[yen223]

Well at least the calculations are easier

It takes about 3s to say 10 "one"s

There are 136,279,841 ones in the binary mersenne prime

That works out to about 41 million seconds worth of footage, or about 473 days

Given there was a gap of 6 years between the discovery of this mersenne prime and the previous, in theory 1 person could say all the digits (in binary) before we find the next mersenne prime!

[dylan604]

Sure, if that one person can stay awake and not eat/drink and use the restroom, sure. Otherwise, you need to make this union happy with 8 hour shifts, 2 15 minute breaks, and a minimum of 12 hour turn around before next shift. If they work more than 8 hours in a day, they are entitled to over time. Working a sixth day in a row is automatic 1.5x pay, and seven consecutive days is automatic 2x pay.

Want to run your calculations again? =)

[variaga]

"The largest known prime is two raised to the power of one hundred thirty six million two hundred seventy nine thousand eight hundred forty one, minus one" only took me 8.2 seconds to say aloud at a normal speaking pace. :)

[Gare]

> Given there was a gap of 6 years between the discovery of this mersenne prime and the previous

It was the largest gap so far. Several primes were quite close. The next one might be discovered much sooner. Previos two had a gap of a bit less than a year.