Science & Technology

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…

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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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51 Comments

  1. Canonest

    October 19, 2023 at 8:30 pm

    “shallow learning”

  2. chas in lakewood

    October 19, 2023 at 8:33 pm

    I give $21 bucks to Wikipedia every year (can’t remember why that amount).
    I have a ‘triviality’ list on Twitter with 9 sources. Yup. I’m that too.

  3. zuali ralte

    October 19, 2023 at 8:52 pm

    the joy of watching random videos on the internet ^__^

  4. Atlantis

    October 19, 2023 at 9:01 pm

    her clothes are weird

  5. Trinidad Traxx

    October 19, 2023 at 9:54 pm

    You had me at DINKUS! 🤣

  6. Suhel H

    October 19, 2023 at 10:40 pm

    Over the course of the years, the quality of TED has just downgraded to a point now it’s just random people giving talks about random things

  7. Sonic gamer

    October 20, 2023 at 12:08 am

    Wokepidia

    • Robert Davidson

      October 21, 2023 at 7:50 am

      Why? Because it doesn’t put up with idiotic anti-vax made up conspiracy theories?

  8. Sonic gamer

    October 20, 2023 at 12:11 am

    Best propaganda site

    • F

      October 21, 2023 at 7:23 am

      Second this.

    • Sonic gamer

      October 21, 2023 at 7:28 am

      @F waaaat

    • Robert Davidson

      October 21, 2023 at 7:51 am

      Nope. Just evidence based

    • Sonic gamer

      October 21, 2023 at 8:50 am

      @Robert Davidson according to Wokipedia Man is a woman 🤦

    • Robert Davidson

      October 21, 2023 at 9:07 am

      @Sonic gamer where?

  9. JayG

    October 20, 2023 at 12:34 am

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

  10. ̇frank694

    October 20, 2023 at 12:53 am

    Service Temporarily Unavailable
    Our servers are currently under maintenance or experiencing a technical problem. Please try again in a few minutes
    2023.10.20

  11. m kk

    October 20, 2023 at 12:56 am

    funny talk curious person love you girl😍

  12. Arrigo MMXVI

    October 20, 2023 at 4:01 am

    i LOVE wikipedia 💖been using it since i was a 10 y.o. when i first stumbled upon it for everything 😸 i don’t posses any particular knowledge to significantly contribute but i use it most of the days of my existence as i have always been curious and craved for knowledge 💖 it’s a gift and a blessing for me 🌻

    p.s. she def scared me abt becoming unable to access info as i am a russian citizen 🙈downloaded the app immediately

    p.p.s. sad that history doesn’t change a bit and they are still burning books and make ppl their slaves by putting them in this windowless box over and over again..i guess some ppl can’t live without dominating over others and playing with their lives 🙈

  13. Maria Antonietta Montella

    October 20, 2023 at 4:39 am

    brava🤗😅

  14. Lil Speed

    October 20, 2023 at 5:50 am

    I love this girl

  15. Tim Truett

    October 20, 2023 at 7:22 am

    Wikipedia is not a reliable source of information. Wikipedia only presents what other people, including ignorant people, unqualified people, and people with an axe to grind, say about a subject. Saying it does not make it true. There have been cases where a real authority on a subject corrected an error on Wikipedia and other people edited the article to change it back to the wrong information.

    Wikipedia is not a source of truth. It is a source of what people say.

  16. Michael Davidson

    October 20, 2023 at 9:51 am

    Wikipedia has a very left wing bias when it comes to political and many historical subjects. I do like Wikipedia, however, for technical subjects, science, math, movie, and TV information.

    • mk

      October 21, 2023 at 5:19 am

      the truth does tend to have a left wing bias, yes

  17. jointco

    October 20, 2023 at 11:46 am

    wikipedia is a fraud

  18. Billabonggg2011

    October 20, 2023 at 1:27 pm

    She reminds me of Annie Murphy 😂❤️

  19. Erfan Farhadi

    October 20, 2023 at 3:03 pm

    I find her way of thinking to be fascinating.

  20. Vito B.

    October 20, 2023 at 3:11 pm

    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.

    • Spayce Ace

      October 21, 2023 at 7:44 am

      Correct. Its not always accurate

  21. Kaoutar Arij

    October 20, 2023 at 3:37 pm

    Free Ghaza 🇵🇸 Free Palestine 🇵🇸🇵🇸🇵🇸🇵🇸

  22. Mars Rider One (Official)

    October 20, 2023 at 6:36 pm

    I love wiki quote of the day

    • Brinax

      October 21, 2023 at 6:43 am

      What is it?

  23. James Bruno

    October 20, 2023 at 7:41 pm

    I know for a fact there are lies on peoples biographies on Wikipedia. And if you try to edit to correct the lie, Wikipedia doesn’t allow you to.

  24. F

    October 21, 2023 at 7:22 am

    Wikipedia is brit nat propaganda.

  25. Priyanshi Gupta

    October 21, 2023 at 12:47 pm

    if you use wikipedia as your source of information, you’re HIGHLY misinformed about a lot of things

  26. arquilli1

    October 21, 2023 at 7:24 pm

    Why was Coleman Hughes’ talk censored based on TED censorship and bunk/irrelevant meta analysis? Why did he receive more scrutiny than others

  27. Jonathan Byrd

    October 22, 2023 at 9:17 am

    Loved this talk! Great skills mastered early. Just wanted to correct that pH means “potential of hydrogen.” 🙂

  28. 진수향

    October 22, 2023 at 9:39 am

    Hummmm this is like a stand-up comedy for TED nerds lol

  29. Larry

    October 22, 2023 at 12:19 pm

    Wikipedia….is not valid information and definitely not your friend

  30. Kin

    October 22, 2023 at 1:12 pm

    👍

  31. LaMelo Ball

    October 22, 2023 at 3:13 pm

    Annie is the perfect example of it’s not about what you say but how you say it. Her passion and enthusiasm shines through her speech.

  32. Fishing Architect

    October 22, 2023 at 8:20 pm

    Wiki is interesting but often as wrong as it is right. Never use it as an encyclopedia. The problem is the editors are often opinionated and not factual.

  33. Vanessa Bernal

    October 22, 2023 at 11:39 pm

    Is there anyone who wants to learn Spanish and can teach me English?

  34. DanWi

    October 23, 2023 at 10:01 am

    Wikipedia is not a good source for information. They cannot help but also offer their OPINION of the information. I understand much of the content is user generated, but until this is fixed, Wikipedia is pretty much worthless as an information source.

  35. Corance Chandler

    October 23, 2023 at 12:20 pm

    With Wikipedia on my left hand and chat GPT on my right, I shall rule the world.

  36. Hannah Friedman

    October 23, 2023 at 3:11 pm

    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.

  37. fluffyshanks

    October 23, 2023 at 4:38 pm

    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.

  38. Geeksmithing

    October 23, 2023 at 4:42 pm

    Oklahomans don’t know the difference between a fruit and a vegetable. Makes sense.

  39. TheTrig86

    October 24, 2023 at 1:46 am

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

  40. Gowes Channel

    October 24, 2023 at 6:49 pm

    Nice camel toe… very interesting wikipedia…

  41. basv

    October 24, 2023 at 9:39 pm

    Wikipedia…? 🤡

  42. Ömer Faruk Demir

    October 25, 2023 at 9:06 am

    she is so much fun

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