Random Responses #5
This post is a collection if interesting submissions I came across that I couldn’t approve, but also couldn’t delete. All of these were very interesting but I just couldn’t verify them…so if one of these is yours, or if you know what the author meant to ask, please let me know. I would hate to not add these to the database. But they need a bit of editing.
“question”: “What two things do the years 1988, 1996 and 2016 have in common?”
“answer”: “Summer Olympics and U.S. Presidential Elections”
While this isn’t incorrect, I think there is more to this question…unless I am overthinking it. The Summer Olympics and U.S. Presidential Elections normally coincide so this applies to a whole bunch of dates. I also looked into other things that are common…like locations where these are held, top performing nations, etc. It was an interesting rabbit hole to fall into but I am not sure this question is ready yet. If you are the person who submitted this, get in touch and let me know what you meant…because I just might be overthinking this.
We also received an interesting form of correction to the answer for the question:
“The first atomic bomb test split an atom of what fissionable element?”
The original answer was “Plutonium” but the submitted the correction was not a straight forward one. The user submitted a link to Google search results. The funny thing about Google is that the results are rather personalized and the algorithm tries to blow up the answer it thinks you are searching for. For me, using the account I use to research and write trivia, the bold answer at the top of the search results was “Plutonium” but when I searched Incognito in Chrome, and through a couple of other devices and accounts I have, the answers were coming up as “Uranium”, “Uranium-235” and “Plutonium”. I find that fascinating and shows that the answer shouldn’t be taken blindly based on the top search result and that some additional reading is required and (but who am I to judge since I often do this myself).
The truth is that when you search “atomic bomb” you will find that they could be made using either uranium or plutonium, which explains the mix of answers. Some articles also provide a lot of additional information on the elements and the search algorithm is not capable of identifying some specifics. The first atomic bomb test, codenamed “Trinity”, used plutonium. But that answer is not near the top of any of the search results and requires some digging. Therefore, we stand by our original answer.
Keep the corrections and submission coming. We love going through them and learning new things and, of course, when we are wrong.
Updates: COVID-19
Hello fellow trivia enthusiasts! By now I am sure that most, if not all of you, have been affected by the virus that is quickly spreading around the world. So have we and our kids and spouses. We are all staying home and driving each other crazy 24/7, looking for something to entertain us until this is all over and we can resume our regular lives. We appreciate you choosing our site as your form of entertainment and learning resource. This means a lot to us and is the reason why we are continuing to maintain and improve the site and database. We have noticed an increase in traffic, e-mails, submissions, and general social interactions, and we are trying to address/respond to each one as quickly as we can. After all, we are human and there is only a couple of us. Please be patient if you don’t see your submissions approved or questions or corrections addressed immediately. We are doing our best!
Speaking of submissions…once they are approved and released into the world, you may not see your questions so easily because there are now well over 20,000 unique trivia questions. Don’t believe us? Keep an eye on the question counter accessible through the About page:
Each of the submissions goes through a vetting process. Each of the questions we come up also goes through a vetting process. BUT because we are simple humans, we too could make mistakes. We do our best not to but it happens. If you see an error, or want to discuss, or dispute a question or an answer, or there is a spelling mistake, please report the error to us and we will address it as quickly as we can. To report an error, simply open the site’s menu and click on the link at the bottom. Alternatively, you could send us an e-mail at [email protected].
Thank you for visiting our site and stay safe out there!
The Random Trivia Generator team
Image credit: Wikimedia
Q: What river is the setting for the novel "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn"?
A: Mississippi River
Random Responses #4
I have been catching up on submissions for a while now but I have been slacking off addressing some incorrect submissions. Typically incorrect submissions just need a bit of massaging/editing to fix them up. They could be off by a few days (if a date is the answer), the spelling of the answer could mean something else, etc. It is rare that I get completely incorrect submissions but I still do. Here is one of the latest ones:
“question” : “What is the only country in the world that is contained within 2 continents?”
“answer” : “Turkey”
If the fix was simple, I would have implemented it and moved on. But this is hard to fix because there are just so many countries that span two continents, or are fully “contained” within two. If you include little territories, then the number of answers grows exponentially. I am not going to name all countries that span multiple continents but a few major ones come to mind – Russia, for example. That is a rather large country to miss.
Just a quick search using your favorite search engine reveals numerous sites listing countries. Here is one at the top of every search result as an example. There are more depending on how you wish to classify the countries.
But in case I have misinterpreted the question, please let me know and I will approve it within the submission system with some minor corrections. You can either respond to this post with a comment or shoot us an e-mail at [email protected].
December 2019 Recap – The Random Trivia Generator by the Numbers
Hello dear readers and fans of the Random Trivia Generator and welcome to another monthly update. The purpose of these posts is to provide a peek behind the curtain and all the action that takes place to bring the tens to thousands of trivia questions to users.
First off, we have not done one of these in about a year so many apologies. Personal lives have been busy with our daytime jobs, family, kids, learning new things, resting, and making small tweaks behind the curtain.
New Questions
Since the last monthly recap in November I added 208 new questions to the main Random Trivia Generator website. As of this post, the site is sitting at 20,408 trivia questions. Not that many in a year but the vast majority of our time was taken up by addressing various technical issues and making small tweaks to improve usability…all boring things that cannot be seen but are necessary to maintain the site and the database.
I want to thank everyone who sent in questions and corrections.
New Developments
We are still experimenting with the old site (Version 1.0) to see what works and slowly rolling out improvements to the current site (Version 2.0). Right now, you can dispute science questions directly by clicking on the actual question itself. A link appears at the bottom which takes you to a form where you can tell us why the question, or answer, could be incorrect. The form logs the question ID so there is no need to open your e-mail application, send us screenshots, or remember the exact question. Just let us know what could be wrong and we will fix it.
Stay tuned for even more questions next month.