The Joy of Learning Random Things on Wikipedia | Annie Rauwerda | TED

Writer Annie Rauwerda makes a habit of getting lost among the seemingly endless digital archives of Wikipedia, discovering fake towns, promiscuous tortoises, 19th-century fangirls and so much more. An avid editor of the crowd-sourced platform, she speaks to the joys of exploring niche and humorous subjects, accidentally learning just for fun — and broadening your horizons along the way.

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[wanted_gem]

Most of us go down rabbit holes on the internet.
Annie takes us down one of hers, which is trivia of random stuff from Wikipedia and it's pretty entertaining!

[mind-of-neo]

Oh man, same. I can spend hours on hours going through Wikipedia articles on dozens of different things. I usually have upwards of a hundred tabs open all on different Wikipedia threads. I'm so used to the format and to using it for a basal overview of everything, that it kinda makes me uncomfortable when there isn't a Wikipedia page on something. It's like my mind thinks "if there's no Wikipedia page on something it doesn't really exist on the internet"

[shubhamkumar-nwui]

It's such a wonder that humans so disorganised in groups can create such a beautiful platforms together voluntarily .

[jamesdignanmusic]

Be warned... I started editing Wikipedia after being fascinated by reading it. I've now been an admin there for over 15 years and have made more than quarter of a million edits, and I do part-time work as a quiz compiler :)

[shannongreen]

I loove going to Wikipedia and I literally get lost in the Wikipedia holes. I kid you not that it has made me a better conversationalist, an trivial pursuit partner and just all around better person. Thanks Wikipedia.

[vito_b]

Wikipedia is such a fascinating platform to gain knowledge, and i just realized it because, In short, I was being told to not read Wikipedia because it's not accurate.

Now, I spend about 30-60m for reading and studying from Wikipedia, daily. If i find something interesting, I could easily click the link and if the answer isn't satisfying to me, I could do more research on Google and YouTube. If the topic is very interesting, I could buy a book of the topic. And I really love improving my foreign language reading comprehension ability as well as my memory of the knowledge I read on Wikipedia.

[kwandakekana]

Someone understands. I want to learn purely for the sake of learning just nje

[fluffyshanks]

What a brilliant Ted Talk!!! One of my favourite pastimes is to click on the day’s featured article (regardless of the subject) and read and click on hyperlinks and generally disappear down a Wiki-rabbit hole.

[erfanfarhadi]

I find her way of thinking to be fascinating.

[Niket]

Its been long being away from TED... this video popped up from nowhere and I'm again interested in the TED talks...😅❤️

[gremarjohn]

I was laughing with her throughout her speech. 😆 She's just genuine!

[orangegreen]

I once went on a Wikipedia rabbit hole about the song Hey Ma Ma Ma by Tritonal, which is also known as Sunchyme by Dario G, which is also known as Never Let You Go by Jakaranda, which was originally using the sample from the song Life In A Northern Town by Dream Academy. And I went on this rabbit hole just because lol. And I also noticed that for some reason the Jakaranda version wasn’t included in Wikipedia as being featured on 1998’s The Parent Trap Soundtrack, so I went ahead and decided to add that info myself, so I did 💀. And this was just for fun. Some may say I was procrastinating and/or wasting my time but I say I was gaining knowledge ;)

[JaySpears]

Wikipedia Random Article Button is addicting, buts it usually random geographical locations or random athletes, eventually u strike gold

[starchaser]

The erection of nipples is not due to erectile tissue, but rather due to the contraction of smooth muscle under the control of the autonomic nervous system is a fact I learned on Wikipedia today.

[TheTrig]

Countless trials to overcome serial procrastination, then a TED talk appears and brings me back to Wikipedia binges

[shashanksam]

thanks for sharing about Wikipedia, they help us a lot, and they need our help now

[leumas]

How is Boston’s “Great Molasses Flood” of 1919 not listed as a non-water flood? That’s crazy!

[andycordy]

Onfim's drawings!!!!

Wonderful presentation.

[raydespoir]

I can relate. But for me instead of Wikipedia its TvTropes.

[hbanana]

the p in pH does have a meaning. It’s referred to as “power of hydrogen” or “partial hydrogen (content)” because pH is calculated based on the hydrogen content of the solution.