The 'bestselling' book about lichens

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Rowan Ellis, Alec Steele and Simon Clark face a question about bulk book buying.
LATERAL is a weekly podcast about interesting questions and even more interesting answers, hosted by Tom Scott. For business enquiries, contestant appearances or question submissions, visit www.lateralcast.com
GUESTS:
Rowan Ellis: @HeyRowanEllis, / heyrowanellis
Alec Steele: @AlecSteele, / alecsteelesteel
Simon Clark: @SimonClark, / simonoxfphys
HOST: Tom Scott.
QUESTION PRODUCER: David Bodycombe.
RECORDED AT: The Podcast Studios, Dublin.
EDITED BY: Julie Hassett.
GRAPHICS: Chris Hanel at Support Class. Assistant: Dillon Pentz.
MUSIC: Karl-Ola Kjellholm ('Private Detective'/'Agrumes', courtesy of epidemicsound.com).
FORMAT: Pad 26 Limited/Labyrinth Games Ltd.
EXECUTIVE PRODUCERS: David Bodycombe and Tom Scott.
© Pad 26 Limited (www.pad26.com) / Labyrinth Games Ltd. 2024.

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Опубликовано:

29 апр 2024

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Комментарии : 171

@WLivi 16 дней назад

I'm half-disappointed nobody went for a Lichen Subscribe gag

@cannot-handle-handles 15 дней назад

Right? My first thought.

@David-ld3ts 16 дней назад

As a lichen aficionado it bothers me how everyone in this video seems to think lichens are plants. They aren’t! Edit: since this comment is getting replies by people who seem interested, lichens are a relationship between a fungi and either a Cyanobacteria or an algae. But it is important to remember that algae are not plants, they’re protists. Although green algae are a sister taxa to plants.

@nodrance 16 дней назад

What are they?

@wesleyevans2981 16 дней назад

@@nodrance Fungi

@MrNicosaure 16 дней назад

Well, from a botanical standpoint, they're a symbiote born from an algae and a fungi, so it is partially a plant, meaning they're partially right But from other points of view, they're only regarded and treated as fungi Taxonomy is a very complex and approximative subject which goal is to name and categorize everything into groups, but nature isn't so simple, if you wanted scientific accuracy, lichen should be its own group, like coral or platypus, but we don't have names for those groups because they only contain 1 member each, so instead we default to one trait and put them in groups they would otherwise not fit, fungi, some greater animal order, and semi-aquatic mammal respectively

@1789Henrique 16 дней назад

@@wesleyevans2981 Aren't lichens some sort of a mutual arrangement between an algae and a fungus?

@jmkqfnvyl87 16 дней назад

Symbiosis between a fungus and algae-like plant. . So not a fungus or a plant but also yes a fungus and a plant . .

@HeyRowanEllis 16 дней назад

sometimes fanfiction knowledge is not enough I guess

@IceMetalPunk 16 дней назад

Lies! Knowing how popular werewolves are helps you understand why this can't be a book on lycans 😁

@spinakker14 16 дней назад

but it was enough to make a great intro! I just wish someone added werewolves from fantasy and rpg to further confuse Tom

@jackleylian 16 дней назад

@@IceMetalPunkp

@estrheagen4160 14 дней назад

I somehow knew it would be the person with blue hair and pronouns going for the lycan interpretation

@Devieus 10 дней назад

Not with that attitude, someone just needs to make a fanfiction about Amazon.

@ExplicableCashew 16 дней назад

Addressing homophones by spelling out the IPA in subtitles was a brilliant solution (and very on brand). The attention to detail never ceases to amaze me

@alexythemechanic8056 16 дней назад

Except for the majority of people who can't read IPA.

@ArifRWinandar 16 дней назад

The subtitles was paid for by Tom's Lamborghini budget

@TheAechBomb 16 дней назад

@@alexythemechanic8056it still helps differentiate them for those that can't hear

@columbus8myhw 15 дней назад

There's a small error, though. It should be /ˈlaɪ.kənz/, not /ˈlaɪ.kəns/. That would be more like "lichence."

@Alsadius 16 дней назад

I now want to know how badly Amazon's wallet got hammered when the publisher saw the demand for this book and put it back into print.

@BarryFrancis 16 дней назад

The joke would have been on them had the publisher thought “We are getting so many orders for this book we’ll have to reprint it” and the next time they ordered them with the book they wanted they got nine copies of this book on lichen.

@TarunoNafs 16 дней назад

And the publisher, 2991 copies in their warehouse.

@artemisspawnofzeus7732 16 дней назад

The issue is that if they did stock the book there are so many alternative books that would work just as well

@ZipplyZane 15 дней назад

I suspect they would find out about the reprinting before they started shipping, and switch to a different book But, if not, you can return the books you don't sell. Still, it might have made sense to have a bunch of different books to use to avoid any one seeming to be popular enough for that.

@tomgidden 15 дней назад

Back in 2009 my sister called me to ask if I wanted to see this new movie, ‘Underworld: Rise of the Lycans’. Not knowing much about the franchise, I asked “is that a movie about vampires versus… moss?”

@ArifRWinandar 16 дней назад

Not even a minute in and there's IPA in the subtitle

@amelialikesfrogs5778 16 дней назад

very tom scott

@myladycasagrande863 16 дней назад

@@amelialikesfrogs5778but Tom doesn't drink. (I'll see myself out)

@amelialikesfrogs5778 16 дней назад

@@myladycasagrande863 please do

@ids1024 16 дней назад

MOS is metal-oxide semiconductor (like in MOSFET transistor, and the company MOS Technology that made the 6502). But I can't think of a computer-related meaning of "moss" with two s at the end.

@aluced 16 дней назад

There's Maurice Moss from IT Crowd of course!

@Archgeek0 16 дней назад

Metal Oxide Semiconductor Field Effect Transistor transistor?

@wta1518 14 дней назад

@@Archgeek0 You can pay for them with cash from the Automated Teller Machine machine.

@Archgeek0 14 дней назад

@@wta1518 Provided of course you have your Personal Information Number number on hand.

@ajk7801 День назад

The notable ones are all old. MIME Object Security Services from 2012 is obsolete. Microsoft Office SharePoint Server was a 2007 release, also obsolete. And the Map Overlay & Statistical System came out in 1979 and is long superceded. Obviously there are some OSS projects called MOSS on GitHub but nothing particularly significant.

@davidroddini1512 16 дней назад

And here I thought that someone at Amazon was just really lichen that book 🤣

@anotherone5235 16 дней назад

As soon as the One Less than 10 came up I knew exactly what was going on.

@cheekychappy1234 16 дней назад

MOSS is an algorithm for detecting similarity between two documents. Often used in plagiarism detection.

@sandwich2473 16 дней назад

very nice!

@Albatross-365 16 дней назад

Anyone else shouting IT Crowd when Alec asked if Moss was computer related?

@globalincident694 16 дней назад

It's also an acronym for Microsoft Office SharePoint Server, which was the former name of Microsoft Sharepoint.

@TimeShrike 16 дней назад

I only got CMOS and MOSFET... oh and now remembered the thought I had about "that Commodore chip" which was a MOS Chip (MOS 6502).

@CharlieMile 16 дней назад

I was searching through the comments for this!!

@RFC3514 16 дней назад

I just shouted "tnetennba"!

@Squant 15 дней назад

No, I wouldn't shout at people on a screen who can't hear me. It's weird.

@hannahk1306 16 дней назад

I'm a surprised that Amazon weren't eventually blacklisted by the publishers! From their perspective, repetitive orders of the same out-of-print book would seem like a scam to get the books at the cheaper price.

@panda4247 16 дней назад

Well, Amazon is a scam, all right

@thesuperknot_ 16 дней назад

I love when I know a Lateral answer before any of the contestants have begun asking questions.

@soffeebeans 16 дней назад

Holy moly one that I knew right off the bat from the BtB episode on Jeff Bezos! Also, great guests, I'd love to see Dr. Simon Clark on more of these!

@jeffhappens1 16 дней назад

Rowan Ellis and Simon Clark!!!!! And awesome to learn about Alex Steele

@Mike7906-fj8gc 16 дней назад

Alec is amazing!

@polypolyman 16 дней назад

I'm just imagining that book someday going back in print and Amazon getting thousands of copies shipped and billed to them all at once

@Kumimono 16 дней назад

Not quite moss, but MOS was was a well know chip maker, whose products ran such devices as Commodore 64 and the Nintendo Entertainment System.

@davidshi451 16 дней назад

There's this really beautiful article on JSTOR about Elke Mackenzie, a pioneering lichenologist who tried to credit herself after her gender transition.

@RossParker1877 16 дней назад

Thank you Tom for pronouncing Lichen correctly

@DrZaius3141 16 дней назад

Weird how people are always bitchin' about lichen.

@hkr667 16 дней назад

blame WOW and their lich king.

@RFC3514 16 дней назад

Actually, the original (Greek) word sounds closer to "ch" than "k".

@Zadster 16 дней назад

Pretty much all computers use sea moss. Okay, CMOS. Complementary Metal-Oxide-Semiconductors. The design of transistors that forms logic gates in very nearly all computers since the mid 1980s. Super low power, only draws current when actively switching.

@ihathtelekinesis 16 дней назад

Fly Fishing by JR Hartley walked so lichen could run.

@deebea6364 15 дней назад

I love this series 🙌🏼

@macdjord 14 дней назад

Huh. I was certain this was going to be some sort of testing thing, where they kept ordering this one particular obscure book as part of checking their systems worked. (I'm reminded about the old DailyWTF article 'I'VE GOT THE MONKEY NOW', about a book ordering system which allowed test orders for a particular book to go into the live system's database. They never actually fulfilled these orders, but the apparent sales created a fictional bestseller which eventually got a sequel!)

@spinakker14 16 дней назад

Rowan is always a delight to hear, I can't wait to listen to the whole episode

@lanielas 16 дней назад

MOSS is a program used to detect plagiarism in computer code. Used it a lot as a TA

@Demasx 16 дней назад

I was proud... then immediately ashamed, I knew something that Tom didn't 😅

@danielleoliver1734 16 дней назад

The best book about lichens is undoubtedly gathering moss by Robin Wall Kemmerer, nothing to do with the question but got to love a botanist poets writing

@darklajid 9 дней назад

I've never heard of Simon before but now I'll go try and find him online!

@pthelo 16 дней назад

Oh cool! Alec Steele!

@pipwilson7435 16 дней назад

That was pretty clever. The ecologist in me found it very difficult listening to lichens being called mosses.

@WyvernYT 15 дней назад

I knew there would be indignant botanists in the comments explaining the difference, but for the sake of keeping the show moving I can see why that wouldn't be a productive tangent.

@MegaLokopo 16 дней назад

You can do the same thing with any website that has a minimum order quantity, but can't check the stock themselves. Like instacart, doordash or other services like that. Order what you want, and then a whole lot of something that you know is out of stock.

@rogerorchard2317 15 дней назад

MOS was a UK chip maker in the 70s that later renamed to INMos, you have used some of the things that came out of the office in Bristol (they got merged into ST)

@a4d9 15 дней назад

MOS was a little company that invented a little 8 bit microprocessor called 6502, used in washing machines, tamagotchi, Terminator T800, Bender, Apple II, NES, and Commodore 64.

@jaywu1951 9 дней назад

God, this subtitles are incredible

@rishitchithirala2977 16 дней назад

Tbf it's mythological fiction knowledge because it's named after Lycaon who was the first werewolf in Greek myth

@michaelocyoung 16 дней назад

Tom Scott is all about ducks, not werewolves.

@danilkinilya1242 16 дней назад

We desperately need a question about wereducks

@WyvernYT 15 дней назад

I remember the ducks video. That was lovely.

@fsodn 11 дней назад

What color are the ducks? And how does he feel about geese?

@suNn.K.O 16 дней назад

Microsoft SharePoint was at some point known as Microsoft Office SharePoint Server, so there's ya IT MOSS abbreviation.

@helenbaumander3953 16 дней назад

I'd argue that it's mythology knowledge, not fan or literary fiction knowledge. But mythology tends to appear in both.

@void.reality 16 дней назад

MOS Technology was a semiconductor production company that created chips powering a lot of computers and consoles in the 80s-90s, such as the Atari 2600 and Commodore 64, eventually being out by Commodore.

@elisam.r.9960 12 дней назад

Now I really want to read that book about lichens.

@BonkedByAScout 5 дней назад

There was a semiconductor manufacturer named MOS. They made the Commodore 64.

@TheM0JEC 16 дней назад

Moss in computers Metal Oxide Semi conductor (I.e. CMOS) springs to mind.

@isaacbobjork7053 15 дней назад

Moss was one of the characters in IT Crew so yeah

@mementomori5580 16 дней назад

If anything, it should be Scott being called out not knowing about Lycans, considering how relatively prevalent they are in both writing and film.

@RFC3514 16 дней назад

The "an" in "lycanthrope" belongs to the second part of the word ("anthropos"). It's not lycan+thrope, it's lyc(o)+anthrope. "Lycan" is just a shortened version of the full word, so it wouldn't be "lycan the wolf", it would be "lycan the werewol".

@vailpcs4040 16 дней назад

For a short period of time, there was a Microsoft Office Sharepoint Server.

@sophiamarchildon3998 13 дней назад

Initial thoughts: some book data (e.g. title, item number, URL part) wasn't being properly parsed, escaped, or sanitized, effecting "new orders" in the system. It could be from SQL injections, XSS, data manipulations, or basic malfunctions (bugs).

@garybarnes4169 11 дней назад

Well, "Moss" is in the IT Crowd, so technically correct. Which is the best kind of correct.

@JonBrase 16 дней назад

Strictly speaking "Lycanthrope" is another word for werewolf, and "Lycan" is slang among tabletop RPGers for "Lycanthrope".

@nanardeurlambda 16 дней назад

0:15 was it a weird aspect of that book's id in amazon' s database? 5:50 I did think of part of that, but couldn't get the full picture.

@Mosethyoth 14 дней назад

My first thought: "Lycans? Oh this could've been so funny if it were about Amazon Werehouses."

@cemace90 15 дней назад

Love Lateral! Bit off topic: Could we have a Technical Difficultities special of Lateral?

@fsodn 11 дней назад

I would *pay* for that.

@KBerg486 8 дней назад

I am surprised the publishers didn't look at the demand, and decide to reprint this popular Lichen book. Think of how many thousands of copies Amazon was trying to order.

@markedis5902 16 дней назад

MOS Metal Oxide Silicone as in MOSFET

@sanfordgfogg 15 дней назад

MOSFET is a type of transistor that is used to physically build/design CPU's

@glossaria2 16 дней назад

Now I want a copy of the lichen book. *pout*

@robertskitch 16 дней назад

I'm curious as to what the title of the lichen book was, and I wonder if it was any good (not that I know anything about books about lichen).

@TarunoNafs 16 дней назад

Funny that I did the exact same thing with Amazon to get their free shipping.

@markusklyver6277 16 дней назад

MOSS may refer to: Technology Map Overlay and Statistical System, a geographic information system (GIS) Microsoft SharePoint, known in its 2007 version as Microsoft Office SharePoint Server (MOSS) MIME Object Security Services, an IETF security protocol Mobile submarine simulator, a sonar decoy Morocco Oukaimeden Sky Survey, an astronomical survey of Solar System objects in Morocco Other uses Market Oriented Sector Selective talks, trade negotiations between the United States and Japan in 1984 MOSS (company), a Japanese video game company MoSS, a Canadian hip-hop producer Mini One Stop Shop, the European Union VAT system for cross-border B2C e-services.

@glratt 16 дней назад

MOS - metal-oxide-semiconductor

@garybarnes4169 11 дней назад

I've actually done this to Amazon. I ordered a n item that wasn't in stock to get the total up over the £25 for free-delivery.

@lateralcast 11 дней назад

Plot twist!

@garybarnes4169 11 дней назад

@@lateralcast Another great standby is if I want free delivery on something, I just add a 12kg bag of Wagg to the order. Hey, the boys are going to eat it anyway.

@sandwich2473 16 дней назад

I heard this before but for the life of me I couldn't remember it I can't even remember where it was that I heard it

@davidf2281 16 дней назад

If you think Moss has no obvious uses in computing then my answer to you is TNETENNBA.

@shambhav9534 16 дней назад

I wonder why they didn't bring the Lichen book back to print. One night of good business and suddenly Amazon is bankrupt, only a few thousand books about lichen to their name.

@lightningpastry2153 15 дней назад

So no love for the third synonym, "likens," then?

@keepmewierd 16 дней назад

6:32 So I still don't understand. Was Amazon receiving the other 9 and returning them or finagling the system to just get one book? And how would that different from any other book store?

@hannahk1306 16 дней назад

They were only sent the one book that was actually ordered, because the other one that they "ordered" was out of print, so there was no stock to send out. Traditional bookshops buy multiple books and often multiple copies of the same book at once, because they want to stock their shelves. However, Amazon didn't have anywhere to store stock at that time and as an online retailer they didn't need the physical copies to be able to sell them. So they only wanted to order what the customer actually purchased, but the publishers had a minimum order of ten books - hence the workaround.

@keepmewierd 16 дней назад

@@hannahk1306 Thank you! I was caught up on this specific book about lichen before realizing that just meant "obviously out of print" (rude) lol

@steamcastle 16 дней назад

What about MOS Technology, ? they made the 6502, which with its low cost made the Apple ii and the Commodore happen.

@KernelLeak 16 дней назад

2:30 What, no CMOS?

@snowconesyrup2698 16 дней назад

Today I learn Lichen is not said how I thought it was

@tttITA10 16 дней назад

So... what book about lichens was it? I feel like I must read it now, to make it up to the author.

@liquidgecka 16 дней назад

CMOS [Complementary Metal-Oxide-Semiconductor] =)

@JohnADoe-pg1qk 16 дней назад

MOS-FET

@cannot-handle-handles 15 дней назад

3:40 He's think of Fermat primes but more importantly: Since when is 9 a prime? 😆

@erictaylor5462 11 дней назад

But, because they were getting so many orders for this book, they ordered another printing run.

@eastmeetswestpresents6923 16 дней назад

Hang on, didnt Matt Parker cover something about this?

@andrewgrant6516 16 дней назад

To be fair, that's exactly what I do when Bezos insists I spend another three pounds on books to get free shipping.

@teh-maxh 16 дней назад

I thought maybe "order" meant "sort".

@mittfh 14 дней назад

Acorn MOS Acorn ADFS BASIC >_

@yugimotobutjacked3231 16 дней назад

How do I watch the show in video without downloading some terrible program like spotify, or Pocket cast. Good lord certainly not an apple product.

@EnderLord99 11 дней назад

"Lycan" is Latin for "wolf" whereas "lichen" is a fungalgae blob. Both can be monsters, in a way...

@nimennacnamme6328 16 дней назад

Someone was just *that* desperate and wanted to lichen subscribe!

@redfrog9717 15 дней назад

Does this have to do with how Amazon used to be Jeff Bezos’s way of getting textbooks cheaper? Or was that a folktale?

@WitherBossEntity 16 дней назад

The "moss" bit irritates me.

@pincushionllama 16 дней назад

lycan vs lichen GO!

@test74088 15 дней назад

It's best not to liken lycan and lichen.

@AFNacapella 16 дней назад

I'm _lichen_ this panel kthxbaiiii

@JanKowalski-wb8ih 14 дней назад

Jesus Christ, Tom, how the heck could you say they are plants like moss?! They are symbiotic colonies of algae and fungi.

@zofiabochenska1240 16 дней назад

As a non-native I only knew of one lycan - the warewolf one 😅

@kelvintan3174 16 дней назад

Microsoft Open Source Software?😅😂 Idiosyncrasy i know.

@SRG-Learn 16 дней назад

Apart from being some of the worst offenders among adobe, apple, autodesk and such, microsoft is doing better in the recent years. Still, don't trust them.

@rugvedkulkarni1593 16 дней назад

I thought it had something to do with lichen sounding like " like and subscribe"

@Simon-fg8iz 16 дней назад

And here I am cringing when they keep saying lichen is moss... it's NOT MOSS!

@sortius_ 16 дней назад

This one was almost too easy. How do a bunch of RU-vidrs not get it?

@panda4247 16 дней назад

It's funny that Tom did not know about lycan(thrope)s. I did not know that lichen is pronounced that way.. am I the only one who assumed it's similar to the Lich king, or Lichess?