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My favorite/worst example of language evolution is the word factoid. Factoid literally meant a thing resembling a fact (i.e. a false fact) which is believed to be true after being repeated in print. Now, those same writers who where presumably spreading factoids, have inverted its meaning to be 'a minor, but true fact' [0].

[0] http://www.doctoryourself.com/hoffer_factoids.html

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Would a more correct version of a minor, true fact be a _factino_? Kind of like a Plutino or Neutrino?

factlet (like piglet)

But that would be mixing Latin and English, just as bad as television!

factette then.

Factule, perhaps, from the unattested but regular diminutive factulum.

Factarrino if you really wanna go wild with it

Trivia?

Sort of an odd use of the “oid” suffix which means “like” or “resembling”. “Like a fact, but not”.

I always thought “meteoroid” was an odd term. It’s something like a meteor, except it hasn’t entered the atmosphere. It’s like calling a slice of bread a toastoid.

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