Baseball and the Price of Gas

This is only tangentially related to the usual subjects I cover in this blog, but it certainly relates to the way I approach research and blogging. I am always doing research online, and during summer evenings and weekends that activity is often accompanied by the day's radio broadcast of the Oakland A's baseball game -- the best baseball team here in the San Francisco Bay Area, by any objective standard.

Tonight was no different, and A's broadcaster Robert Buan caught my attention when he opened the post-game show. He pointed out that in winning tonight, the A's have secured their biggest lead in their division since September 30, 1992. As a fan of the team, this is interesting; to everyone else it's probably instantly forgettable. But more intriguing was what he actually said -- in the very first sentence of the program. He opened his show with this statement:

According to a reliable authority, wikipedia.com, the last time the A's had a lead of six and a half games in the American League West, gas was selling for $1.38.

I couldn't help reflecting on how much the Web is changing the way everyone approaches information and research!