Smokey wins Guinness record for Loudest Purr

A British shorthair cat has set a Guinness World Records title for having the loudest purr in the world.

Smokey the cat, 12, a grey and white tabby from Northampton, has been officially recognized as the world’s loudest purring domestic cat. During the Guinness record test, Smokey’s purr peaked at a record-setting 67.7 decibels, and she has been known to purr at home as loudly as 90 decibels — that's as loud as a lawnmower. Most domestic cats purr at around 25 decibels.

A car horn reaches 110 decibels, and a rock concert 120 decibels, Guinness said. The loudest animal sounds are the low-frequency pulses made by blue whales and fin whales, which can reach 188 decibels.

"It's incredible to think that a cat's purr can be as loud as a vacuum cleaner," said Guinness World Records' editor-in-chief Craig Glenday.

Smokey’s owner, Ruth Adams, adopted the tabby from an animal rescue center three years ago. Adams said that Smokey purrs almost all the time, except for when she is sleeping. Smokey first got into competitive purring when Adams started a loudest purr competition in Northampton to promote a charity called Cats Protection. A local community college recorded the purr and submitted it to Guinness.

Guinness World Records announces top 50 game characters

Guinness World Records has declared the top 50 video game characters of all time, with Nintendo's Mario was rated top. The Legend of Zelda's Link came second, while Microsoft's enigmatic space soldier Master Chief followed in third place.

Nintendo had 11 characters in the Top 50, followed by Sony and Capcom with six and five, respectively. However, there are several widely recognizable characters that were not feature in the top 50, such as Mario's brother Luigi, Mortal Kombat's Scorpion and Bioshock's Big Daddy.

Gaz Deaves, Guinness World Records gaming editor, said: "The world has seen so many pivotal characters throughout the history of gaming that asking our readers to narrow it down to just 50 was a challenge in itself."

Mr Deaves added that while some of the inclusions could be disputed by gamers, the list will prompt much debate.

Mitsubishi breaks Five Guinness World Records in 24 Hours

Mitsubishi is out to reveal that the Outlander and Outlander Sport crossovers have some real SUV capabilities. Recently, the automaker took one of each Outlander’s and made five Guinness World Records within 24 hours.

Stuntman Garvin Cross -- Daniel Craig's stunt double -- was the driver of the vehicles on frozen Ghost Lake near Calgary, Alberta, Canada. With temperatures below freezing, the following records were broken. However it's unclear that how many of the Outlander all-wheel-drive competitors have tried similar feats:

1. Greatest distance driven by a vehicle in reverse on snow in 30 seconds;
2. Shortest braking distance by a vehicle on ice;
3. Most vehicle figure eights on ice in two minutes;
4. Fastest vehicle slalom relay on ice; and
5. Fastest driven square lap.

The resulting advertisements will air on twelve network and cable TV stations, including ESPN, Discovery Channel and FX.

Mazda MX-5 Miata Sets New Guinness World Record

The Mazda MX-5, or Miata as it’s called in certain markets, has just set a new Guinness World Record for the "Best selling two-seat sports car".

Interestingly, the MX-5 initially set the record when production of the car reached 531,890 units in May 2000. Guinness updated the record when production passed 700,000 and, later, 800,000 units. Currently, Mazda is reapplying to have the record updated to 900,000 units.

The 900,000th example of the car was built earlier today in Japan and is intended for a home in Germany. This tally has been growing since the launch of the first generation of the car back in 1989. Since then, it has only undergone two complete product redesigns though a series of upgrades have kept it fresh.

World's Most Expensive Book sells for £7m

A rare copy of John James Audubon's 'Birds of America' made a new world record for a printed book at auction Tuesday, selling for 7.3 million pounds in London.

The four-volume book was subject to competitive bidding on the phones and in Sotheby's New Bond Street galleries, and sold for 7,321,250 pounds (11,542,683 dollars, 8,647,111 euros), the auction house said in a statement.

Originally estimated to sell for between four and six million pounds, the book was bought by London dealer Michael Tollemache. The proud new owner described the work as "priceless".

Known as Audubon's Elephant due to its size (39in by 26in), large enough to contain life-size illustrations of the birds, it owes its value to its rarity and the quality of the 435 images in its pages. It was completed in 1858 having taken the author 12 years to produce, and only 119 copies still exist.

The previous world record for any printed book sold at auction was 5,565,110 pounds, or 8,802,500 dollars, for a different copy of Audubon's 'Birds of America' sold in New York in March 2000.