You’re reading Significant Digits, a daily digest of the numbers tucked inside the news.
About 10
Number of times somebody tried to camp out and have a slumber party in an IKEA somewhere in the world this year, including two 14-year-olds in Sweden recently. The company is now on record asking teens and others to stop doing it, having never heard of the Streisand Effect evidently. Hear that kids? IKEA slumber parties are the new recreational drug use. [BBC]
22 percent
Percentage of Americans who have given to an online fundraising project. For some context: that’s higher than the number who have used a ride hailing app (15 percent) but lower than the number who have bought tickets from an online reseller (28 percent). [Pew Research Center]
455
Number of scripted television series that aired this year according to the research team at FX, up from 421 last year. If your pilot isn’t already in development, that’s on you. [TV By The Numbers]
2,606
Number of census tracts, plus a further 278 zip codes, where lead poisoning is at least twice as prevalent as it was in Flint, Michigan at the height of Flint’s lead crisis. There are likely more areas, but Reuters was only able to analyze records in 21 states. [Reuters]
$105,803
Cindy Stowell, a 41-year old from Texas, just finished a seven-episode win streak on “Jeopardy!” that aired through Wednesday. Over the course of the run — which was pre-taped in August — Stowell won $105,803 and had a good rapport with Trebek. Now we know that as she taped, Stowell had Stage IV colon cancer with a six-month prognosis, competed despite a blood infection to fulfill a life-long dream, kicked serious tail as far as Jeopardy win streaks go, was raising the money to donate to cancer-related groups and passed away on December 5. I’ll take “Reasons to cry on the subway” for $400, Alex. [SB Nation]
1.3 billion
Tesla has 1.3 billion miles of car-driving data thanks to its Autopilot-equipped vehicles that are already on the road before competitors in Detroit and Silicon Valley can roll self-driving cars off the lot. It’s a massive competitive advantage. [Bloomberg]
Jus so you have a little warning on this, Significant Digits is off between Christmas and New Years. After Friday’s edition, we’ll see you on the other side. Maybe we’ll send you some of the data awards I spent all week writing.
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If you see a significant digit in the wild, send it to @WaltHickey.