50 Intriguing “Today I Learned” Facts That You Probably Didn’t Learn In School (New Pics)

Steve traces back the origins of his podcast to the '90s. "I first became interested in these quirky facts and stories when I started teaching high school science in the early 1990s," he tells Bored Panda. 

"I quickly realized that my students loved this kind of stuff, so I purchased a few books that others had written. This was before the World Wide Web, so online research wasn't an option. I was an early adoptee of the web, and for lack of any better ideas, I decided to take some quirky stories that I knew and place each one on a separate web page."

The I Should Have Known trio first started out as a pub trivia team. "When our local pub quiz shut down, we took up the mantle and started researching our own fun 'did you know' facts," Sups, Andi and Tanner tell us.

Their podcast’s premise is particularly interesting. They describe it as a trivia podcast that can't be trusted. Each week, either Sups, Andi or Tanner present their listeners with four big facts on a topic, but one of those facts is a lie. The audience then can try to guess which one is false.

“When we decided to create our show, we knew we wanted to stand out from other podcasts and leave our audiences with something more. So we put our full effort into researching our trivia to make sure it's vetted and as double-checked as possible. Especially because the other two hosts will be grilling us to find the lie among our facts!"

The creators of I Should Have Known reveal the secrets of being professional trivia masters: "Foster creativity to ask weird questions like 'Are birds dinosaurs?' Build diligence in research so you're not just taking Google's or an AI's word as gospel. And develop empathy so you can actually teach your audience something fun and new without boring or stumping them."

The content of the Useless Information website and podcast has shifted as time went on. Steve admits that the topics he covers are those that he personally finds interesting. "Over the years, I have greatly expanded my research and tend to focus on obscure human interest stories that occurred between 1900 and 1965," he says. "I like to joke that it is simply a hobby that got a bit out of hand."

Since he's such a veteran, the means of finding content have also changed a great deal. Most of the stories Steve covers come from old newspapers, which he loves to read. "Years ago, the only way to do this was to go to the library and load up reels of microfilm," he adds. "But now all it takes is a few clicks of a mouse button to pull up some old articles."

Andi, Tanner and Sups believe that people are naturally drawn to learning. "There's something about being stuck in school and being forced to memorize facts that don't interest us which dampens our curiosity. But if you can deliver interesting nuggets of knowledge and make them relatable to your audience, you find that people can't get enough."

"And then the added bonus with our show is that listeners want to see if they're right. They love to hear the hosts poke holes in the facts and then guess along with them to check their understanding."

In Steve Silverman’s mind, there's nothing really surprising about our hunger for learning podcasts such as his. "People love things that are out of the ordinary," he believes. "We like movies with surprising plot twists, books with unexpected endings, and so on. The same is true of being told interesting facts and stories."

The phrase that is now the name of his website and the podcast came from one of the kids Steve was teaching. "A student had told me that I knew more 'useless information' than anyone else, so I placed that title on the main page and have been using it ever since."

It comes as no surprise that Steve is quite a popular pick for a team on a trivia night. Yet he remains humble: "I am the first to admit that there are huge gaps in my knowledge." He says his focus is less on trivia – he's more interested in telling true stories.

"An example of trivia is knowing how many men have walked on the moon (12 men), but I consider myself to be a storyteller. The more unusual and obscure the stories are, the better."