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I recently submitted a puzzle with the 'knowledge' tag. It was automatically changed by the system to 'trivia'.

When did this happen?

Do we now consider all knowledge to be trivia?

Should the 'knowledge' tag simply be deleted if it is no longer allowed?

EDIT 13 Oct 2015

For clarity, here is a definition

trivia

details, considerations, or pieces of information of little importance or value. "we fill our days with meaningless trivia"

https://www.google.co.uk/?gws_rd=ssl#q=trivia+definition

Proposal

Since all trivia is knowledge but not all knowledge is trivia, I suggest that the more general 'knowledge' would be a more apt tag to keep. The trivia tag is too restrictive and should no longer be the default. Instead I propose that 'knowledge' should.

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  • $\begingroup$ The [knowledge] tag is a synonym of the [trivia] tag, so everything automatically gets tagged as [trivia]. $\endgroup$
    – Illyasviel
    Oct 13, 2015 at 0:45
  • $\begingroup$ How would you differentiate between the two? (The synonym could be made to point the other way, too. That might make more sense.) $\endgroup$
    – user20
    Oct 13, 2015 at 1:14
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    $\begingroup$ @Emrakul I would interpret trivia to relate to snippets of "interesting fact"-type information, but knowledge expects some deeper level of expertise or understanding of the subject-matter (or appropriate use of your favorite search engine). $\endgroup$
    – Gordon K
    Oct 13, 2015 at 9:38
  • $\begingroup$ I've added a definition of trivia to my answer. I have also added a proposal. $\endgroup$
    – chasly - supports Monica
    Oct 13, 2015 at 10:32
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    $\begingroup$ Okay. For the interim, I've deleted the tag synonym. I still think we should work out exactly what should happen with those tags, though. I'm in favor of merging and/or synonymizing trivia into knowledge, but we'll ultimately go with whatever you all think will work best. $\endgroup$
    – user20
    Oct 13, 2015 at 16:24
  • $\begingroup$ It seems to me that if a concrete subject matter can be named, then that ought to be the tag - preferable to 'trivia' in my opinion, and much more than 'knowledge'. $\endgroup$
    – dennisdeems
    Oct 13, 2015 at 18:30

1 Answer 1

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No, not all knowledge is trivia. Math is knowledge, but I expect nobody thinks we ought to do away with the 'math' tag.

I think that 'knowledge' is far too broad to be useful as a tag. Who is going to be searching for it and why?

Particularly for a question such as this USA geography puzzle , I do not see how a user gets any benefit from the addition of the 'knowledge' tag.

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  • $\begingroup$ That is a fair point but it doesn't explain why currently 'Knowledge' is automatically converted to 'Trivia'. We don't automatically convert 'Knowledge' to 'Math' -- why convert it to Trivia? In either case we are going from the general to the particular and that seems unreasonable. $\endgroup$
    – chasly - supports Monica
    Oct 13, 2015 at 15:52
  • $\begingroup$ Does the presence of the knowledge tag not suggest that a certain depth of knowledge will be required to solve it? $\endgroup$
    – Gordon K
    Oct 14, 2015 at 16:17
  • $\begingroup$ The presence of the 'geography' tag already suggests that, doesn't it? $\endgroup$
    – dennisdeems
    Oct 14, 2015 at 16:31

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