So Many Questions

When most people use a search engine they focus on a few key terms, perhaps use quotation marks to find specific phrases or using addition or subtraction marks if they’re a bit more sophisticated in the use of such tools. Others seek knowledge using an actual question, as if the search engine is a human who happens to be sitting somewhere in the cloud. This probably happens less than five percent of the time based on years of screening my access logs.

questions. Image by Andrew Steele; (CC BY-SA 2.0)

So I decided to record search engine queries that arrived in the form of a question on a single day. They provide a fascinating case study as well as an opportunity to present some “greatest hits” from my articles archive. I can only hope that these actual, genuine questions got proper responses from Twelve Mile Circle.

  • Are there any states that split a time zone? – Yes, 14 (not 13!) States are split by time zones.
  • What counties in the united states share a border with their namesake? – There are at least 11 instances of adjacent counties with the same name.
  • Approximately what percent of the population lives within 160km of the us border? – I looked in the logs and determined that this was a visitor from Canada, thus it’s approximately 75%.
  • At what elevation is Nepal? – Mt. Everest is 8,848 m (29,029 ft) and it’s the answer this visitor probably sought. However, what they found was a much more interesting and obscure reference to the lowest elevation in Nepal at 67m (220 ft).
  • How did Gambia get its shape? – Colonialism combined with the Gambia River, put simply.
  • How many sides are there in the shape of the state of Colorado – It depends, but it’s not a rectangle.
  • The prime meridian now goes through which city? – Greenwich, but others too.
  • What are the world’s northernmost and southernmost capitals? – Reykjavík, Iceland and Wellington, New Zealand, respectively [UPDATE: Nuuk, Greenland is now northernmost].
  • What is the smallest county in Alabama by population? – Greene County, 9,974 people in the 2000 Census.
  • Why do you think the time zone boundary lines are not straight lines? – Probably because national, provincial, city, etc., boundaries are not straight lines, and groups of affiliated people don’t want to be split into different times.
  • Why does the southern border of Massachusetts dip into Connecticut? – That’s the Southwick Jog and it has an interesting history.
  • Why is Kearneysville coast guard in West Virginia? – The late Sen. Robert Byrd more than likely had something to do with this, but it’s also because this facility handles functions that don’t depend on access to the sea.

I hope you enjoyed a day in the life of search engine questions on the website.


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3 responses to “So Many Questions”

  1. Anthony Avatar
    Anthony

    Re: counties and namesakes. Delaware County, PA borders Delaware, and Nevada County, CA borders Nevada. Are there others like this?

    1. Twelve Mile Circle Avatar

      There are a number of counties with another state’s name but I’d have to check the maps and see which ones actually border their namesake. It’s probably very few.

  2. Peter Avatar

    At what elevation is Nepal? – Mt. Everest is 8,848 m (29,029 ft) and it’s the answer this visitor probably sought. What they found, however, was a much more interesting and obscure reference to the lowest elevation in Nepal at 67m (220 ft).

    Something I find surprising is that the country whose lowest point is at the highest elevation above sea level is not a country commonly thought of as mountainous, such as Nepal, Bolivia or Switzerland, but Lesotho.

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