Depths of Wikipedia | |
|---|---|
 The account's logo, featuring the Wikipedia logo with a crown on top.[a] | |
| Instagram information | |
| Page | |
| Followers | 1.518 million (April 2025) |
Depths of Wikipedia began in 2020 as asocial media account dedicated to highlighting the more unusual and entertaining facts fromWikipedia.Annie Rauwerda founded Depths of Wikipedia by digging through Wikipedia for its most unusual, amusing or bizarre content. Rauwerda has also performed live comedy shows based on the anecdotes she found.
In 2022, Rauwerda won Media Contributor of the Year at the annualWikimedian of the Year awards.
Annie Rauwerda, then a student inneuroscience at theUniversity of Michigan,[1][2][3] created the Depths of WikipediaInstagram account in April 2020 as a personal project at the beginning of theCOVID-19 pandemic,[4] intending to share various facts from theEnglish Wikipedia[1] among friends.[4] According to Rauwerda, the project was inspired by acollage of excerpts from Wikipedia she had made for a friend'szine, and by a photograph from the Wikipedia article oncow tipping.[2] She had been interested in Wikipedia before beginning the project, having spent time reading it as a child[1] andWikiracing with friends through middle and high school.[5]
Instagram influencerCaroline Calloway brought Depths of Wikipedia its first wave of followers, by boosting the page's posts on herInstagram story. Calloway had previously criticized the account for a post featuring an older version of her Wikipedia page, which listed her occupation as "nothing". Calloway's promotion of the Depths of Wikipedia account came following an apology by Rauwerda.[4][5]
| External videos | |
|---|---|
 The Joy of Learning Random Things on Wikipedia, Annie Rauwerda,TED Talk, October 19, 2023 |
After her Instagram account gained followers, Rauwerda createdTikTok andTwitter accounts of the same name,[4] and launched anewsletter covering unusual Wikipedia pages in greater detail.[5]
Depths of Wikipedia has highlighted articles on topics includingexploding trousers,Nuclear Gandhi,[1]chess on a really big board, andsexually active popes.[6] According to Rauwerda, she often receives submissions of Wikipedia articles to feature, but is selective in choosing which to post.[4] In October 2021, she said she was getting "probably 30 to 50 user submissions per day."[5]
AWikipedia editor herself,[1] Rauwerda has hosted anedit-a-thon, welcoming new contributions to the encyclopedia,[2][7] and enjoys taking photos to add to theWikimedia Commons.[8] She has also hosted livecomedy shows based on trivia from Wikipedia between 2021 and 2023[5][4][9] and travels for Wikipedia-related conferences.[10]
Followers of the Depths of Wikipedia account includeNeil Gaiman,John Mayer,Troye Sivan,Olivia Wilde andLex Fridman.[11][6][12] According to Heather Woods, a professor ofrhetoric and technology atKansas State University, Depths of Wikipedia "makes the internet feel smaller" by "offering attractive—or sometimes hilariously unattractive—entry points tointernet culture".[4] Zachary McCune, the brand director of theWikimedia Foundation, which funds and hosts Wikipedia, called the account "a place where Wikipedia comes to life, like an after-hours tour of the best of Wikipedia".[4] In his 2023 bookAll the Knowledge in the World, authorSimon Garfield called it "a great Twitter feed. It may suck up all your spare time."[13] Clare Martin found the facts to be the ones that make you laugh, remember how strange the world is and spark your curiosity.[10]
Rauwerda was named the 2022 Media Contributor of the Year at the annualWikimedian of the Year awards.[14]
