Qi 1227 Facts

QI'' is the smartest comedy show on British television, but few people know that we''''re also a major legal hit in Australia, New Zealand, Israel and Africa and an illegal one on BitTorrent. We also write books and newspaper columns; run a thriving webs ite, a Facebook page, a Twitter feed; and produce an iPhone App and a sister Radio 4 programme. At the core of what we do is the astonishing fact - painstakingly researched and distilled to a brilliant and shocking clarity. In Einstein''''s words: ''''Ever ything should be as simple as possible, but not simpler.'''' Did you know that: cows moo in regional accents; the entire internet weighs less than a grain of sand; the dialling code from Britain to Russia is 007; potatoes have more chromosomes than huma n beings; the London Underground has made more money from its famous map than it has from running trains; Tintin is called Tantan in Japanese because TinTin is pronounced ''''Chin chin'''' and means penis; the water in the mouth of a blue whale weighs more than its body; Scotland has twice as many pandas as Conservative MPs; Saddam''''s bunker was designed by the grandson of the woman who built Hitler''''s bunker; Under the Wildlife and Countryside Act of 1981, it is explicitly illegal in Britain to use a m achinegun to kill a hedgehog. ''1,227 QI Facts To Blow Your Socks Off'' will make you look at the universe (and your socks) in an alarming new way.