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Today I learned that the word "factoid" originally meant something that wasn't true. The OED says: "Something that becomes accepted as a fact, although it is not (or may not be) true; spec. an assumption or speculation reported and repeated so often that it is popularly considered true; a simulated or imagined fact." I think most people have come to use it to mean a piece of trivia or like a "mini-fact." That's how I use it.

I also learned this in the book that I'm reading.