9 ms·
Who is this "Franklin" guy he keeps talking about? Franklin Roosevelt?
by mjd 2y ago
Who is this "Franklin" guy he keeps talking about? Franklin Roosevelt?
- mdp2021 2y agoFirst line: > Benjamin Franklin wrote and published Poor Richard's Almanack annually from 1732 to 1758
- mjd 2y agoLike I'm going to believe some guy who doesn't even know how to spell "almanac"
- mdp2021 2y agoI suppose you understand that there is no objective rule to transliterate 'al-manakh' into IE dialects, so I must guess you are joking. Benjamin Franklin, you know: Founding Father [of the USA], signer of the Declaration of Independence and of the Constitution; first postmaster general of the USA; first US ambassador to France; secretary and president of the American Philosophical Society; inventor of the lightning rod and bifocal eyeglasses; founder of the Library Company and the University of Pennsylvania... Polymath, inspirational figure... And surely you know that jokes in these pages make sense only if they fulfill the purpose HN has.
- baruz 2y agoI believe user mjd is Mark J Dominus, ie, Perl-lover. Check the OP.
- mdp2021 2y agoThanks. So, if I may, jumping in like a Lord Flashheart. Well I could not predict it the same way I could not predict Stravinsky doing somersaults on stage.
- madcaptenor 2y agoI knew he was a Perl lover and I've been reading plover.com for at least fifteen years but I had not made that connection.
- tomcam 2y agoLove it! I am observing a moment of silence for your no-doubt plummeting karma scores
- fuzztester 2y agohn karma score be like no one care about em. dey no have value in de real world except for hipsters. eye em oh.
- tomcam 2y agoYou get da wrong spelling brah, it be hipstas
- fuzztester 2y agobe it, reeeely? nope, dope. * * #sorrycudnresistderhyme repeat afta me: we doan need no spellucation!
- tomcam 2y agowe doan need no thot control
- fuzztester 2y ago:) ah said ta repeat afta me, but ya went ahead, bro! ennyway, kudos, n sudos! ah B frum Unix land, you C ...
- fuzztester 2y agomark-jason, imo, you should have said, "some guy who don't' even know how to spell 'almanac' ". that would have made your trick more believable. still, nice try. :)
- chrisco255 2y agoBack in the day when we had paper currency (before Apple Pay), you would find this guy on the most expensive denomination: $100. $100 used to be a lot of money. Benji also printed his own benjis: https://arstechnica.com/science/2023/07/was-benjamin-franklin-the-first-to-incorporate-colored-fiber-into-currency/ https://arstechnica.com/science/2023/07/was-benjamin-frankli...
- bigstrat2003 2y ago$100 still is a lot of money. It's not as much as it used to be (thanks for nothing, inflation) to be sure. But I would be upset if I lost $100 in a way that I wouldn't be if I lost $1 or even $10.
- ashton314 2y agoThat’s when I made my first million dollars. Back then, that was a lot of money. — Daddy Warbucks, *Annie*
- NathanaelRea 2y agoThe first $100 US note was issued in 1862, adjusting for inflation about $3,000 in 2024.
- 082349872349872 2y agoWho is this "mjd" guy who keeps talking about himself in the third person? Mason-Jominus Dark?
- mjd 2y agoWe prefer DARK MOMINUS.
- 082349872349872 2y agoDon't try to frighten us with your sorcerer's ways, Lord Mominus. Your sad devotion to that ancient religion has not helped you conjure up the stolen data tapes... [but seriously: did you ever figure out whether it was more likely Loki had thought of the goat shtick beforehand or not?]
- knodi123 2y agoBenny Franklin, some ye olde guy who is only famous for his groundbreaking discovery that black clothes make you hotter than white clothes.
- jhbadger 2y agoAlso famous for getting electricity signs wrong, not understanding that electrons existed and had charges that were "negative" according to his definition.
- IncreasePosts 2y agoHe didn't get it wrong - it is entirely arbitrary. Though it might be fair to say that it would be more useful to beginners studying electromagnetism if he had reversed the signs.
- bigstrat2003 2y agoAlso famous for advising young men that if they're gonna have premarital sex, they should bang old women and not young women.
- jppope 2y agoThats just science. Older women are more experienced generally
- elzbardico 2y agoThe downvotes you seem to be getting only confirms that HN average commenter have a very poor sense of humour and take themselves too much seriously.
- krapp 2y agoHumor is for the dregs on Reddit. Hacker News is serious business.
- 2y ago
- silisili 2y agoI'm not sure I've seen someone troll their audience about their own article. Masterful.
- msla 2y agoAnyway, your post is serendipitous: Not very long ago (well, mid-May) I was looking for scans of Poor Richard's Almanack and I found the same things you did: The www.rarebookroom.org site, and its unfortunate UI. Thanks for putting the files up in a more convenient fashion.
- mjd 2y agoI'm glad I could help.