Godwin's law

Over here that ratio goes down considerably.

call me a sceptic, but I don’t think studies like this are creditable because you would have to follow every online conversation to get a proper result, and I certainly don’t trust those nazis at wikipedia.

I would also imagine that, given enough list growth and given enough time, virtually any subject is bound to get mentioned eventually – so in this respect, Godwin’s Law strikes me as being merely a special case of the infinite monkey theorem.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infinite_monkey_theorem

@CWO:

I would also imagine that, given enough list growth and given enough time, virtually any subject is bound to get mentioned eventually – so in this respect, Godwin’s Law strikes me as being merely a special case of the infinite monkey theorem.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infinite_monkey_theorem

!!!OIOO OOAHHA AHHA EEE!!!

It is worrying how easily and quickly you pull up pictures of primates, Garg.

@CWO:

I would also imagine that, given enough list growth and given enough time, virtually any subject is bound to get mentioned eventually – so in this respect, Godwin’s Law strikes me as being merely a special case of the infinite monkey theorem.

This.

I see the 3rd post proved the theory right for this thread.  Way to ruin the suspense, Grasshopper

No, wait.  The original poster is guilty.  Is that why you made “0” a choice, Linkon??

This is the Nazi’s fault.

If they hadn’t had started killing people…

@Gargantua:

This is the Nazi’s fault.

If they hadn’t had started killing people…

By that logic, Cancer would be the opening word of every conversation ever.

@Linkon:

Let’s face it, about 75-80% of the Axis discussion’s for this board in general is about the Nazi’s. And I think that on sides of the general game, 65 % of strategy comments direct to the Axis.

Which makes sense.  The three main Allied nations recognized that the biggest threat among the three main Axis nations was the threat posed by Nazi Germany (hence their “Germany first” overall strategy).  I think it was Richard Overy, in his book Why The Allies Won, who described Nazi Germany as being “in a different league altogether” than Japan when it came to its military punch (in terms of both the numbers of divisions it could field and the degree to which those divisions were armoured or mechanized).  As for Italy, it occupied the #3 spot on the list of perceived Axis threats: Gordon Prange’s book Miracle at Midway (if I remember correctly) colourfully refers to Italy as “the tail of the Axis kite.”

Ironically though, they took out Italy first.

Soft underbelly

@Gargantua:

Ironically though, they took out Italy first.

Yup.  As the least dangerous Axis nation, it was the easiest one to knock out of the war first – at least on paper.  The British in particular (unlike the Americans) liked to think of Italy as the “soft underbelly of the crocodile”.  The problem is that Italy’s topography – basically a long line of mountains running up the middle, with narrow lowlands along both coasts – makes it excellent terrain for a determined defender, which the Germans under Kesselring proved to be when they took over much of Italy after the Italians surrendered to the Allies.

Re Italy: Pick on the weakling! Nasty allied nations.
At least we are still better at football.
Fighting in Italy still tied down some very good German Divisions.
Despite the terrain advantage I think it was almost 1-1 in numbers of Divisions engaged, so the Germans were worse off overall.

@wittmann:

Re Italy: Pick on the weakling! Nasty allied nations.
At least we are still better at football.
Fighting in Italy still tied down some very good German Divisions.
Despite the terrain advantage I think it was almost 1-1 in numbers of Divisions engaged, so the Germans were worse off overall.

However you choose to look at it - I think it’s safe to say… alot of good soldiers died.

@Gargantua:

However you choose to look at it - I think it’s safe to say… alot of good soldiers died.

Amen