Which of these countries with the word “democratic” in their name are actually democratic according to the Economist Democracy Index?
The People’s Democratic Republic of Algeria
The Democratic Republic of the Congo
The Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia
The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea
The Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste
The first new player to comment on the website with the correct answer wins a free drink at their next iQ Trivia quiz.
Are there more molecules in a drop of water or stars in our solar system?
The first new player to comment on the website with the correct answer wins a free drink at their next iQ Trivia quiz.
This week we’re thinking about greeting cards.
But nothing so vague as Happy Birthday, or Get Well Soon, or Congratulations on Your New Job.
No, your team name should be an EXTREMELY specific greeting card.
Sorry to hear your wife lost a tooth after slipping on a wet floor in the supermarket
Happy 47th birthday to my second favourite oncologist
Congratulations from your great aunt on being accepted into a graduate program in accounting
Please allow me to punch the next person who says everything happens for a reason
Any ridiculously specific greeting cards will get a bonus point.
If you need ideas, try this sketch for inspiration.
Have an interesting week.
Here’s what you may have missed this week at iQ Trivia.
WINNERS
JACKPOT
It’s rare that knowing characters from The Blacklist comes in handy. But once in a while in a jackpot it’s REALLY handy.
TEAM NAMES
You had a lot of complaints about things we can’t do in spite of the fact that we can land a man on the moon.
But we can’t land a woman on the moon
But we can’t leave Elon Musk there
But we can’t stop people eating Tide pods
But we can’t beat an army of emus
But we can’t find a way to let you commit adultery at a coldplay concert without the whole damn world finding out
But we can’t build Hobart Stadium
But we can’t fool people into believing we put a man on the moon
But we can’t teach Stuart to use Teams
But we can’t get him into therapy
But we can’t find the clit
But we can’t get the President off the Epstein list
But we can’t release the Epstein files
But we can’t order off the breakfast menu after 10am
But we can’t think of a clever team name
But we can’t win trivia
TriviArt
Giraffe Gun
Bittersweet Wombat
Pikachu Sandwich
Flirtatious Cherry
Banana Victuals
INTERESTING MOMENTS
Voting against their first instinct on the dilemma question backfired on a team when we wound up with a tie that was broken not in their favour.
When we asked about the distance from the easternmost to the westernmost point of Australia, one team guessed 41,000km, which is longer than the circumference of the whole earth.
When asked if one of our hosts owned a kilt, one team answered accurately that he didn’t but that “you totally have the ass for it”. Is it sexual harassment if you like it?
And there’s a gap of just four points at the top of the table in our quarterly tournament.
| Team | Wins | Score | Average |
| The Smith Family | 3 | 221 | 73.67 |
| Leader Housen | 3 | 217 | 72.33 |
| Wrote a Letter | 2 | 161 | 80.50 |
| That sounds like a you problem | 2 | 160 | 80.00 |
| Bagpuss | 2 | 154 | 77.00 |
| Professional Cuddlers | 2 | 152 | 76.00 |
| Richard Gere Appreciation Society | 2 | 151 | 75.50 |
| Hipster Dog | 2 | 148 | 74.00 |
| Tournament Name | 2 | 147 | 73.50 |
| Diversity Council | 2 | 145 | 72.50 |
| Comfortable Mediocre | 2 | 142 | 71.00 |
| Pang and Friends | 2 | 141 | 70.50 |
| Trough Lobster | 2 | 139 | 69.50 |
| Damp Squids | 2 | 137 | 68.50 |
| Happy Hour | 2 | 127 | 63.50 |
| Tullynessle | 1 | 76 | 76.00 |
| Fish and Friends | 1 | 74 | 74.00 |
| Hotel Rwanda | 1 | 74 | 74.00 |
| 6 Go Crazy | 1 | 73 | 73.00 |
| Bandits | 1 | 73 | 73.00 |
| Foxolotl | 1 | 73 | 73.00 |
| Leon & Val | 1 | 73 | 73.00 |
| Whale Emoji | 1 | 73 | 73.00 |
| Julius Caesar | 1 | 71 | 71.00 |
| Cuck | 1 | 70 | 70.00 |
| Tight End Jesus | 1 | 70 | 70.00 |
| GNOM | 1 | 69 | 69.00 |
| There Won’t Be Blood | 1 | 69 | 69.00 |
| Toddler | 1 | 69 | 69.00 |
| Captain Kathie’s Mandarin | 1 | 68 | 68.00 |
| Al’s Team | 1 | 66 | 66.00 |
| Goose is on the Loose | 1 | 66 | 66.00 |
See you next week.
What do the first four notes of the Mission Impossible theme spell in morse code?
The first new player to comment on the website with the correct answer wins a free drink at their next iQ Trivia quiz.
What race was the first non-white player in the NBA?
The first new player to comment on the website with the correct answer wins a free drink at their next iQ Trivia quiz.
Name the TV series, and what is notable about the minor characters in these scenes?
The first new player to comment on the website with the correct answer wins a free drink at their next iQ Trivia quiz.
As anyone who has been to iQ Trivia would know, every quiz has a homework question. It’s something easy to find, unambiguous, but something you wouldn’t likely know unless you looked it up.
The idea, naturally, is that you are expected to look it up and given an advantage for being on our mailing list. And for the most part it works just fine.
Once in a while people acting in good faith wind up getting the homework question wrong, and if that happens at a significant scale we will generally change the homework question. Even if the question is right, we don’t want people to have to research it in great depth or fact check or be caught out by the first source that they find.
But now AI is emerging as a tool being used by more and more people, and some people are asking AI chatbots the homework question, and then complaining that they got the homework question wrong.
So now we’ve had to issue this advisory.
DO NOT USE AI ON THE HOMEWORK QUESTION.
Not because it’s cheating. It’s not. And you are supposed to look up the homework question.
But AI frequently gets things wrong.
As an example, last week we tested the homework question at one of our quizzes on an AI chatbot, asking it what four teams won the Stanley Cup in the 1980s. You can look that up yourself and you should find the answer quite easily on Wikipedia or on a number of other sources.
But the chatbot came back with an interesting answer.
And then followed up with a pretty firm statement that was demonstrably false.
(When asked a follow up question about the Calgary Flames who won in 1989 and which one of our hosts is old enough to distinctly remember, it went on to say that the Flames did not win in the 80s, and that their only win was in 1989. But anyone who didn’t know that may have taken the initial statement at face value and lost out on a point.)
The homework question isn’t meant to be hard to research. If it is, we will generally change it.
Now we don’t know the ins and outs of how AI works or why it makes mistakes. We once tried using AI to write trivia questions and they were a combination of about 1/4th straight up factually inaccurate, and the remainder overwhelmingly questions that are technically correct, but extremely dull. That’s not what we aim to do, so we’re not going to use AI in putting together quizzes.
And you shouldn’t use AI in doing your homework.
Have an interesting week.
As we post this, it is the anniversary of the moon landings.
It was a big moment for humanity, in as much as it gave cranky people everywhere an excuse to complain about things.
You probably heard someone say “we can land a man on the moon but we can’t…”
Well this week, your team names are going to finish that sentence.
Get a ziploc on potato chip bags
Make a drive thru speaker that is actually audible
Perform a prostate exam without… fingers
Build an anti-microwave that cools things in seconds
Print a black and white page when we’re low on magenta
Send a man to the moon again 56 years later
Tell us something you’re amazed we can’t do in light of the fact that we can land on the moon for a bonus point.
Have an interesting week.
Here’s what you may have missed this week at iQ Trivia.
WINNERS
JACKPOT
Two teams got a jackpot for knowing about Finnish alcohol.
TEAM NAMES
You got creative with your team names.
Everywhere is a toilet if you’re a toddler
Every criminal is free if they’re President of the US
Any trivia answer is a correct answer if you’re threatening enough
Every day is payday if you’re a bank robber
Every light is a green light if you’re colour blind
Any distance is walking distance if you’ve got the time
Every work day is a last work day if you can’t keep your mouth shut
Every day is a weekend if you’re unemployed
Any joke is funny if you’re drunk enough
Every sink is a bathtub if you’re under 5’2’’
Every tree is a public urinal if you’re drunk enough
Any book is a Bible if you have enough faith in it
Every house is a mansion if you’re a mouse
Every walk is a bushwalk if you’re hairy enough
Any bath is a swimming pool if you’re small enough
Every sleeve is a tissue if you’re snotty enough
Any dog is a horse if you’re small enough
Every meeting is an AA meeting if you’re vulnerable enough
And multiple teams went with… Anything is a dildo if you’re brave enough
TriviArt
Moose Milkman
Hot Air
Boney Apple
Cactus Lozenge
Chocolate Steak
Corporate Coffee
INTERESTING MOMENTS
Biggest religions in India? Cricket and Virat Kohli obviously.
What term beginning with N refers to technology on a scale of billionths of metres? Napoletana.
The blokiest team in the room, statistically speaking, were the first to get a bonus question on tampons.
And our quarterly tournament somehow got closer.
| Team | Wins | Score | Average |
| Wrote a Letter | 2 | 161 | 80.50 |
| Bagpuss | 2 | 154 | 77.00 |
| Professional Cuddlers | 2 | 152 | 76.00 |
| Richard Gere Appreciation Society | 2 | 151 | 75.50 |
| Leader Housen | 2 | 147 | 73.50 |
| The Smith Family | 2 | 147 | 73.50 |
| Tournament Name | 2 | 147 | 73.50 |
| Diversity Council | 2 | 145 | 72.50 |
| Trough Lobster | 2 | 139 | 69.50 |
| That sounds like a you problem | 1 | 83 | 83.00 |
| Tullynessle | 1 | 76 | 76.00 |
| Fish and Friends | 1 | 74 | 74.00 |
| Hotel Rwanda | 1 | 74 | 74.00 |
| Bandits | 1 | 73 | 73.00 |
| Foxolotl | 1 | 73 | 73.00 |
| Leon & Val | 1 | 73 | 73.00 |
| Whale Emoji | 1 | 73 | 73.00 |
| Hipster Dog | 1 | 72 | 72.00 |
| The Happy Meals | 1 | 71 | 71.00 |
| Tight End Jesus | 1 | 70 | 70.00 |
See you next week.