I've run a couple of pretty big quizzes recently, with upwards of 200 people, which both went very well, I think, but I was surprised to find when I started speaking and stared out on the large mass of humanity in front of me, my hand was unaccustomedly shaky - I had no other reason to be nervous (I rarely am) than the very size of the crowd, so I wonder if the bigger and bigger an audience gets the more other 'performers' feel the weight of entertaining them.
In the past, I've generally found that numbers in themselves make no difference at all and an audience of one can be just as intimidating as 50,000, but perhaps not.
Equally, I tend to find I thrive and perform more the bigger the crowd, move around and make more of an active effort to generate excitement.
It would be brilliant some time to do a quiz for a really huge number, to hear the roar of hundreds and hundreds, or thousands, of people. Who knows? Stadium Quizzing?
Wednesday, 11 June 2008
Tuesday, 3 June 2008
I'm going up to Leicestershire to run a quiz today - I think it will probably be only two rounds, which is a long trip for not much time working, but's it's for a lot of people, and a pretty smart do, so in its own way as hard as anything.
The last time i ran a quiz for this group, i had a few trials with my laptop beforehand (about the only time that's ever happened in a serious way) so that added to the worry, but i think i got through that pretty well - playing all the music at low volume, if at all, and generally keeping it very low key.
You never really know how it's going to pan out, though - one night for the same company can be lowkey and civilised, the next one they'll be throwing food around. That's why one really does have to adapt as one goes, and why the job never becomes routine.
It seems almost surreal to me now that most quizzes just involve someone reading out a list of questions, but of course they do, and why shouldn't they?
I haven't taken part in a quiz for ages, I do enjoy it but it's never been an obsession of mine, and also i can find it a wee bit embarrassing (if i do well) or pressured (if people know what i do). Well, lots of things really.
Hopefully i'll do one soon - I had an idea with the people i used to do a regular quiz with to go round London picking off the quizzes like pirates or Harlem Globetrotters - a fun idea which gradually becomes more objectionable when you think about it. Quizzes bring out the arrogance in me like nothing else, and its probably best kept in a box while i carry on being average at other pursuits
The last time i ran a quiz for this group, i had a few trials with my laptop beforehand (about the only time that's ever happened in a serious way) so that added to the worry, but i think i got through that pretty well - playing all the music at low volume, if at all, and generally keeping it very low key.
You never really know how it's going to pan out, though - one night for the same company can be lowkey and civilised, the next one they'll be throwing food around. That's why one really does have to adapt as one goes, and why the job never becomes routine.
It seems almost surreal to me now that most quizzes just involve someone reading out a list of questions, but of course they do, and why shouldn't they?
I haven't taken part in a quiz for ages, I do enjoy it but it's never been an obsession of mine, and also i can find it a wee bit embarrassing (if i do well) or pressured (if people know what i do). Well, lots of things really.
Hopefully i'll do one soon - I had an idea with the people i used to do a regular quiz with to go round London picking off the quizzes like pirates or Harlem Globetrotters - a fun idea which gradually becomes more objectionable when you think about it. Quizzes bring out the arrogance in me like nothing else, and its probably best kept in a box while i carry on being average at other pursuits
Tuesday, 20 May 2008
2 Cool
I haven't really remained true to my promise to post more regularly, but that's because work in general hasn't become significantly less busy in the last few weeks, with further question-writing projects as well as a fair few quizzes, ranging from a fairly huge, fairly tricky but enjoyable quiz for Barclays for 'Cultural Awareness' to a small quiz for some design firm in Shoreditch House which was, being honest, a long way too cool for school.
If there's anything I find vexing when running quizzes its not being shouted out, or people not doing well, or people not paying attention (well, ok, i do find all those things a little annoying, but let me continue), it's people who persist in some kind of phoney embarrassment at the very idea of knowing anything. You ask a question - partly there's a response of 'how are we supposed to know that' but then quite a few people do it and they know it in a kind of 'god, i can't believe i know that, it's so beneath me to know that' way. O well.
As far as I'm concerned it's all just knowledge, whether it's about Beats International featuring Lindy Layton or Pi Appreciation Day.
Furthermore, at one quiz, I got the 'How are we supposed to know that?' reaction when I asked 'Who was third in the US presidential election in 2000?', where the answer, Ralph Nader, and his very candidacy, has arguably had a more significant effect on the world than almost anyone in the last 20 years. That's how your supposed to know. I understand not knowing exactly where you would fing Cell Number IV65536, but come on, knowledge, like ridicule (they often go hand in hand) is nothing to be scared of.
If there's anything I find vexing when running quizzes its not being shouted out, or people not doing well, or people not paying attention (well, ok, i do find all those things a little annoying, but let me continue), it's people who persist in some kind of phoney embarrassment at the very idea of knowing anything. You ask a question - partly there's a response of 'how are we supposed to know that' but then quite a few people do it and they know it in a kind of 'god, i can't believe i know that, it's so beneath me to know that' way. O well.
As far as I'm concerned it's all just knowledge, whether it's about Beats International featuring Lindy Layton or Pi Appreciation Day.
Furthermore, at one quiz, I got the 'How are we supposed to know that?' reaction when I asked 'Who was third in the US presidential election in 2000?', where the answer, Ralph Nader, and his very candidacy, has arguably had a more significant effect on the world than almost anyone in the last 20 years. That's how your supposed to know. I understand not knowing exactly where you would fing Cell Number IV65536, but come on, knowledge, like ridicule (they often go hand in hand) is nothing to be scared of.
Friday, 2 May 2008
20000 Down
There are two reasons why it's been a couple of months since I've written anything here.
1 And very much the main reason is that i've been holed up in my quiz bunker writing and preparing 20000 questions for quiz machines which is, you know, a lot of questions. I mean, 100 questions is a lot of questions....20000, i don't know how we did it. I'd say it's about the equivalent of a 5/6/7oo page book, and that has to be 20000 discrete faultlessly factual, faultlessly laid out entinties.
I'm quite impressed with myself, frankly. I've also gone more than a little mental.
2 I was pondering, blogwise, whether to get a bit more general - there's only so many crazy corporate quiz stories one can tell, i suppose. Should i use this as a platform for political rants which no one will read or flights of whimsy which no one will read or encomiums to Ryan Giggs which no one will read? The choices are endless.
And yet, I feel i should keep this within its remit as the diary of a quizmaster, so you won't hear be getting my views on this exciting mayoral election and quite how half of London has persuaded itself it would be a hilarious jape to vote for a r...... f .....ph......l...us....c..-f...T....w..., but, no, i'll keep those thoughts to myself, and stick to the quizzes. But first, I need to sleep. for a few years.
1 And very much the main reason is that i've been holed up in my quiz bunker writing and preparing 20000 questions for quiz machines which is, you know, a lot of questions. I mean, 100 questions is a lot of questions....20000, i don't know how we did it. I'd say it's about the equivalent of a 5/6/7oo page book, and that has to be 20000 discrete faultlessly factual, faultlessly laid out entinties.
I'm quite impressed with myself, frankly. I've also gone more than a little mental.
2 I was pondering, blogwise, whether to get a bit more general - there's only so many crazy corporate quiz stories one can tell, i suppose. Should i use this as a platform for political rants which no one will read or flights of whimsy which no one will read or encomiums to Ryan Giggs which no one will read? The choices are endless.
And yet, I feel i should keep this within its remit as the diary of a quizmaster, so you won't hear be getting my views on this exciting mayoral election and quite how half of London has persuaded itself it would be a hilarious jape to vote for a r...... f .....ph......l...us....c..-f...T....w..., but, no, i'll keep those thoughts to myself, and stick to the quizzes. But first, I need to sleep. for a few years.
Sunday, 9 March 2008
It's been a fair while since i've posted anything, having been extremely busy coming up with 1000 questions on NFL. 500 0dd questions on that unbelievably strange thing that is Country Music and checking daily that I till have my sanity intact.
I've also had time to run a few quizzes, though, and a mixed bunch they've been, from a big event in a small restaurant in London, to a quiz for an almost exclusively non- English audience (pretty tough) to Friday's big charity quiz for teams where I'd been told the average age might be about 50 but it looked to me more like 70.
There are many things to consider for that kind of quiz, volume being one of the most important, as you have to be loud enough for the many hearing-impaired to hear, but quiet enough for the many who would ask you to turn your headphones down on the tube not to object.
Also the question range is very important, and it much more resembles a traditional general knowledge quiz, with lots on politics, history, geography etc, than our usual more raucous and silly affair.
I actually get far more nervous doing quizzes for middle-aged and old people than any others, so the one on Friday went very satisfactorily, and everyone was very nice afterwards.
It will be a relief to get back to asking questions about Charles and Eddie next week though.
I've also had time to run a few quizzes, though, and a mixed bunch they've been, from a big event in a small restaurant in London, to a quiz for an almost exclusively non- English audience (pretty tough) to Friday's big charity quiz for teams where I'd been told the average age might be about 50 but it looked to me more like 70.
There are many things to consider for that kind of quiz, volume being one of the most important, as you have to be loud enough for the many hearing-impaired to hear, but quiet enough for the many who would ask you to turn your headphones down on the tube not to object.
Also the question range is very important, and it much more resembles a traditional general knowledge quiz, with lots on politics, history, geography etc, than our usual more raucous and silly affair.
I actually get far more nervous doing quizzes for middle-aged and old people than any others, so the one on Friday went very satisfactorily, and everyone was very nice afterwards.
It will be a relief to get back to asking questions about Charles and Eddie next week though.
Tuesday, 19 February 2008
No 1399
Pheweee!
Quiet on the blog front lately but that's cos it's been quiet for me on the quiz-running front, though not, I should say, quiet on the working myself to the bone front.
I'm knee-deep in putting together a vast amount of questions for a project I think i have to be a wee bit confidential about (can one be a wee bit confidential, it's not the best way to confide a secret is it) but suffice to say I've written 1400 questions in the last week and a half, which, in case you have no frame of reference for the question-writing art, is a lot of questions. A lot of questions, and barely a dent in the full number. Which is making me a bit mental. Hopefully not in a bad way, but my usually sparkling, wide-ranging, polymathic banter is pretty limited at the moment to 'Do you know how many questions I've written today. That's when I have spoken...which is rarely....to other people...which is...never.
Heyho, doing a quiz on Thursday so I suppose I'd better switch vaguely back into the mode of the living. Bear with me...
Quiet on the blog front lately but that's cos it's been quiet for me on the quiz-running front, though not, I should say, quiet on the working myself to the bone front.
I'm knee-deep in putting together a vast amount of questions for a project I think i have to be a wee bit confidential about (can one be a wee bit confidential, it's not the best way to confide a secret is it) but suffice to say I've written 1400 questions in the last week and a half, which, in case you have no frame of reference for the question-writing art, is a lot of questions. A lot of questions, and barely a dent in the full number. Which is making me a bit mental. Hopefully not in a bad way, but my usually sparkling, wide-ranging, polymathic banter is pretty limited at the moment to 'Do you know how many questions I've written today. That's when I have spoken...which is rarely....to other people...which is...never.
Heyho, doing a quiz on Thursday so I suppose I'd better switch vaguely back into the mode of the living. Bear with me...
Sunday, 10 February 2008
No Sleep til Chelmsford
Who'd have thought that it would take almost as long to get to Chelmsford as Edinburgh? For the quiz on Friday night, the car journey from south London was quite something, and left us with little time to set everything up at the venue. A little problem with connection to the projector sorted, and I was ready to unleash a good three hours heavy quizzing to the good people of Essex.
It was pretty exhausting, actually, especially as my foot is killing me at the moment, and i'd much rather be feet up in front of the boxing on a Friday night.
But the reaction was enormously positive, being told it was 'the best quiz I've ever been to' and one woman lavishing praise and trying to get our contact details while i was trying to read out the final scores. Which was nice, though yet more distracting was another woman who had misheard 19 rather than 90 in one of the final questions (though no other teams had) and seemed to imply that was my fault, likewise implying it was my fault her team was at the back of the room and had trouble seeing the screen for some questions. (The other team right at the back came 2nd of 14 teams so I don't think it was the crucial factor in their lowly position).
Dealing with complaints and queries is all part of the job, and, in some ways, knowing how lairy I get in a quiz or a football match feeling that an injustice has been done, it's nice how rarely any kind of issue isn't dealt with with the utmost ease.
Of course, it helps that we know where our questions have come from and we know how and why they are right, it helps, i think, that one can usually afford to be placatory with a point here or there, but still, I got barred from a pub once for taking issue very strongly with a quizmaster (it goes without saying i was in the right, doesn't it.....) so well done for keeping your cool, people of Britain, you're better men and women than I.
It was pretty exhausting, actually, especially as my foot is killing me at the moment, and i'd much rather be feet up in front of the boxing on a Friday night.
But the reaction was enormously positive, being told it was 'the best quiz I've ever been to' and one woman lavishing praise and trying to get our contact details while i was trying to read out the final scores. Which was nice, though yet more distracting was another woman who had misheard 19 rather than 90 in one of the final questions (though no other teams had) and seemed to imply that was my fault, likewise implying it was my fault her team was at the back of the room and had trouble seeing the screen for some questions. (The other team right at the back came 2nd of 14 teams so I don't think it was the crucial factor in their lowly position).
Dealing with complaints and queries is all part of the job, and, in some ways, knowing how lairy I get in a quiz or a football match feeling that an injustice has been done, it's nice how rarely any kind of issue isn't dealt with with the utmost ease.
Of course, it helps that we know where our questions have come from and we know how and why they are right, it helps, i think, that one can usually afford to be placatory with a point here or there, but still, I got barred from a pub once for taking issue very strongly with a quizmaster (it goes without saying i was in the right, doesn't it.....) so well done for keeping your cool, people of Britain, you're better men and women than I.
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