Trivia needn’t be trivial

Mar 7 2010 by Ian Robson, Sunday Sun

QUIZZES are dumbing down, apparently, so here’s a starter for five-and-a-half.

What do you need to have to do well in a pub quiz?

Not, it turns out, a high IQ. Not even an average IQ.

But you do, according to a recent survey, need a good PQ to get the points.

PQ is a good knowledge of pop culture including the latest celebrity gossip, what’s happening in soaps, and who’s saying what on social networking sites.

Forget the capital cities of the world, famous dates in history, or a knowledge of art and literature.

Today’s quiz champions are more likely to be immersed in trivial information about stars than general knowledge.

They major in Cheryl Cole, Jordan, Lady Gaga, Victoria Beckham and the like.

The news comes from a drinks company that claims pub teams are more likely to win their quizzes if members read celebrity magazines rather than newspapers.

It says women, perhaps not surprisingly, are more clued up than men in their chosen subjects of flim and flam.

The company is launching its own nationwide pub quiz. Quizzes have to reflect the real world, and in the real world there is an obsession with living other people’s lives.

There’s no real harm in it, but it does become a problem when there’s nothing else going on between the ears.

Swot up on celebrity gossip if you like, read OK and Hello for research, and watch all the new reality TV programmes.

But brush up on general knowledge as well. Trivia does not have to be trivial or limited to celebrities.

Or are we proud to live in a time when most of us could not even name our MPs?

Jumping on the bandwagon

MORE than 100,000 have joined a campaign to save BBC station 6 Music.

I wonder how many of them have jumped on the bandwagon and never actually listened to it?

Perhaps there might be some money in the trimmed-down BBC budget to finance an investigation.

Me, never heard it, not interested in it, and if 6 Music can’t pull its own weight, the Beeb is better off without it.

Lost  time

SCIENTISTS have calculated that the earthquake in Chile has shifted the earth’s axis by 8cm and shortened the day by just over one millionth of a second.

How will we ever make the time up?