Navigating Wikipedia without a keyboard

Things you will need

• An device with a net connection (we used the Linux box under the TV)
• Some kind of music player (we used Amarok)
• Some booze (we used Red wine)

How to play

Open Wikipedia in your browser of choice, then set your music player to shuffle mode and start it. Now the object of the game is to navigate your way through Wikipedia to the page of the currently-playing artist or band without recourse to the keyboard. You must find your way to where you want to go purely by clicking on links.

For example, let’s say the target track is How Soon Is Now by The Smiths. Well, we know they’re from Manchester, so that seems a good place to aim for. We can get there via:

• The ‘Geography portal’ link
• The ‘Europe portal’ link
• The ‘European Union portal’ link
• The ‘More cities…’ link
• The ‘London’ link
• The ‘United Kingdom’ link
• The ‘Cities and conurbations’ link
• The ‘Manchester’ link

And now it’s just a couple of hops:

• The ‘Music’ link
• The Smiths!

and that’s it. Presuming you got there before the end of the track, that’s +1 for you (and be sure to record these scores somewhere, otherwise the whole thing becomes pointless).

Then use The Smiths as the starting point to get to the next artist. Repeat until you lose interest.

Tips

Knowing any of these things about the artists or bands proved useful when we were navigating around:

• The city from which they originate
• Other artists with which they may have collaborated
• Movie soundtracks on which they may have appeared

Thanks to Kitty, Chris and Ulrike for helping to come up with this.