The modern magic numbers

In the past (and todays) several numbers have more special places than others. Like Pi (π), which history begins from around 1600 BC. Or the golden ratio (φ), which defines harmony on various designs and architectures, has references back from 2400 years (from 400 BC).

Today, in the 21-th century, the modern & computing era defines many new special numbers. Below are some of them.

a) 404 – The famous error code when a web page is missing, that everybody of us encountered at least once. It’s so popular that webmasters start using the 404 error pages for showing more creativity. Here are some 60 cool examples of 404 pages.\

b) 1337 – Among with 31337 and 13370, they are part of the modern Internet alternative alphabet and language. Yes, in the digital world (and especially hacker’s world), everything should be digits, so to stay elite (which is the original term of eleet, or leet, or 1337), you have to be able to talk in that language. And if you ar3 n0t, h3r3 15 a c0nv3t3r 4 u. Still not convinced? Check the G00gl3 s3arch page in 13370.

c) 42 – 42 is the Ultimate Answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, The Universe, and Everything, as defined from the Douglas Adams’s The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. It took 7½ million years of a supercomputer named Deep Thought to calculate the answer, but unfortunately the Ultimate Question is… unknown. Learn more from here, or by reading the book itself.

You still don’t believe on the ultimate answer? There is a formula to prove it, that even involves the previously listed 1337 number, and the classic pi. Here it is:

What is the pi% of 1337? We asked Wolfram computational machine, and the result is… the answer of everything.

d) 0xCAFEBABE – What is a modern world without the hex number system? Usually, we count in the decimal system, that means all digits that are representing our numbers are from 0..9 (10 digits). The hex number uses 16 digits, and to represent the extras 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, it uses the letters A, B, C, D, E and F. To mark a number as a hex, they usually are marked with “0x” in the beginning. So, the 0xCAFEBABE is 3405691582 in decimal system. That actually does mean nothing, but 0xCAFEBABE is used nowadays as a unique magic number to identify Java compiled binaries files. And since Java is tightly ‘connected’ to coffee, what is sexier than a CAFEBABE?

e) 55378008 – To understand the ‘power’ of this number, you actually have to have a calculator handy. Type the number into the calculator, and turns it upside-down. It reads “BOOBLESS”, and there are many jokes related to this result. One of them.

A woman’s boobs weighed 69 pounds,
which she though was 2, 2, 2 much.
So she went down 51st street
to see DR. X
he gave her 8 pills… which left her…

6922251×8= BOOBLESS

Do you know any numbers of the modern time that is suitable for this list? Please let us know @ the comments .

@ haha.nu

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