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Unrelated to what you are citing, but I believe a “factoid” is something that looks like a fact but is not. Like how a planetoid looks like a planet but isn’t o
by chewbacha 2y ago
Unrelated to what you are citing, but I believe a “factoid” is something that looks like a fact but is not. Like how a planetoid looks like a planet but isn’t one.
I only realized this myself decades after using the term factoid due to pages in highlights for kids.
- cwillu 2y ago“A factoid is either an invented or assumed statement presented as a fact, or a true but brief or trivial item of news or information.”
- throw101010 2y agoLiterally a useless word on its own now that the definition evolved this way... many such cases unfortunately.
- j16sdiz 2y agoFunny that the word "literally" have evolved in a similar way
- Scarblac 2y agoThe other meaning is a small or trivial bit of (true) information.
- chewbacha 2y agoQuite that factoid. How do we know which it is? ;p Guess it goes both ways... which is kinda worse.
- arijun 2y agoI thought the second definition came about from continual misunderstanding of the word, like how literally no longer means literally.
- TheDudeMan 2y agoBTW, what is the new word to use when one literally means literally?
- taneq 2y ago‘Actually’ is what I’ve heard most often.
- AngriestLettuce 2y agoThere is none. The word has been misused to the point of ambiguity being an accepted part of its definition, and we are all worse off for it. The language is now less expressive, and you need to use more words to add context and remove ambiguity when you really do mean "literally" in the literal sense.
- 8organicbits 2y agoUse literally. It still means literally. Language has all kinds of things like sarcasm, exaggeration, and metaphor that change the way a sentence should be interpreted, but the meaning of each word remains the same.
- k_sze 2y agoYou add “quite” before “literally”.
- rpastuszak 2y agoJust prefix the sentence with “literally literally (not literally literally)”
- moogly 2y agoGen Z uses the very awkward "unironically".
- rcxdude 2y agothat too, will often get used ironically
- _0ffh 2y agoI really like to call those factlets, but that's probably just me.
- adastra22 2y agoThis is a British vs American English thing. In British English a “factoid” is something that looks true but isn't. In American English “factoid” is a synonym for trivia--something that is true, but of minor importance.
- defrost 2y ago> In British English a “factoid” is something that looks true but [ ... ] may or may not be true. Wikipedia has it as "an item of unreliable information that is repeated so often that it becomes accepted as fact." after the original USofAmerica coinage by Norman Mailer. In Commonwealth countries (Australia, Canada, UK) two decades past we used it on intelligence forums as the name for atomic snippets of information released by companies via stock exchanges, company reports, PR .. each nugget being an atomic fact like paragraph linked back to a source that asserted that fact to be true, but to be taken as potentially incorrect.
- adastra22 2y agoLiterally the very next line: "Since the term's invention in 1973, it has become used to describe a brief or trivial item of news or information." The intended meaning by Norman Mailer never took on in the states.
- defrost 2y agoLiterally you asserted: > In British English a “factoid” is something that looks true but isn't. I responded that In British English a “factoid” is something that looks true but may or may not be true. .. there's a difference.
- underdeserver 2y agoSo, a factoid being sometimes true, but not always... Is a factoid.
- 2y ago
- Terr_ 2y agoOther examples I like to trot out: Android is not really a man, Asteroid is not really a star, Meteoroid is not really a meteor.
- shermantanktop 2y agoFactoids (true or not) seem to have special appeal for people who like to socialize with others by knowing things - the Cliff Clavens of the world. It has an overtone of superficiality along with triviality.