+1 for a well-put argument. However, I admit to asking a lot of trivia questions when interviewing candidates at Apple, partly as a culture fit, and partly bec

+1 for a well-put argument. However, I admit to asking a lot of trivia questions when interviewing candidates at Apple, partly as a culture fit, and partly because I could use them to segue into a chain of questions that dealt with the consequences of seemingly innocuous design decisions made by engineers long ago. This was something my group had to learn to foresee and deal with when we thought bad things would happen. One of these questions had to do with 0xCAFEBABE. That said, getting the trivia part right was a +1, and not knowing the info was a +0, so no harm if the job candidate didn't know it. I'd also use them as a shortcut to validating their experience in an area. Again, a +0 if they didn't know the trivia, but if they do, I can move on to a different line of questions.