That same level of accidental discovery was never, and perhaps is never again going to be, quite as available as it was when paging through a book meant you HAD

That same level of accidental discovery was never, and perhaps is never again going to be, quite as available as it was when paging through a book meant you HAD to see things that weren't AT ALL related to what you were looking for. I think that the internet is about a billion times better for this than anything else. With an encyclopedia you can just find information about random stuff, but I think the random button on Wikipedia is just as good, and you can dive deep through the sources and learn as much as you want. The home page itself is a great starting point. Further, the Internet as a whole is a tremendous source for information that you wouldn't be able to easily find information about in traditional sources. I've researched everything from the history and functionality provided by different types of water towers (a clever hack), to the reasoning behind building different roads out of different kinds of materials, as it related to one particular highway near where I live. It's great to be able to take a random, obscure topic, and learn a lot about it.