Wikipedia:Main Page history/2020 February 16

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From today's featured article

Yuri Lowenthal

Marvel's Spider-Man is a 2018 action-adventure game developed by Insomniac Games for the PlayStation 4 console. In the main storyline, the crime lord Mister Negative threatens to release a deadly virus; Spider-Man, voiced by Yuri Lowenthal (pictured), must confront him and protect New York City. Shown in third-person perspective, the superhero can move freely around the city, interacting with characters, undertaking missions, and casting webs to incapacitate foes. Development began in 2014 and took approximately four years. Reviewers praised the game for its narrative, characterization, combat, and web-swinging traversal mechanics, although some criticized its open-world design for lacking innovation. Spider-Man became one of the best-selling PlayStation 4 games of all time, and the fastest-selling superhero game in the United States. It was followed by the downloadable, story-based Spider-Man: The City that Never Sleeps, which was released monthly from October to December 2018. (Full article...)

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Did you know ...

Teraupo'o and his family

... that Raiatean chief Teraupo'o (pictured) was captured on the night of 15–16 February 1897 and sent into exile for leading an indigenous resistance against the French takeover of the Leeward Islands?
... that a fire training academy in the state of Washington has been designated as a quarantine site during the current coronavirus outbreak?
... that in his ballet Alice im Wunderland, composer Herbert Baumann made the story's author a character?
... that Leprous's 2019 album Pitfalls took shape from its songwriter's depression and anxiety?
... that American missionary William Harrison Anderson staked a land claim in Rhodesia for the Rusangu Mission by carving a message on a tree trunk?
... that groups of social feather dusters sway in unison in the water current and retract into their tubes at the slightest disturbance?
... that Anoosh Masood Chaudhry completed a medical degree before entering law enforcement and becoming an assistant superintendent of police?
... that to commemorate its new call letters in 1938, radio station KITE in Kansas City, Missouri, gave away 15,000 kites to children?

In the news

Bong Joon-ho

The Irish general election concludes with no party holding a majority of seats in Dáil Éireann.
South Korean film Parasite wins four Academy Awards, including Best Picture and Best Director for Bong Joon-ho (pictured).
A mass shooting in Korat, Thailand, leaves 30 people dead and more than 50 others injured.
Two avalanches near the Turkish town of Bahçesaray kill at least 41 people.

On this day

February 16: Day of the Shining Star in North Korea

Painting of the burning Philadelphia by Edward Moran

1270 – Livonian Crusade: In the Battle of Karuse, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania achieved a decisive victory over the Livonian Order on the frozen surface of the Baltic Sea.
1804 – First Barbary War: Lieutenant Stephen Decatur led a U.S. Navy raid to destroy the captured USS Philadelphia in the harbor of Tripoli (depicted), denying her use to the Barbary States.
1936 – In the Spanish general election, the Popular Front coalition of left-wing parties came to power, precipitating the Spanish Civil War five months later.
1985 – The Lebanese Shia political and paramilitary organization Hezbollah released a manifesto describing its ideology and goals.
2005 – The Kyoto Protocol, an extension to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, entered into force.

Richard of Dover (d. 1184) · Heinz-Wolfgang Schnaufer (b. 1922) · Theresa Goh (b. 1987)

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Today's featured picture

The Dharmaraya Swamy Temple is one of the oldest temples in Bangalore, India. It is thought to be more than 800 years old and is built in the Dravidian style, with a gopuram, an ornate monumental entrance tower. Gods worshipped here include Dharmaraya, Krishna, Arjuna, Draupadi and Bhima.

The Karaga festival starts from the temple each year; the festival is dedicated to Draupadi, the most important female character in the Hindu epic, the Mahabharata. Starting at midnight, a priest dressed as a woman carries an earthen pot filled with water and adorned with decorations several feet high on his head in procession through the town, preceded by hundreds of bare-chested, dhoti-clad, turbaned Veerakumaras bearing unsheathed swords.

Photograph credit: Muhammad Mahdi Karim

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