too much television does not directly cause myopia.
Walter Wood has debunked the theory that too much near work causes myopia.
In his book The Ultimate Unification of Diet Health and ...
- 511
7
votes
Did ABC News briefly report that Hillary Clinton had died in the hospital, and did ABC confirm it on the phone with Infowars?
tl;dr An anchorman did start a news show with the words "…about Hillary Clinton's death…". That seems to have been a simple one word mixup for whatever reason, broadcast live once, uncorrected. Who ...
- 44k
7
votes
Did the CNN live election analysis show a porn site logo during broadcast?
No, it didn't. This tweet shows the original unedited video. There was a popup which explains why the news anchor (John King) looked a bit annoyed but it's unclear what the popup was, but definitely ...
- 1,319
6
votes
Accepted
Is the chance of solving a murder cut in half if they don't find a lead within the first 48 hours?
The best research I'm aware of is a Washington Post investigation of 8,000 murder arrests. Their data journalists found that half of the arrests happened in 10 days or fewer, not 48 hours.
A ...
- 731
5
votes
Is Russian TV airing a "hunger games" like reality series where contestants can rape, kill or be killed?
No, this information seems to be false at this moment.
The only information regarding illegal activities that I managed to find on their official website is:
VIOLATION OF THE LAWS OF THE RUSSIAN ...
- 556
5
votes
Accepted
Did Tomoaki Hamatsu live entirely on contest winnings?
NPR investigated this and found that he was given bread until he actually won food.
(Nasubi's testimony) The staff got together and would give me
basically a very simple little bread each day, so ...
- 44.9k
5
votes
Accepted
Did Rossiya 24 show an advertisement for Russian women to marry Chinese men?
(partial answer based on findings by this moment)
Misleading
So was this clip shown as an advert on Rossiya 24?
The only truth seems to be that this clip was, indeed, produced for a Russian ...
- 2,329
Only top scored, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible