sporcle blog

Well, I figured it was about time I started to learn a bit more about the countries of the world. While I could have just had one remember them straight from memory, I really find that a visual representation helps one remember them, as well as learn them for the next time.

So I put together a little map and naming game. Each country highlights a color when you get it right, to help distinguish the countries apart. I wanted the map to be small enough to work on multiple resolutions, which is why some of those eastern European countries are a little hard to distinguish, assuming you remember what they’re called. I’m expecting those on the other side of the pond to do better than us Yanks.

Without further ado….
Can you name all the countries of Europe?

With the NFL season fast approaching, all the experts are getting their predictions in before thursday’s Indy/Saints game. Since you still have another day to make or change your picks, here’s a roundup of some of the predictions we could find around the web. We’ll combine these and put them into a pundit group over on sporcle.

Salon: King Kaufman’s AFC preview, shockingly not picking the Dolphins to win anything.

ESPN: Experts roundup.
ESPN Page 2: Greg Easterbrook picks the division winners, and comes up with some seriously whacked expected w/l records.

CBS Sportsline: Going through each division, one day at a time:
AFC East, AFC North, AFC South, AFC West(TBD)
NFC East, NFC North, NFC South, NFC West(TBD)

Sports Illustrated: Who needs online content? Apparently you should be buying the magazine if you want their NFL preview information.

And remember, make your own predictions here, the only place that puts the power of predicting into the hands of the common man or woman.

The NFL season is only a few days away (thursday night starting game? really? football is for sundays. done.), and here’s a little update on what people are predicting.

Sporcle user’s NFL 2007 Predictions

Four teams currently don’t have anyone picking them to win their division. These perennial winners are Buffalo, Cleveland, Washington and Atlanta. I’ll admit, I didn’t pick Atlanta either, but I think Joey Harrington is underrated. I think he’s got a good chance for a rebound year. All those years in Detroit, he was blessed with well…nothing. Pretty much everything around him was awful, from the other players all the way to the owner. I’ll be rooting for him to do well this year, though it’s possible that the curse of being a Lions QB will never rub off.

Looking over the division winners, almost every division has a run away team: (over 60% of users picking them to win)
AFC: New England, Indianapolis, San Diego
NFC: Philadelphia, Chicago, New Orleans, Seattle

Only the AFC North is fairly evenly split amongst Baltimore and Cincinnati. It will be interesting to see if these predicted teams hold up through the season. Another interesting observation, besides the current division leaders having won their division last year, the order of the teams in each division from top to bottom almost exactly mimic the 2006 final standings. Apparently the majority of people don’t believe the notion of parity in the NFL.

New England is currently picked to win the Super Bowl by almost 1 in 4 predictors. They certainly have a great coach, QB and what looks like a good supporting cast. As is usual with all predictions in the NFL though, it really comes down to injuries. If a team can stay healthy and keep most of their starting players through the year, they have a really good chance to win it all.

The statistics will continue to update between now and thursday’s starting game.

Every once in a while in life, you run across something that just takes your breath away. Something that comes out of nowhere, and takes a hold of your brain, and you can’t get it out. At Bumbershoot in Seattle on Saturday, I ran into one of those things. It was the musical duo called Rodrigo y Gabrielaand it was simply phenomenal.

The real amazing part is that I haven’t heard of this group until now. Their album is over a year old, and they’ve been playing together for over 5 years now. Originally from Mexico, they currently live and were discovered in Ireland. The music is all instrumental, and they play 2 acoustic guitars. If you just listen to them, it seriously sounds like there are 4 or 5 people playing.

An example of their live performance, highly recommend if you get a chance:

Their CD is currently #35 in music on Amazon, only costs $9, and comes with a bonus DVD. It will seriously be the cheapest entertainment you’ll buy all year.