Contra Green on Great Facts
Recently, Hank Green said great facts are not only interesting, but uncover something true about the learner or the world. The second part, presuming it is not tautologically included in the term 'fact', might point at a level of profundity or hinting at narrative relevance.
My own view is that great facts are primarily determined by a combination of usefulness and how well they hint at other questions you should ask. It was genuinely stunning to me someone could reference what makes a good fact and center it around interestingness and not usefulness. This might be a product of the fact that Hank Green mostly works providing entertainment (some of the entertainment is for students).
I think if he were reading this, he'd say, of course, this is from the perspective of generating media about science. That's fair.
But I'm more concerned about the general social tendency towards evaluating the quality of things by how well they're shared between people, how they mediate social interactions, or how others react to them. The deepest truths are often heard and rejected. For many years, I've said a true sign of wisdom (as opposed to knowledge) is that you can say it to someone and it will bounce off their mind completely. They will not say something deeply true about the learner. The listener usually won't even learn the thing! But it'll be valuable nonetheless.