Description
The world's largest trivia contest is held in Stevens Point, Wisconsin every
year in April. The contest is broadcast for 54 hours straight over the
University of Stevens Point radio station (90FM). The contest is written
by The Oz (Jim Oliva) and John Eckendorf.
Questions
Eight questions are asked over the university's radio station (90FM) each
hour. Team contestants are given the length of time for two songs to play in
which to respond with an answer. The teams gives an answer by calling the radio
station and giving them their team number. Each team is given one attempt
to answer. Teams can use any media to research including books,
notes, and the internet.
Questions can be about anything but our mostly about movies, television,
cartoons, comics, sports, and music. In addition to normal question, teams
are given a rule book when they register which contain pictures. During
the contest, a question will be asked regarding the picture. The question
is usually who or what the picture is, but sometimes the question can be more
complex like what movie is it from or a question about the person's
career. Finally, there are two to three questions about the
trivia movie. The trivia movie is played one or two weeks before the
contest at special showings (midnight Friday, 10 AM Saturday, and midnight Saturday) in Stevens Point. The movie is selected by the Oz and is usually (but
not always) a recent movie that has finished playing in theaters but has not yet
been released on video.
All teams that respond correctly are given an equal share of the 2000 points
that a question is worth, with a minimum of 5 points and a maximum of 500
points. There are two hours during the contest when only four questions are
asked. This allows time to read all of the team standings. There is also two hours where
10 questions are asked and teams are only given the length of one song to answer
the question. This results in 428 questions for the entire contest.
Running Questions
The Running Questions are given at specific locations in Stevens Point at
7:00 A.M. both Saturday and Sunday mornings. Teams are asked to gather
information from local businesses within "running" distance of the
meeting sight. Teams must find the answers on foot. Any use of
wheels including bikes, roller blades, and skateboards will disqualify the
team. Running questions are worth 150 points each.
Trivia Stone
The Trivia Stone is like a road rally. During the contest, teams are
instructed to follow a certain group of clues. These clues lead teams throughout
the city and countryside, and at three times are instructed to get their Trivia
Times booklet stamped. The stamps are then turned in at 6:30 Sunday evening for
points. One stamp earns 50 points, two stamps 150 points, and three stamps 300
points.
Music Questions
The music questions are snippets of 8 songs. There are three music questions.
Teams are given a specific time at which they have to turn in a sheet with their
answers for the questions. Each of the snippets is equivalent to one
question and is scored as a normal question (i.e. points are based on how many
teams correctly identified the snippet.)
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