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Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff you Should Know, a production of iHeartRadio.

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Speaker 2: Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, and

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Speaker 2: there's Charles w Chuck Bryant, and Jerry's here too. We're

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Speaker 2: just rolling the dice and moving the pies. Yeah, because

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Speaker 2: I mean it was like a pie piece. Yeah. I

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Speaker 2: can't think of anything else you call them. I think

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Speaker 2: some people call them wedges, but they're clearly sickos. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: Oh, I think they're officially wedges.

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Speaker 2: Well, I've seen the guys who invented the game.

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Speaker 1: So did you watch that video?

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Speaker 2: Yeah?

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Speaker 1: Oh boy.

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Speaker 2: We should probably tell everybody what we're talking about. First,

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Speaker 2: this is Stuff you should Know. Second, we're talking about

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Speaker 2: Trivial Pursuit. Arguably one of the greatest board games ever created.

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Speaker 2: And we're not just saying that because Stuff you Should

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Speaker 2: Know has its own Trivial Pursuit edition. It's because it

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Speaker 2: legitimately is such a great game.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. I played this game a lot when I was

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Speaker 1: a kid. It was a family favorite. My mom really

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Speaker 1: really loved it. We were often a team together, my

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Speaker 1: mom and I, so it's kind of one of my

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Speaker 1: good childhood memories with her.

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Speaker 2: I'll bet Yeah, looking at the board and all like

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Speaker 2: pictures of the board and some of the question cards

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Speaker 2: and all that. Like, I was just overwhelmed with nostalgic

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Speaker 2: because it was a huge thing in my family too,

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Speaker 2: playing Trivial Pursuit.

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Speaker 1: Boomer City, Baby.

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Speaker 2: I love that game.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, for sure, as it turns out, for sure.

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Speaker 2: And what's funny is in doctrineeded us into everything that

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Speaker 2: Boomer's like. Like it was a really like huge cultural

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Speaker 2: transfer from one generation to the other in that way.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean I was a twelve year old who

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Speaker 1: learned about gun smoke and Richard Nixon through playing Trivial Pursuit.

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Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, and Spiro Agnew from Mad Magazine. Oh yeah,

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Speaker 2: So we should probably start at the start, and that

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Speaker 2: actually goes long before Trivial Pursuit was created, but not

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Speaker 2: as far back as you would think. Like in the

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Speaker 2: United States, we did a live episode on game shows

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Speaker 2: that was really cool, and we talked about this some

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Speaker 2: but back as far back to the thirties on the

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Speaker 2: radio and then later on TV, quiz shows were like

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Speaker 2: all the rage and America's had like fascinations with trivia

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Speaker 2: and then got bored with it and then came and

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Speaker 2: found it again and then got bored with it. And

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Speaker 2: back in the thirties that was one of the peaks

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Speaker 2: where everybody was super into it.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, quiz shows were for sure big. I think you know,

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Speaker 1: Lvia helped us with this. And I always kind of

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Speaker 1: wondered about the word trivial because I thought that was

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Speaker 1: a pretty genius And we'll get to the name change,

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Speaker 1: because initially this was called trivia pursuit, and a lot

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Speaker 1: of people called it trivia pursuit. But the change to trivial,

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Speaker 1: I don't know, that was just something that made it

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Speaker 1: a little cheeky.

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Speaker 2: Maybe yeah, because you're not just talking about trivia, you're

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Speaker 2: also poking fun at your own game, Like you're putting

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Speaker 2: all this effort into something that doesn't really matter in

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Speaker 2: the end.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I guess so. But I thought it mattered when

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Speaker 1: I was a kid. I was Now that i'm adult,

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Speaker 1: I'm like, trivia Pursuit's kind of a fun name. When

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Speaker 1: I was a kid, I was like, this is not trivia.

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Speaker 1: These are facts and figures, right, it's weird.

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Speaker 2: Oh I took it seriously too. Yeah, for sure, I

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Speaker 2: love trivial pursuit too, but it was definitely in the

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Speaker 2: vein of the people who invented this thing to kind

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Speaker 2: of poke fun at themselves and even at you, the

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Speaker 2: player for playing it.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, for sure. So pub quizzes were big in England

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Speaker 1: before they were a big deal in the United States,

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Speaker 1: where we call it just par trivia, I guess, but

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Speaker 1: they kind of hit it big earlier on. So the

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Speaker 1: world of trivia was gaining steam through the nineteen sixties.

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Speaker 1: I think there was a Columbia student named Edwin Goodgold

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Speaker 1: who I think he wrote a book, right, He and another.

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Speaker 2: Guy named Dan Karlinski wrote a book simply called Trivia. Yeah,

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Speaker 2: but he's credited as one of like the early people

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Speaker 2: to spread the whole concept of being quizzed about inconsequential

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Speaker 2: usually pop culture questions to just show like how much

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Speaker 2: you knew about your childhood and that Edwin Goodgold thing.

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Speaker 2: Two things about him. He went on to become the

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Speaker 2: manager of Shanna Nah really yeah, oh wow, And he

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Speaker 2: wrote in Columbia University's I guess their newspaper, he was

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Speaker 2: one of their writers. He wrote that this is that

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Speaker 2: these trivia games that are like the hot new thing

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Speaker 2: on campus are played by young adults who, on the

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Speaker 2: one hand, realize they have misspent their youth, yet on

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Speaker 2: the other hand, do not want to let go of it.

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Speaker 2: And that was the whole idea. It was about all

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Speaker 2: the stuff that you learned in your childhood from reading

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Speaker 2: Superman comic books and listening to like gangster or seen

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Speaker 2: like gangster TV shows, just from being a kid. That's

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Speaker 2: what the whole thing was based on. And that kind

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Speaker 2: of became a tradition too that it was largely stuff

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Speaker 2: in the past. A lot of it was pop culture.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly, and that was the mid sixties. The mid

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Speaker 1: seventies is when the pub quizzes really took off in England.

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Speaker 1: That didn't start in the US untill really after Trivial Pursuit.

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Speaker 1: There was a time even where the TV show Jeopardy

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Speaker 1: was not on the air because like you said, there

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Speaker 1: was just a waxing and waning on interest in trivia.

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Speaker 1: But Jeopardy came back in eighty four and all of

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Speaker 1: a sudden, you know, trivia started to be important in

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Speaker 1: the United States again.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, and I didn't see it anywhere, but I would

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Speaker 2: put some serious money on the idea that Trivial Pursuits

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Speaker 2: success revived Jeopardy.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I bet it did, because it was.

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Speaker 2: A huge, huge deal as we'll see, yeah, for sure,

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Speaker 2: But the whole thing starts all the way back in

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Speaker 2: nineteen seventy nine, in December of nineteen seventy nine, appropriately

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Speaker 2: because Trivial Pursuit and Christmas for its first few years

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Speaker 2: of being out, were synonymous with one another. Essentially, maybe

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Speaker 2: synonymous isn't the right word, but they were. It was

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Speaker 2: a big deal around Christmas time when it first came out.

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Speaker 1: About that, Yeah, and this is our pick. We kind

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Speaker 1: of had a hard time deciding this year, but actually

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Speaker 1: not really. It was a toss up, but we always

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Speaker 1: do like a Christmas you know, legendary Christmas gifts in

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Speaker 1: pop culture history kind of episode, And this year we

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Speaker 1: went with Trivial Pursuit because it was a big you know,

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Speaker 1: they as you'll see that. You know, rolling out a

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Speaker 1: board game in October and November is a pretty smart

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Speaker 1: move for sure.

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Speaker 2: And these two guys, there are two Canadians. I read

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Speaker 2: an article about them that was contemporary to them in

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Speaker 2: the Toronto Star. It said that they come off like

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Speaker 2: the two original Hosers. Yeah, even bigger Hosers than Bob

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Speaker 2: and Doug Mackenzie is what they were saying.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, there were a couple of hockey dudes, just hockey

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Speaker 1: beer drinking, Canadian, good old fashioned Canadian hockey playing. They're

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Speaker 1: at least hockey watching. I bet they played too. They

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Speaker 1: all played.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I think they definitely did. They certainly covered it.

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Speaker 2: One of them, Scott Abbott, was a sports reporter for

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Speaker 2: the Canadian Press who I think his focus was on hockey.

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Speaker 2: The other guy was Chris Haney. He was a photo

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Speaker 2: editor at the Montreal Gazette. So these are a couple

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Speaker 2: of late seventies early eighties journalist dudes who wear mustaches

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Speaker 2: and drink beer during their interviews on the news and

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Speaker 2: smoke like yeah, and smoke during them too, like this

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Speaker 2: would These were the guys who invented trivial pursuit.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. Hani was a high school dropout. Abbott did have

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Speaker 1: a master's degree in journalism from the University of Tennessee,

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Speaker 1: and he was living with Haney and his wife Sarah

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Speaker 1: in their apartment in Montreal at the time. And as

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Speaker 1: the legend goes, they're hanging out one day it was

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Speaker 1: kind of rainy, they were like, hey, let's play some scrabble.

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Speaker 1: They realized they didn't have some scrabble, and then I

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Speaker 1: saw a couple of different versions. It kind of inconsequential,

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Speaker 1: like whether or not he just dropped everything and went

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Speaker 1: out and bought a scrabble or whether just on his

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Speaker 1: next shopping trip he did. But Hani would buy a

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Speaker 1: scrabble game, bring it back to play and was like,

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Speaker 1: you know what, I bought like six of these things

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Speaker 1: over the years because I just keep losing number leaving

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Speaker 1: behind or learning them out or something, and like what

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Speaker 1: a racket, Like we should get into the gaming business.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, that's how I was born. They just realized how

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Speaker 2: how many times he bought a scrabble game, and they

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Speaker 2: were like, we should we could do that.

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Speaker 1: We should say.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, these guys, that was the kind of thing that

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Speaker 2: they would talk about doing, is making a game because

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Speaker 2: they realized that you could that other people have made

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Speaker 2: money off of it.

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Speaker 1: Yeah.

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Speaker 2: Up to this point, their big claim to fame in

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Speaker 2: their circle was having carried out a pyramid scheme with

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Speaker 2: a chain letter that was actually successful in that they

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Speaker 2: made money off of it and they never got caught

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Speaker 2: for it either. So up to this point, so these

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Speaker 2: were that was these this kind of these kind of

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Speaker 2: guys right, And this particular idea though, kind of started

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Speaker 2: to take shape really really quickly. I think it was

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Speaker 2: Chris Abber Scott Abbott who was like, well, how about

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Speaker 2: something with trivia. And remember, at the time, like trivia

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Speaker 2: was not hot item, and also, as we'll see, board

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Speaker 2: games were not a high item. So these were like

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Speaker 2: two bad ideas that these guys decided to put together

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Speaker 2: and accidentally became a success, or not accidentally it ended

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Speaker 2: up becoming a success. But it was like they figured

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Speaker 2: it out really quickly, didn't they.

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Speaker 1: Some might say suspiciously quickly. We'll get to that later.

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Speaker 1: But as their story goes at about forty five minutes time,

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Speaker 1: and they're really specific about that. I'd never saw anywhere

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Speaker 1: an hour. They always said forty five minutes. They got,

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Speaker 1: you know, the game together, They got some construction paper,

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Speaker 1: they started sketching things out. They based the design of

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Speaker 1: the circular board on a ship's wheel with six spokes

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Speaker 1: that corresponded to categories of geography, entertainment, sports and leisure,

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Speaker 1: science and nature, arts and literature, and history. And you

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Speaker 1: would roll the die. You would move in any direction

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Speaker 1: you wanted, as long as it's only one direction. You

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Speaker 1: get this little circular pie crust with six available pie slots,

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Speaker 1: right wedges not wedges. And the idea is you go

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Speaker 1: around and you answer questions in the corresponding categories, and

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Speaker 1: when you answer them on the center of each spoke

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Speaker 1: or I guess the landing point of each spoke, you

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Speaker 1: would get to put in a pie piece. Once you

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Speaker 1: have all those pie pieces in, you roll your way

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Speaker 1: to the center. Must have an exact role, and then

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Speaker 1: the other teams decide which category of question they want

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Speaker 1: to randomly ask you and if you miss you if

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Speaker 1: you make it, you win the game. If you miss it,

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Speaker 1: you got to roll back out and then answer questions

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Speaker 1: eventually roll back in.

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Speaker 2: Yes, well put. I am not one for boasting typically,

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Speaker 2: but I will say that I once confirmed one a

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Speaker 2: game doing all the things you just said in twenty minutes.

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Speaker 1: The wow by yourself?

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Speaker 2: No no, no, not by myself. It's playing a dude

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Speaker 2: at work at the liquor store.

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Speaker 1: No no, no, I mean, were you on a team by yourself?

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Speaker 2: No? Oh no, just me, Okay, that's what.

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Speaker 1: I was asking, not literally playing boy, Josh. I'll never mind.

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Speaker 2: I mean, I guess if you were really honest you

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Speaker 2: could play by yourself.

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Speaker 1: You know, he gets it around recards. I did that

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Speaker 1: for a little while.

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Speaker 2: That's not honest. I'm saying you could roll, you could move,

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Speaker 2: you could ask yourself questions, answer them and yeah, got

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Speaker 2: it wrong.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, just you could talk in different voices. No, good,

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Speaker 1: try chuck right, great.

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Speaker 2: You kind of ruined my twenty minute anecdote.

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Speaker 1: Frankly, no, I want to dwell back on that, because

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Speaker 1: twenty minutes. I mean, I played a lot of trivial pursuit,

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Speaker 1: and I don't feel like we ever got through a

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Speaker 1: game in less than that standard forty five minutes. It

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Speaker 1: took to an a minute.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, it took It took a It could take

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Speaker 2: a while, especially if like they were just had a

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Speaker 2: lot of people who yeah, didn't didn't know trivia. But yeah,

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Speaker 2: it would usually take yeah, forty five minutes an hour,

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Speaker 2: depending on how fast everybody was moving. Usually it took

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Speaker 2: longer because the whole point was almost every question and

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Speaker 2: answer would like generate a quick conversation or usually a

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Speaker 2: short conversation, sometimes longer, yeah, exactly, And.

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Speaker 1: Most of the times it was boomer parents like waxing

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Speaker 1: philosophic about how great their.

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Speaker 2: Stuff was right exactly to that too. But that was

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Speaker 2: the point, and that's one of the reasons it became

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Speaker 2: so popular, is like it was really easy to have

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Speaker 2: a party centered on trivial pursuit.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, so I don't think we mentioned you could you

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Speaker 1: could have teams. I did sort of allude to that,

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Speaker 1: but you could have I mean, you could probably have

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Speaker 1: as many people as you want on a team, but

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Speaker 1: I think they suggested max of four, meaning a max

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Speaker 1: of twenty four players, and anything more than that would

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Speaker 1: get at unwieldy. But I feel like we were and

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Speaker 1: my family wasn't big. It was usually we were in pairs.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, that was typically how it was done, so you

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Speaker 2: could argue and be mad at one another one the

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Speaker 2: other one insisted on the wrong answer.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, And as a kid, I do also remember all

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Speaker 1: of my family trying to nab me because I was

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Speaker 1: the only one who really knew much about sport.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. That was always my weak one too, and that

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Speaker 2: was always the one that would get picked for me

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Speaker 2: if I ever made it to the middle.

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Speaker 1: What was your category? Like, if you could pick your

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Speaker 1: own final category, what would it be?

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Speaker 2: It was usually history or entertainment.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I would say, I would say sports and leisure

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Speaker 1: or entertainment for me, Yeah, definitely not geography.

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Speaker 2: Still, yeah, my worst was definitely sports and leisure, and

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Speaker 2: I would yeah, geography was probably second.

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Speaker 1: That's because they didn't have masths.

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Speaker 2: Right, only in the British version.

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Speaker 1: So I mentioned the name change. That was Sarah, who

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Speaker 1: was Hani's wife, Chris Haney's wife. Sarah is the one

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Speaker 1: that said now change it to trivial instead of trivia.

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Speaker 1: I think it was a pretty great switch. And I

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Speaker 1: think that's a pretty good intro.

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Speaker 2: Oh okay, well if that's the end of the intro,

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Speaker 2: then Chuck, I think we have to put an ad

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Speaker 2: break in here.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, let's move along to Act two.

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Speaker 2: Right after this, so Hani and Abbott like they were like,

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Speaker 2: we're gonna do this, and they came upon a great

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Speaker 2: idea that they would visit a toy industry convention, like

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Speaker 2: the big one in Canada. I think it was the

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Speaker 2: Canadian Toy Manufacturer's Trade Show. I can't remember what's called.

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Speaker 2: I looked it up and couldn't find anything on it.

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Speaker 2: But they went. Remember they were journalists, so they went

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Speaker 2: as reporters as if they were on an assignment to

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Speaker 2: do a story on the toy industry, specifically the board

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Speaker 2: game industry. So they used that cover to pick the

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Speaker 2: brains of a bunch of people who we're in the

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Speaker 2: board game industry and one of the well, they found

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Speaker 2: out a couple of things very quickly. They found out

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Speaker 2: that the board game industry was in a slump. They

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Speaker 2: also found out that is a very very closed industry

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Speaker 2: where if you're a newcomer with an idea, just hit

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Speaker 2: the bricks like they're not going to listen to you.

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Speaker 2: That's not how the board game industry works. And they

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Speaker 2: figured this out. So they decided that from going to

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Speaker 2: this conference they were going to have to do this themself.

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Speaker 2: If they wanted to get this game out there, they

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Speaker 2: were going to have to They couldn't just sell the idea.

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Speaker 2: They had to make the game first. And that's what

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Speaker 2: they said about doing.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, they were like, we did a pyramid scheme. We're

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Speaker 1: good at selling things that don't exist. So they enlisted

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Speaker 1: a little bit of help. They got Chris's brother, John

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Speaker 1: Haney on the team, and then a guy named Ed

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Speaker 1: Werner who was a friend who's a corporate attorney, and

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Speaker 1: they formed the horn Abbot Company. Hani's sickname was the Horn,

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Speaker 1: and Abbot in this case with one tee was just

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Speaker 1: a variation on Abbot's two teed name. And they started

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Speaker 1: selling equity to raise a little money through friends and family.

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Speaker 1: So they sold forty shares at one thousand dollars each

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Speaker 1: to thirty two friends and family members. And boy, you

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Speaker 1: want to talk about an investment that paid off for sure? Wow?

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Speaker 1: Can you imagine it'd be like one of the early

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Speaker 1: Apple stock or Google stock, right, you know.

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Speaker 2: Very similar to that, not quite as lucrative, but still

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Speaker 2: pretty well. The people who bought several shares each were

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Speaker 2: set for life basically after the game hit. Oh yeah,

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Speaker 2: but at the time Chris Haney told his mom she

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Speaker 2: shouldn't invest. Yeah, and this is his idea, his business venture.

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Speaker 2: That's how much he paged in it, I guess. But

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Speaker 2: there's a guy named Michael Worstlin, and so this iconic,

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Speaker 2: really elegant design for the package, the board itself, cards,

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Speaker 2: all that stuff. It was Michael Worstlin's work. He was

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Speaker 2: eighteen at the time.

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Speaker 1: That's just amazing.

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Speaker 2: And he didn't get a dime front for it. He

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Speaker 2: did this work for five shares of stock in the company.

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Speaker 2: Of equity and yeah, it was very smart, as we'll see.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, so they managed to raise forty grand. They got

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Speaker 1: a seventy five thousand dollars line of credit from a bank,

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Speaker 1: and that was enough dough to start getting this game

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Speaker 1: together in earnest. The one thing they didn't have they

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Speaker 1: had design, They had it kind of all ready to go.

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Speaker 1: They needed six thousand questions and so I assume with

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Speaker 1: some of that, what is that like close to one

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Speaker 1: hundred and twenty grand. They went to Spain in nineteen

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Speaker 1: eighty one and they said, we're going to go drink

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Speaker 1: beer on the beach and write questions. We're going to

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Speaker 1: pack a bunch of you know, dictionaries and encyclopedias and

347
00:17:47,359 --> 00:17:51,560
Speaker 1: reference books and newspapers, and we're going to go out there.

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Speaker 1: We're going to write it for the American audience. Some

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00:17:54,760 --> 00:17:57,600
Speaker 1: of this stuff's going to be pretty obscure stuff. Some

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00:17:57,760 --> 00:17:59,080
Speaker 1: is going to be you know, some are going to

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Speaker 1: be a little easier. They wanted to kind of give

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00:18:00,720 --> 00:18:04,400
Speaker 1: it a little bit of variety, and finally, in November

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Speaker 1: eighty one, registered Trivial Pursuit as a trademark and then

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Speaker 1: launched the Genus not Genius edition that same month is

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Speaker 1: when that came out.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, we should explain, because I've never understood it until

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00:18:19,280 --> 00:18:23,719
Speaker 2: I started researching this. It's called genus because genus, you know,

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00:18:23,800 --> 00:18:26,920
Speaker 2: like in taxonomy, genus is above species. So yeah, there's

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00:18:27,000 --> 00:18:31,960
Speaker 2: a bunch of different variations of this thing. Another way

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00:18:32,000 --> 00:18:36,080
Speaker 2: to interpret another definition of it. It's general, it's not specific,

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Speaker 2: and so the questions in here were not They were

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Speaker 2: very general. You didn't have to be like a specialist

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00:18:42,200 --> 00:18:45,600
Speaker 2: in anything to play trivial pursuit, and if you were,

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Speaker 2: you're kind of handicapped because there was a bunch of

365
00:18:48,480 --> 00:18:50,919
Speaker 2: other questions that had nothing to do with your specialist

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00:18:51,520 --> 00:18:57,360
Speaker 2: or special Yes, specialist, specialism, what's the word I'm looking for? Specialty?

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Speaker 1: You go, I think or something behind you with the

368
00:19:01,119 --> 00:19:03,440
Speaker 1: giant y like dancing up and down.

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Speaker 2: I think there's somebody behind me with a hammer.

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Speaker 1: Oh no, no, no, no. So toy Fair people were

371
00:19:11,160 --> 00:19:14,720
Speaker 1: not too interested at first, at least they got passed

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Speaker 1: on from the bigs Parker Brothers and Milton Bradley at

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Speaker 1: the time, saying this is a really expensive game to produce,

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Speaker 1: and I mean that's something we learned a lot about

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00:19:24,119 --> 00:19:26,040
Speaker 1: and doing this stuff you should know version is like,

376
00:19:26,440 --> 00:19:29,159
Speaker 1: cost of production is obviously a big deal. I just

377
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Speaker 1: never we were like, you know what if those pieces

378
00:19:31,280 --> 00:19:34,280
Speaker 1: were like copper or something, and they're like, uh no,

379
00:19:34,320 --> 00:19:37,000
Speaker 1: they're gonna be punch out cardboard. But you got you

380
00:19:37,040 --> 00:19:37,719
Speaker 1: guys are sweet.

381
00:19:38,080 --> 00:19:40,280
Speaker 2: Yeah. We were like, well what about plastic. They're like

382
00:19:40,320 --> 00:19:41,360
Speaker 2: we keep guessing.

383
00:19:41,600 --> 00:19:44,920
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know Monopoly has all those solid lead figurines,

384
00:19:45,520 --> 00:19:47,200
Speaker 1: and they're like no, no, no, no, no no no.

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Speaker 2: That's brain damage if you play too much.

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Speaker 1: Not to knock the team we worked with, because they

387
00:19:52,280 --> 00:19:55,040
Speaker 1: werenating the game turned out great. It's just it's just

388
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Speaker 1: how you make a game to make money.

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00:19:57,040 --> 00:19:59,000
Speaker 2: Yeah, we said it before and we'll say it again.

390
00:19:59,080 --> 00:20:02,720
Speaker 2: Like they were the greatest bunch of people that I've

391
00:20:02,720 --> 00:20:05,160
Speaker 2: ever worked with as a group. Like, as a group,

392
00:20:05,200 --> 00:20:07,160
Speaker 2: they were as good as it comes. It was amazing.

393
00:20:07,400 --> 00:20:10,840
Speaker 1: Yeah, it was pro top to bottom enthusiasm, just a

394
00:20:10,880 --> 00:20:15,400
Speaker 1: sheer pleasure. Yeah all right, so enough of that kissing up.

395
00:20:16,720 --> 00:20:20,520
Speaker 1: They got about eleven hundred games made, sold them to

396
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Speaker 1: local retailers, regional Canadian retailers, basically right before Christmas, and

397
00:20:27,040 --> 00:20:33,600
Speaker 1: then this distributor of games Cheaptain products very smartly were like, hey,

398
00:20:33,960 --> 00:20:37,440
Speaker 1: we'll put this thing together. My daughter, supposedly the vice

399
00:20:37,480 --> 00:20:40,200
Speaker 1: president's daughter, really really loved the game when she went

400
00:20:40,200 --> 00:20:41,760
Speaker 1: away for a weekend and played it a lot, and

401
00:20:41,800 --> 00:20:44,240
Speaker 1: he's it ended up being a great decision for them

402
00:20:44,240 --> 00:20:44,600
Speaker 1: as well.

403
00:20:44,920 --> 00:20:48,720
Speaker 2: So yeah, a hugely consequential And this was Christmas nineteen

404
00:20:48,760 --> 00:20:51,720
Speaker 2: eighty one, So this is the first Christmas that Trivial

405
00:20:51,760 --> 00:20:55,120
Speaker 2: Pursuit comes out and makes a big splash because they

406
00:20:55,280 --> 00:20:58,400
Speaker 2: sold out of those eleven hundred games so quickly that

407
00:20:58,840 --> 00:21:01,600
Speaker 2: by the time that end of the by the time

408
00:21:01,640 --> 00:21:05,359
Speaker 2: the next Christmas rolled around, they'd already sold one hundred

409
00:21:05,400 --> 00:21:09,760
Speaker 2: thousand copies in Canada. And that's a lot. And it

410
00:21:09,800 --> 00:21:11,719
Speaker 2: turns out it's even more than you think it is,

411
00:21:11,760 --> 00:21:14,119
Speaker 2: because at the time a board game to be a

412
00:21:14,160 --> 00:21:19,159
Speaker 2: best seller sold about ten thousand copies. So this little

413
00:21:19,560 --> 00:21:24,120
Speaker 2: independent yeah, a very independent game created by a couple

414
00:21:24,200 --> 00:21:28,200
Speaker 2: of outsiders, sold ten times more than you would expect

415
00:21:28,200 --> 00:21:31,560
Speaker 2: it to sell as a best seller in this first year.

416
00:21:32,160 --> 00:21:35,000
Speaker 1: Yeah, it was incredible. They were making everything in Canada

417
00:21:35,520 --> 00:21:38,800
Speaker 1: Canada at the time except for the Dice, thirty five

418
00:21:38,880 --> 00:21:42,040
Speaker 1: hundred games a day, but they still couldn't keep up

419
00:21:42,040 --> 00:21:46,480
Speaker 1: with the pace in nineteen eighty three. Finally, a US

420
00:21:46,680 --> 00:21:51,879
Speaker 1: company called Celcho and Richter I guess or writer, writer, yeah, writer,

421
00:21:52,800 --> 00:21:56,560
Speaker 1: they licensed that game. They had real marketing money. Finally,

422
00:21:57,400 --> 00:22:00,880
Speaker 1: they sold one point three million games nineteen eighty three

423
00:22:01,760 --> 00:22:05,080
Speaker 1: with that company. And one thing we haven't mentioned is

424
00:22:05,240 --> 00:22:07,679
Speaker 1: this game was about double the cost of what a

425
00:22:07,720 --> 00:22:11,200
Speaker 1: board game was at the time, twenty five to forty

426
00:22:11,200 --> 00:22:13,160
Speaker 1: bucks depending on where you went. That's up to ninety

427
00:22:13,200 --> 00:22:13,919
Speaker 1: dollars today.

428
00:22:14,480 --> 00:22:16,920
Speaker 2: And so I saw one hundred and twenty five today.

429
00:22:17,440 --> 00:22:17,960
Speaker 1: Oh really?

430
00:22:18,480 --> 00:22:21,440
Speaker 2: Yeah? I put forty dollars in for nineteen eighty three

431
00:22:21,480 --> 00:22:23,680
Speaker 2: in west Egg and it said one hundred and twenty five.

432
00:22:23,760 --> 00:22:24,679
Speaker 1: It told me ninety.

433
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Speaker 2: Oh god, oh no, inflation calculations are no in question.

434
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Speaker 1: Oh god, it must be having the worst thing that's

435
00:22:32,960 --> 00:22:37,080
Speaker 1: ever happened our beloved West Egg. Well, either way, let's

436
00:22:37,119 --> 00:22:40,840
Speaker 1: settle at one ten. Okay, great, But either way, that

437
00:22:40,960 --> 00:22:43,679
Speaker 1: was about double the cost of a board game. So

438
00:22:43,720 --> 00:22:46,440
Speaker 1: it was no small thing to plunk down that kind

439
00:22:46,440 --> 00:22:50,800
Speaker 1: of money on this big, heavy, voluminous, voluminous game.

440
00:22:51,119 --> 00:22:55,800
Speaker 2: Voluptuous too, So you said heavy. Each game package weighs

441
00:22:55,880 --> 00:22:59,480
Speaker 2: six pounds, because they they really pulled out the stops

442
00:22:59,520 --> 00:23:02,159
Speaker 2: in their materials and like, yeah it was cardboard, and

443
00:23:02,240 --> 00:23:04,960
Speaker 2: yeah it was plastic, but it was really really well made,

444
00:23:05,400 --> 00:23:10,160
Speaker 2: well manufactured, well designed cardboard and plastic put together. And

445
00:23:10,200 --> 00:23:12,960
Speaker 2: again that just the look of it had such an

446
00:23:13,000 --> 00:23:16,320
Speaker 2: elegant look. It just didn't. It did not look like

447
00:23:16,440 --> 00:23:19,639
Speaker 2: other board games at the time. It's like Sorry or

448
00:23:19,760 --> 00:23:22,760
Speaker 2: Trouble or something like that, you know, whereas like wacky.

449
00:23:22,800 --> 00:23:25,320
Speaker 2: And there was like a cartoon explosion or something like that,

450
00:23:25,359 --> 00:23:27,840
Speaker 2: a bunch of kids rolling dice on there, and that

451
00:23:27,960 --> 00:23:31,679
Speaker 2: was a big deal too. There was no kid, no

452
00:23:31,880 --> 00:23:35,000
Speaker 2: person anywhere on the box. The only person who showed

453
00:23:35,080 --> 00:23:39,120
Speaker 2: up was the poet, the English poet Alexander Pope, who

454
00:23:39,520 --> 00:23:43,320
Speaker 2: who's quote what mighty contests derived from trivial things was

455
00:23:43,359 --> 00:23:46,080
Speaker 2: on the box. So this whole thing is so highbrow

456
00:23:46,800 --> 00:23:50,119
Speaker 2: that it just doesn't even make sense. And yet that

457
00:23:50,240 --> 00:23:52,360
Speaker 2: made people want it all the more. It was a

458
00:23:52,440 --> 00:23:56,160
Speaker 2: brand new thing. It was a revival of board games,

459
00:23:56,200 --> 00:23:58,240
Speaker 2: is what trivial Pursuit was when it came out.

460
00:23:58,480 --> 00:24:01,440
Speaker 1: Yeah, and it was, I mean it said for adults

461
00:24:01,480 --> 00:24:04,560
Speaker 1: on the box, which turned out to be a stroke

462
00:24:04,600 --> 00:24:07,080
Speaker 1: of genius because I even remember I read an article

463
00:24:07,080 --> 00:24:10,399
Speaker 1: in Slate that kind of drove this home. But I

464
00:24:10,440 --> 00:24:14,120
Speaker 1: even remember kind of agreeing with what Slate was saying,

465
00:24:14,119 --> 00:24:18,639
Speaker 1: which was like as a kid in the eighties, especially

466
00:24:18,720 --> 00:24:23,080
Speaker 1: for kids in the eighties who had like narcissistic parents

467
00:24:23,080 --> 00:24:25,960
Speaker 1: who didn't show them much attention, it was if you

468
00:24:25,960 --> 00:24:28,200
Speaker 1: could play trivial pursuit and hang, it was a chance

469
00:24:28,240 --> 00:24:30,800
Speaker 1: to sit at the adult table for a minute. Yeah,

470
00:24:30,800 --> 00:24:33,879
Speaker 1: and to like interact with your parents for an hour

471
00:24:33,920 --> 00:24:34,320
Speaker 1: a day.

472
00:24:34,720 --> 00:24:38,240
Speaker 2: Yeah, and maybe make some extra allowance in the bargain. Yeah, hey,

473
00:24:38,359 --> 00:24:41,280
Speaker 2: you throw a little money on it. You never know exactly.

474
00:24:42,080 --> 00:24:46,400
Speaker 2: So this was Christmas nineteen eighty three that it blew

475
00:24:46,480 --> 00:24:50,640
Speaker 2: up in the United States, and like when it blew

476
00:24:50,720 --> 00:24:53,800
Speaker 2: up in the US, it like it really just changed everything.

477
00:24:53,840 --> 00:24:56,480
Speaker 2: Like you said, that first year they sold one point

478
00:24:56,520 --> 00:24:59,240
Speaker 2: three million games, they sold twenty million the next year

479
00:24:59,280 --> 00:25:02,640
Speaker 2: in nineteen eighty f and by January of nineteen eighty four,

480
00:25:02,720 --> 00:25:05,639
Speaker 2: right after it started to come out in the United States,

481
00:25:05,880 --> 00:25:09,520
Speaker 2: the New York Times reported that people in New York

482
00:25:09,520 --> 00:25:13,119
Speaker 2: were trading cocktail parties for trivial Pursuit parties. And I

483
00:25:13,200 --> 00:25:16,320
Speaker 2: was thinking about it, yeah, right, yeah, I don't think

484
00:25:16,320 --> 00:25:19,240
Speaker 2: there's anything more insufferable than the New York Times reporting

485
00:25:19,280 --> 00:25:21,920
Speaker 2: on what cool New Yorkers are doing right now right.

486
00:25:22,880 --> 00:25:26,520
Speaker 2: This was a great example of that eighties version two.

487
00:25:26,960 --> 00:25:30,520
Speaker 1: Yeah, for sure, they had a great marketing early on

488
00:25:30,560 --> 00:25:32,560
Speaker 1: with this new company that was a marketing consultant they

489
00:25:32,600 --> 00:25:36,840
Speaker 1: hire named Linda Pizzano, who would send these games out

490
00:25:36,880 --> 00:25:40,119
Speaker 1: to celebrities who were featured in questions in the game,

491
00:25:40,800 --> 00:25:42,760
Speaker 1: and she got letters back from some of them and

492
00:25:42,800 --> 00:25:46,720
Speaker 1: she would publish those. She got letters from Pat Boone,

493
00:25:46,720 --> 00:25:48,960
Speaker 1: Gregory Peck, and James Mason.

494
00:25:49,000 --> 00:25:50,280
Speaker 2: So the trio.

495
00:25:50,560 --> 00:25:54,280
Speaker 1: Yeah, the boomers are just going nuts. And then to

496
00:25:54,359 --> 00:25:58,080
Speaker 1: really drive it home, there was a Time magazine report

497
00:25:58,320 --> 00:26:01,359
Speaker 1: that the cast of The Big Chill, the most boomer

498
00:26:01,400 --> 00:26:05,399
Speaker 1: movie of all boomers movies of all time, were unwinding

499
00:26:05,440 --> 00:26:09,120
Speaker 1: between scenes, enjoying trivial pursuit and looking back at the

500
00:26:09,160 --> 00:26:12,119
Speaker 1: nostalgia of their younger days. And that's it was. That

501
00:26:12,240 --> 00:26:15,760
Speaker 1: was peak boomer nostalgia, trivial pursuit reporting.

502
00:26:16,400 --> 00:26:18,920
Speaker 2: Yeah, I've never seen that movie, but I do know

503
00:26:19,320 --> 00:26:23,080
Speaker 2: it's good that one of the characters lets her husband,

504
00:26:24,160 --> 00:26:28,359
Speaker 2: I guess, impregnate serve as like a surrogate sperm donor.

505
00:26:28,600 --> 00:26:29,520
Speaker 2: To her friend.

506
00:26:29,840 --> 00:26:30,560
Speaker 1: Yeah.

507
00:26:30,720 --> 00:26:32,560
Speaker 2: The only reason I know that is because there was

508
00:26:32,600 --> 00:26:39,080
Speaker 2: a great Saturday Night Lives get about it really Yeah,

509
00:26:39,119 --> 00:26:42,520
Speaker 2: and I guess did they show the wife who was

510
00:26:42,680 --> 00:26:45,560
Speaker 2: like hanging out downstairs in the movie while they went

511
00:26:45,640 --> 00:26:48,920
Speaker 2: upstairs or something like that. Yeah, So in the Satura

512
00:26:49,000 --> 00:26:51,359
Speaker 2: Night Live one, like she's just sitting there like reflecting,

513
00:26:51,400 --> 00:26:53,560
Speaker 2: like drinking tea and like thinking about how great and

514
00:26:53,640 --> 00:26:59,000
Speaker 2: just beautiful. This is the sound coming from upstairs. They're

515
00:26:59,040 --> 00:27:01,600
Speaker 2: like really getting into it, and she's getting more and

516
00:27:01,680 --> 00:27:03,000
Speaker 2: more concerned than more.

517
00:27:04,040 --> 00:27:05,080
Speaker 1: I remember that.

518
00:27:05,480 --> 00:27:07,480
Speaker 2: Yeah, it was I think it was Jan Hooks who

519
00:27:07,600 --> 00:27:10,560
Speaker 2: was like the yeah coming downstairs. That was a great sketch.

520
00:27:10,800 --> 00:27:13,560
Speaker 1: Oh that's funny. Well, that movie was very big in

521
00:27:13,600 --> 00:27:16,240
Speaker 1: my house. In that soundtrack, I mean, I joke about

522
00:27:16,240 --> 00:27:18,280
Speaker 1: it now, but that's literally the thing that introduced me

523
00:27:18,359 --> 00:27:21,080
Speaker 1: to Motown. Oh yeah as a kid, Yeah, listening to

524
00:27:21,160 --> 00:27:23,600
Speaker 1: I was twelve years old or whatever. It was listening

525
00:27:23,640 --> 00:27:28,000
Speaker 1: to Aretha Franklin and the Four Tops and you know

526
00:27:28,119 --> 00:27:32,159
Speaker 1: everyone else. Jeremiah was a Bullfrog, which wasn't Motown. But

527
00:27:32,240 --> 00:27:34,320
Speaker 1: if you want to hear a more in depth conversation

528
00:27:34,359 --> 00:27:37,280
Speaker 1: about that, you can listen to the movie Crush episode

529
00:27:37,320 --> 00:27:41,159
Speaker 1: featuring the wonderful and charming Janey had d Tompkins.

530
00:27:41,600 --> 00:27:44,439
Speaker 2: Oh nice, that was her pick, Hunt, that was her pick. Nice.

531
00:27:44,720 --> 00:27:48,359
Speaker 1: Good movie though, but now it suffers from anti boomeritis.

532
00:27:49,359 --> 00:27:52,359
Speaker 2: Oh okay, so I should wait ten years to see it.

533
00:27:53,160 --> 00:27:54,640
Speaker 1: How do you feel about boomers right now?

534
00:27:55,560 --> 00:27:56,720
Speaker 2: I'll wait ten years to say.

535
00:27:56,720 --> 00:28:02,480
Speaker 1: Okay, all right, So nineteen eighty four, well, I guess

536
00:28:02,520 --> 00:28:04,520
Speaker 1: we should mention that book. In nineteen eighty three, a

537
00:28:04,520 --> 00:28:06,359
Speaker 1: guy named Robert J. Heller wrote a book called How

538
00:28:06,359 --> 00:28:08,960
Speaker 1: to Win at Trivial Pursuit. Like that's how big it got.

539
00:28:09,760 --> 00:28:13,480
Speaker 1: I think, like ninety six trivia games trying to cash

540
00:28:13,480 --> 00:28:18,439
Speaker 1: in on trivial pursuits success, and people writing books like

541
00:28:18,560 --> 00:28:20,920
Speaker 1: how to Win at Trivial Pursuit, in which Robert J.

542
00:28:21,040 --> 00:28:24,480
Speaker 1: Heller said, why don't you just memorize all six thousand cards?

543
00:28:24,880 --> 00:28:28,240
Speaker 2: That became kind of an urban legend, like your cousin's

544
00:28:28,320 --> 00:28:31,160
Speaker 2: friend memorized. Also really thousand questions?

545
00:28:31,240 --> 00:28:32,040
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's funny.

546
00:28:32,400 --> 00:28:37,480
Speaker 2: Yeah. And there were some other cute or interesting anecdotes

547
00:28:37,520 --> 00:28:40,040
Speaker 2: I guess that kind of came out around the time.

548
00:28:40,280 --> 00:28:44,400
Speaker 2: One was Ronald Reagan was reported on having played the

549
00:28:44,400 --> 00:28:47,000
Speaker 2: game while he was waiting for the election results in

550
00:28:47,040 --> 00:28:50,800
Speaker 2: nineteen eighty four, and during the game he got two

551
00:28:50,920 --> 00:28:55,080
Speaker 2: questions about himself, and you can relax, he got them correct,

552
00:28:55,200 --> 00:28:55,840
Speaker 2: both of them.

553
00:28:57,080 --> 00:28:59,760
Speaker 1: Well, that's the only thing Reagan I can do, is

554
00:28:59,800 --> 00:29:00,360
Speaker 1: the one word.

555
00:29:01,160 --> 00:29:04,800
Speaker 2: One of the one of the facts I saw bandied

556
00:29:04,800 --> 00:29:06,720
Speaker 2: about in some of the reporting that was a great

557
00:29:06,760 --> 00:29:11,920
Speaker 2: Reagan by the way, was that either Ronald Reagan signed

558
00:29:11,920 --> 00:29:15,240
Speaker 2: Clark Gable's discharge papers from the army or Clark Gable

559
00:29:15,320 --> 00:29:18,400
Speaker 2: signed robins. It depends on who you ask, Yes.

560
00:29:18,360 --> 00:29:20,720
Speaker 1: What was one of them authorized to do so? Or

561
00:29:20,720 --> 00:29:22,480
Speaker 1: are they just like, come over here, buddy, sign this thing.

562
00:29:22,800 --> 00:29:25,080
Speaker 2: No, No, like they just happened to be like that

563
00:29:25,200 --> 00:29:27,320
Speaker 2: was just happened to be the luck of the draw

564
00:29:27,440 --> 00:29:28,800
Speaker 2: as far as the arrangement went.

565
00:29:29,400 --> 00:29:30,920
Speaker 1: Oh, like they bore witness or something.

566
00:29:31,360 --> 00:29:33,480
Speaker 2: No. I think like, as let's say it was Clark

567
00:29:33,480 --> 00:29:35,920
Speaker 2: Gable who signed them, he would have maybe been like

568
00:29:35,960 --> 00:29:39,440
Speaker 2: a higher up to Ronald Reagan, because Ronald Reagan was

569
00:29:39,440 --> 00:29:41,880
Speaker 2: getting out. It happened to be Clark Gable rather than

570
00:29:42,400 --> 00:29:43,760
Speaker 2: Colonel Joe Schmoe.

571
00:29:43,960 --> 00:29:47,680
Speaker 1: Who was glad I complicated that very clean and cool story.

572
00:29:50,080 --> 00:29:54,280
Speaker 1: Another fun little trivial factoid, And yes, I'm saying factoid

573
00:29:55,200 --> 00:29:58,160
Speaker 1: was that q E two Queen Elizabeth I hosted and

574
00:29:59,040 --> 00:30:01,440
Speaker 1: the first NERD Cruise. It sounds like because she hosted

575
00:30:01,480 --> 00:30:05,280
Speaker 1: an eight day trivial pursuit tournament crews in I guess

576
00:30:05,320 --> 00:30:06,080
Speaker 1: eighty five.

577
00:30:06,840 --> 00:30:10,800
Speaker 2: And so at each Christmas nineteen eighty three, it was

578
00:30:10,840 --> 00:30:15,280
Speaker 2: like you could not find that thing. Yeah, in nineteen

579
00:30:15,320 --> 00:30:18,280
Speaker 2: eighty four, same same deal, Like it was really hard

580
00:30:18,280 --> 00:30:20,920
Speaker 2: to find. But this time Selchow and writer had like

581
00:30:21,200 --> 00:30:23,959
Speaker 2: learned their lesson and we're like keeping up with supply

582
00:30:24,080 --> 00:30:26,200
Speaker 2: a lot better than they were at the very beginning

583
00:30:26,240 --> 00:30:28,880
Speaker 2: of this whole thing. And so at the at the

584
00:30:29,000 --> 00:30:32,480
Speaker 2: peak of this, I think it really peaked in eighty four,

585
00:30:32,520 --> 00:30:35,200
Speaker 2: but that certainly continued on in the nineteen eighty five.

586
00:30:35,320 --> 00:30:39,480
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, and the spring of nineteen eighty five, fifteen

587
00:30:39,520 --> 00:30:44,000
Speaker 2: percent of households in America had a trivial pursuit game

588
00:30:44,120 --> 00:30:46,480
Speaker 2: in their house. I saw at some point it was

589
00:30:46,720 --> 00:30:48,240
Speaker 2: twenty percent, one in five.

590
00:30:49,160 --> 00:30:53,440
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think they're at about eighty million to date game.

591
00:30:53,560 --> 00:30:55,920
Speaker 2: Oh, I believe that totally.

592
00:30:56,040 --> 00:30:58,520
Speaker 1: That's just a staggering amount of game. I mean, my

593
00:30:58,560 --> 00:31:00,280
Speaker 1: mom still you talked about how well it was made.

594
00:31:00,280 --> 00:31:03,280
Speaker 1: My mom still has our the og from whatever forty

595
00:31:03,280 --> 00:31:03,920
Speaker 1: eight years ago.

596
00:31:04,520 --> 00:31:06,520
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm sure it's just a little bit frayed in,

597
00:31:06,600 --> 00:31:08,560
Speaker 2: like yep, the parts were it folded and the rest

598
00:31:08,560 --> 00:31:09,440
Speaker 2: of it's just fine.

599
00:31:09,600 --> 00:31:12,000
Speaker 1: No, you can still read Richard Nixon on a third

600
00:31:12,000 --> 00:31:12,680
Speaker 1: of those cards.

601
00:31:13,200 --> 00:31:16,480
Speaker 2: Nice, there's a little like cocaine in the little folds

602
00:31:16,480 --> 00:31:19,920
Speaker 2: and like tequila stains on some of the in the spots.

603
00:31:20,200 --> 00:31:23,560
Speaker 1: Oh not in my family, pal, So Trivial Pursuit is

604
00:31:23,640 --> 00:31:28,360
Speaker 1: selling Gangbusters. Abbott and Haney are rich dudes and also

605
00:31:28,640 --> 00:31:33,160
Speaker 1: weirdly kind of celebrities. They were not shy. They love

606
00:31:33,240 --> 00:31:35,920
Speaker 1: to be on TV and to do interviews. They were

607
00:31:35,920 --> 00:31:39,520
Speaker 1: in TV commercials, They were pitchmen for other brands like

608
00:31:40,160 --> 00:31:43,040
Speaker 1: Amex and Diet Coke, and they would put that Trivial

609
00:31:43,080 --> 00:31:45,720
Speaker 1: Pursuit branding on anything they thought they could make money of.

610
00:31:46,560 --> 00:31:49,680
Speaker 1: And like you mentioned, those original investors did really, really well.

611
00:31:50,040 --> 00:31:52,720
Speaker 1: There was an entertainment writer at the Toronto Globe and

612
00:31:52,760 --> 00:31:57,280
Speaker 1: Mail named Susan Ferrier McKay who took out a bank

613
00:31:57,320 --> 00:32:00,560
Speaker 1: loan to buy ten shares early on, and in nineteen

614
00:32:00,600 --> 00:32:04,480
Speaker 1: eighty four she bought a house and then she retired

615
00:32:04,520 --> 00:32:05,320
Speaker 1: not too long after that.

616
00:32:06,120 --> 00:32:08,960
Speaker 2: Yeah, and Worstlin, the guy the eighteen year olds who

617
00:32:08,960 --> 00:32:12,080
Speaker 2: did all the art, he founded a company called Worstlin

618
00:32:12,200 --> 00:32:17,440
Speaker 2: Group All one word that became pretty successful marketers in Toronto,

619
00:32:17,760 --> 00:32:20,160
Speaker 2: and he used his money from his shares to start that,

620
00:32:20,360 --> 00:32:24,480
Speaker 2: so it definitely paid off. And then yeah, like you said,

621
00:32:24,960 --> 00:32:28,400
Speaker 2: the Heinies and Chris Abber or Scott Abbott were just

622
00:32:28,760 --> 00:32:32,400
Speaker 2: mega rich from this. I mean, this game made hundreds

623
00:32:32,400 --> 00:32:35,440
Speaker 2: of millions of dollars in the eighties, like eighties money.

624
00:32:35,760 --> 00:32:39,400
Speaker 2: God knows what West Egg would convert that to, but

625
00:32:39,960 --> 00:32:41,920
Speaker 2: there was a lot of money made off this, and

626
00:32:41,960 --> 00:32:43,560
Speaker 2: you got to think back like these were just a

627
00:32:43,600 --> 00:32:47,080
Speaker 2: couple of dudes who had an idea and went with it,

628
00:32:47,520 --> 00:32:50,720
Speaker 2: although there were people who were like, yeah, that's questionable

629
00:32:50,760 --> 00:32:53,080
Speaker 2: whether you had that idea, like you kind of referred

630
00:32:53,120 --> 00:32:54,040
Speaker 2: to earlier. Right.

631
00:32:54,520 --> 00:32:58,000
Speaker 1: Yeah, there were two cases, at least like two notable

632
00:32:58,040 --> 00:33:02,240
Speaker 1: court cases. One was a lawsuit in nineteen ninety four

633
00:33:02,400 --> 00:33:06,320
Speaker 1: from a guy, an Australian named David Wall who said, hey,

634
00:33:06,720 --> 00:33:10,360
Speaker 1: in nineteen seventy nine, this Chris Haney guy picked me

635
00:33:10,480 --> 00:33:14,360
Speaker 1: and my buddy up when we were hitchhiking and we

636
00:33:14,360 --> 00:33:17,440
Speaker 1: were in Nova, Scotia, and while we were driving around,

637
00:33:17,560 --> 00:33:20,560
Speaker 1: I told him about this idea for the game, like

638
00:33:20,800 --> 00:33:25,719
Speaker 1: really specifically, like my mom has pictures of the wheel

639
00:33:25,760 --> 00:33:28,880
Speaker 1: that I drew and the pie pieces and everything. In

640
00:33:28,920 --> 00:33:30,880
Speaker 1: the court were like, well where are those documents And

641
00:33:30,920 --> 00:33:33,800
Speaker 1: he was like, I don't have those anymore. And they

642
00:33:33,840 --> 00:33:36,200
Speaker 1: said we'll bring forward some witnesses and he was like,

643
00:33:36,360 --> 00:33:40,920
Speaker 1: no one, No one's really coming forward. They moved, Yeah,

644
00:33:40,960 --> 00:33:45,040
Speaker 1: they moved away, Hane said, or he said that. Hany

645
00:33:45,200 --> 00:33:48,560
Speaker 1: later offered him shares, like, hey man, we're getting this

646
00:33:48,640 --> 00:33:51,320
Speaker 1: game that you got told me the idea for going,

647
00:33:51,840 --> 00:33:53,640
Speaker 1: and I'm going to offer to buy you shares. This

648
00:33:53,680 --> 00:33:57,200
Speaker 1: is a real thing. He refused. Had he bought those shares,

649
00:33:57,200 --> 00:33:59,200
Speaker 1: he would have ended up a rich person as well.

650
00:34:00,040 --> 00:34:02,000
Speaker 1: But in court, Haney was like, I never met this guy,

651
00:34:02,240 --> 00:34:07,920
Speaker 1: never picked him up. They awarded him initially, well not

652
00:34:07,960 --> 00:34:11,120
Speaker 1: awarded him. He got zero dollars, but the judge ruled

653
00:34:11,120 --> 00:34:13,280
Speaker 1: in Haney's favor and awarded them one point two million

654
00:34:13,280 --> 00:34:16,720
Speaker 1: dollars in court costs, just after a thirteen year legal battle.

655
00:34:16,760 --> 00:34:20,080
Speaker 1: But they reduced that to one million because they said,

656
00:34:20,560 --> 00:34:23,319
Speaker 1: but you know what, your big corporate attorneys came in

657
00:34:23,400 --> 00:34:26,279
Speaker 1: and sued two of his witnesses. So we're gonna knock

658
00:34:26,320 --> 00:34:28,600
Speaker 1: off two hundred grand and just make it a million.

659
00:34:29,480 --> 00:34:31,560
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean imagine being that guy. You're like, you

660
00:34:31,600 --> 00:34:34,120
Speaker 2: owe me tens of millions of dollars and then ten

661
00:34:34,200 --> 00:34:37,480
Speaker 2: years later you owe them a million dollars. Like, yeah,

662
00:34:37,520 --> 00:34:39,640
Speaker 2: this is just some guy. He wasn't some like high

663
00:34:39,640 --> 00:34:41,520
Speaker 2: flying jet setter who had a bunch of money. I

664
00:34:42,040 --> 00:34:44,000
Speaker 2: don't know what happened to him.

665
00:34:43,800 --> 00:34:45,479
Speaker 1: But yeah, I mean he had a hard he didn't

666
00:34:45,480 --> 00:34:47,799
Speaker 1: have the million bucks. I saw that. So they said

667
00:34:47,800 --> 00:34:49,680
Speaker 1: they were looking to garnish his wages, and I was like,

668
00:34:49,760 --> 00:34:51,520
Speaker 1: oh man, this just gets from bad to worse.

669
00:34:52,160 --> 00:34:55,560
Speaker 2: Yeah, but I mean, this is the one guy who

670
00:34:55,640 --> 00:34:57,120
Speaker 2: said that, and like you said, he didn't come up

671
00:34:57,120 --> 00:35:00,839
Speaker 2: with witnesses or any kind of supporting evidence. And yeah,

672
00:35:00,840 --> 00:35:03,319
Speaker 2: it's just not clear what the deal was, whether he

673
00:35:03,400 --> 00:35:05,839
Speaker 2: was just looking for a payday or if he did

674
00:35:05,880 --> 00:35:08,080
Speaker 2: get ripped off. But as far as the court's concerned,

675
00:35:08,080 --> 00:35:09,960
Speaker 2: he definitely did not get ripped off.

676
00:35:10,239 --> 00:35:12,719
Speaker 1: Yeah. What I was trying to find out was they

677
00:35:12,760 --> 00:35:14,799
Speaker 1: you know, they said they sued to first. The judge

678
00:35:14,800 --> 00:35:17,560
Speaker 1: said there was no witnesses. Then I find out that

679
00:35:17,680 --> 00:35:22,319
Speaker 1: they had sued two of the witnesses, which they considered like,

680
00:35:22,440 --> 00:35:25,560
Speaker 1: you know, witness intimidation or something. Sure, so I'm wondering

681
00:35:25,600 --> 00:35:27,759
Speaker 1: if one of those witnesses they sued was like the

682
00:35:27,800 --> 00:35:29,800
Speaker 1: friend that hitchhiked with them, And I'm just I couldn't

683
00:35:29,800 --> 00:35:32,040
Speaker 1: find anything out. It's so hard to find out stuff

684
00:35:32,040 --> 00:35:33,120
Speaker 1: about old court cases.

685
00:35:33,560 --> 00:35:36,040
Speaker 2: Well, if if it was like a David and Goliath

686
00:35:36,080 --> 00:35:39,600
Speaker 2: thing where Goliath won, that would be very sad. Indeed, Yeah,

687
00:35:39,640 --> 00:35:42,680
Speaker 2: what I imagine that. Yeah, we'll move on because this

688
00:35:42,680 --> 00:35:45,799
Speaker 2: one's getting really sad. Uh. The other one is the

689
00:35:45,840 --> 00:35:48,719
Speaker 2: story of a guy named Fred Elworth, And if you

690
00:35:48,840 --> 00:35:52,680
Speaker 2: are into trivia, fred Worth is essentially your messiah. He

691
00:35:52,880 --> 00:35:58,160
Speaker 2: is the original trivia dude who's been writing books on trivia,

692
00:35:58,360 --> 00:36:02,719
Speaker 2: books like containing trivia for decades and decades. Now. I

693
00:36:02,719 --> 00:36:04,680
Speaker 2: don't know if he's still a live but if he is,

694
00:36:04,719 --> 00:36:09,440
Speaker 2: he's probably still going strong. And he apparently published a

695
00:36:09,480 --> 00:36:12,799
Speaker 2: three volume Encyclopedia of trivia at some point, this is

696
00:36:12,840 --> 00:36:16,520
Speaker 2: before Trivia Pursuit was launched, and he did something. You

697
00:36:16,560 --> 00:36:19,680
Speaker 2: know how we've talked about map makers, like including like

698
00:36:19,719 --> 00:36:23,279
Speaker 2: a fake town to basically protect their properties, see if

699
00:36:23,280 --> 00:36:24,239
Speaker 2: somebody ripped them off.

700
00:36:24,440 --> 00:36:25,280
Speaker 1: Yeah, he did.

701
00:36:25,120 --> 00:36:28,759
Speaker 2: Something with trivia question. He included a trick question in

702
00:36:28,800 --> 00:36:29,400
Speaker 2: his stuff.

703
00:36:30,120 --> 00:36:33,840
Speaker 1: He did, and that that well, it didn't bear fruit,

704
00:36:33,880 --> 00:36:36,800
Speaker 1: but it played out in his favor. It was a

705
00:36:36,880 --> 00:36:41,000
Speaker 1: question on Colombo the TV show with what's his name

706
00:36:42,120 --> 00:36:44,719
Speaker 1: Peter Falk, Peter Falk, Almos said Robert Blake, I used

707
00:36:44,719 --> 00:36:45,520
Speaker 1: to get those confused.

708
00:36:45,719 --> 00:36:47,000
Speaker 2: No, that was Barretta.

709
00:36:47,760 --> 00:36:49,920
Speaker 1: Yeah, he sees the one who murdered his wife in

710
00:36:49,960 --> 00:36:50,399
Speaker 1: real life.

711
00:36:50,880 --> 00:36:51,320
Speaker 2: Yeah.

712
00:36:51,520 --> 00:36:55,880
Speaker 1: Yeah, anyway, Peter Falk did not murdered his wife as

713
00:36:55,880 --> 00:36:59,240
Speaker 1: far as I know, but he he was Frank Colombo.

714
00:36:59,760 --> 00:37:02,960
Speaker 1: And and the question it was, the answer was Philip Columbo,

715
00:37:03,040 --> 00:37:06,360
Speaker 1: Like what was Columbo's real name? And you know, I

716
00:37:06,360 --> 00:37:08,920
Speaker 1: don't know if anywhere else Philip Columbo had ever been printed,

717
00:37:08,920 --> 00:37:11,360
Speaker 1: So it looked like pretty good proof to me. He

718
00:37:11,400 --> 00:37:14,200
Speaker 1: sued for three hundred million bucks, claimed that close to

719
00:37:14,239 --> 00:37:17,560
Speaker 1: seventeen hundred of the questions were his, and a judge

720
00:37:17,600 --> 00:37:19,640
Speaker 1: threw it out and said, first of all, this game

721
00:37:19,680 --> 00:37:22,080
Speaker 1: is a lot different than that book, and at which

722
00:37:22,080 --> 00:37:25,200
Speaker 1: time Worth should have said, that's not what I'm saying, right,

723
00:37:25,840 --> 00:37:28,880
Speaker 1: And then he said but you can't copyright facts. No case,

724
00:37:29,360 --> 00:37:32,640
Speaker 1: which I officially feel bad for Worth because it seems

725
00:37:32,800 --> 00:37:35,880
Speaker 1: clear to me that they took a lot of his questions.

726
00:37:36,200 --> 00:37:38,560
Speaker 2: Uh yeah, he probably. I mean they said that they

727
00:37:38,640 --> 00:37:41,719
Speaker 2: used his book for creating these things. Like they didn't

728
00:37:41,760 --> 00:37:44,799
Speaker 2: deny that at all, but yeah, I guess it was

729
00:37:44,840 --> 00:37:47,279
Speaker 2: just their Their case was based on the idea that

730
00:37:47,480 --> 00:37:49,600
Speaker 2: like the effects of fact, like this guy didn't it's

731
00:37:49,600 --> 00:37:53,040
Speaker 2: not a creation of his own. Yes, he found it right, No,

732
00:37:53,160 --> 00:37:55,879
Speaker 2: I get it. And I imagine Fred Worth probably thought

733
00:37:55,920 --> 00:37:58,279
Speaker 2: that was like an iron proof defense, like.

734
00:37:58,280 --> 00:37:59,279
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I got it.

735
00:37:59,360 --> 00:38:01,279
Speaker 2: These people in putting this question in there and it

736
00:38:01,280 --> 00:38:03,759
Speaker 2: didn't work out. I'm sure he was astonished when that

737
00:38:03,800 --> 00:38:08,120
Speaker 2: came along that ruling. But also, just before we move on, Chuck,

738
00:38:08,840 --> 00:38:11,960
Speaker 2: I just want to tell all of our hardcore Colombo

739
00:38:12,040 --> 00:38:15,239
Speaker 2: fan listeners to just stop your emails right now. We

740
00:38:15,320 --> 00:38:17,879
Speaker 2: know for a fact that Frank is not, as far

741
00:38:17,920 --> 00:38:22,440
Speaker 2: as Cannon goes, Colombo's first name. Yeah, canonically Colombo doesn't

742
00:38:22,480 --> 00:38:25,160
Speaker 2: have a first name or else. His first name is lieutenant.

743
00:38:25,600 --> 00:38:27,920
Speaker 2: So Frank Columbo just happened to show up in a

744
00:38:27,960 --> 00:38:31,560
Speaker 2: couple of screenshots that the producers of the show originally

745
00:38:31,600 --> 00:38:34,000
Speaker 2: never intended anybody to be able to zoom in on.

746
00:38:34,840 --> 00:38:38,440
Speaker 1: Boy, do you think there are any Colombo pet ants?

747
00:38:39,640 --> 00:38:41,080
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, definitely listen to this.

748
00:38:41,640 --> 00:38:45,520
Speaker 2: Sure, yeah, we got all kinds. Takes all kinds, Chuck.

749
00:38:47,400 --> 00:38:51,240
Speaker 1: So the nineties are now upon us and these guys

750
00:38:51,280 --> 00:38:54,120
Speaker 1: are are They said they feel like rock stars. Basically,

751
00:38:54,880 --> 00:38:59,600
Speaker 1: they've got all kinds of money. Supposedly John Haney, the

752
00:39:00,200 --> 00:39:02,040
Speaker 1: that was brought in early on. They were talking about

753
00:39:02,040 --> 00:39:04,440
Speaker 1: finances and he said, we'll be great as long as

754
00:39:04,480 --> 00:39:08,040
Speaker 1: we don't do anything stupid like invest in racehorses. So

755
00:39:08,080 --> 00:39:11,560
Speaker 1: that's just what they did. Hani and Abbott invested in racehorses,

756
00:39:12,360 --> 00:39:14,840
Speaker 1: but for Abbot paid off. He spent fifty grand on

757
00:39:14,880 --> 00:39:17,759
Speaker 1: a yearly named Charlie Bailey that ended up winning about

758
00:39:17,840 --> 00:39:21,040
Speaker 1: nine hundred thousand dollars in total purses over the years.

759
00:39:21,280 --> 00:39:24,520
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, and lots of studding out for big money.

760
00:39:25,200 --> 00:39:29,920
Speaker 1: And they both invested in kind of built from the

761
00:39:29,920 --> 00:39:33,840
Speaker 1: ground up these two golf courses in Canada, and Abbot

762
00:39:33,920 --> 00:39:35,920
Speaker 1: bought that. He was a big hockey guy, so he

763
00:39:36,000 --> 00:39:39,360
Speaker 1: bought the Brampton Battalion at the time before moving them

764
00:39:40,280 --> 00:39:43,520
Speaker 1: north and changing their name, and they are from the

765
00:39:43,560 --> 00:39:46,799
Speaker 1: Ontario Hockey League, and I think he might still own them.

766
00:39:47,239 --> 00:39:48,600
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, I think so.

767
00:39:48,920 --> 00:39:51,359
Speaker 1: I mean this article I found was from the late

768
00:39:51,719 --> 00:39:52,680
Speaker 1: twenty teens.

769
00:39:53,160 --> 00:39:54,239
Speaker 2: Oh yeah probably then.

770
00:39:54,400 --> 00:39:56,000
Speaker 1: Yeah, I don't see why he would have sold it.

771
00:39:57,560 --> 00:40:00,440
Speaker 2: Oh so they're now the Brampton Battalion. They were the

772
00:40:00,480 --> 00:40:01,400
Speaker 2: North bab Battalion.

773
00:40:01,480 --> 00:40:04,040
Speaker 1: Right, no, no, no, and now they're in North Bay.

774
00:40:04,400 --> 00:40:07,239
Speaker 2: Okay, I always get North Bay and Brampton. Confused, I

775
00:40:07,320 --> 00:40:14,200
Speaker 2: do too. So Olivia dug up a pretty interesting article written.

776
00:40:13,880 --> 00:40:17,120
Speaker 1: By who chuck a guy named Ron Rodriguez.

777
00:40:17,600 --> 00:40:19,120
Speaker 2: No, it's one Rodriguez.

778
00:40:19,200 --> 00:40:19,879
Speaker 1: Oh is it one?

779
00:40:20,280 --> 00:40:24,920
Speaker 2: Yeah? Okay, so mister Rodriguez is what we're going to

780
00:40:24,960 --> 00:40:26,960
Speaker 2: call him from now. And because his name is really

781
00:40:27,000 --> 00:40:30,920
Speaker 2: hard to say, it turns out he was a He

782
00:40:31,040 --> 00:40:34,560
Speaker 2: wrote I think a daily quota of forty trivial pursuit

783
00:40:34,640 --> 00:40:39,040
Speaker 2: questions a day, obviously, and only about half would get picked.

784
00:40:39,480 --> 00:40:41,319
Speaker 2: And we kind of went through that too, because we

785
00:40:41,400 --> 00:40:47,280
Speaker 2: helped out putting questions together for our version, and they've

786
00:40:47,360 --> 00:40:49,760
Speaker 2: asked for hundreds and hundreds of them and you're like, okay,

787
00:40:49,760 --> 00:40:51,640
Speaker 2: well we're done. They're like, okay, well we're going to

788
00:40:51,719 --> 00:40:53,320
Speaker 2: use about a third of those, So we're gonna have

789
00:40:53,360 --> 00:40:55,319
Speaker 2: to do this again a couple more times. And it

790
00:40:55,400 --> 00:40:57,719
Speaker 2: was like, there weren't that many facts in all of

791
00:40:57,760 --> 00:41:00,200
Speaker 2: the episodes of stuff you should know, you guys, But

792
00:41:00,280 --> 00:41:03,640
Speaker 2: we pulled it out. But I can feel mister Rodriguez

793
00:41:03,680 --> 00:41:04,040
Speaker 2: his pain.

794
00:41:04,560 --> 00:41:07,239
Speaker 1: Yeah, for sure. It was a lot of writing. He

795
00:41:08,000 --> 00:41:10,800
Speaker 1: said that he is the dictionary of twentieth century world politics,

796
00:41:11,440 --> 00:41:15,479
Speaker 1: pop culture magazines. As his story goes, when he needed

797
00:41:15,560 --> 00:41:19,240
Speaker 1: Rambo questions, he watched all the Rambo movies two times

798
00:41:19,640 --> 00:41:23,359
Speaker 1: to come up with the best questions. And you know,

799
00:41:23,440 --> 00:41:25,600
Speaker 1: once you write them, they did. I think he had

800
00:41:25,640 --> 00:41:28,080
Speaker 1: a partner. They had some researchers on the team and

801
00:41:28,120 --> 00:41:30,600
Speaker 1: they would fact check and do corrections and tweaks and

802
00:41:30,640 --> 00:41:31,200
Speaker 1: stuff like that.

803
00:41:31,719 --> 00:41:34,040
Speaker 2: Yeah, I should say we didn't. We weren't actually writing

804
00:41:34,080 --> 00:41:36,440
Speaker 2: the questions. We were coming up with the source material

805
00:41:36,520 --> 00:41:37,160
Speaker 2: for the question.

806
00:41:37,239 --> 00:41:39,360
Speaker 1: Yeah, from the podcast Huge Signa.

807
00:41:39,360 --> 00:41:42,319
Speaker 2: They're going, oh no, yeah, there's some writer. It has

808
00:41:42,360 --> 00:41:50,040
Speaker 2: Bro's like, uh.

809
00:41:46,600 --> 00:41:49,920
Speaker 1: As far as the nitty gritty goes, questions have a

810
00:41:49,960 --> 00:41:54,080
Speaker 1: maximum of forty five characters. They prefer two lines, even

811
00:41:54,120 --> 00:41:56,960
Speaker 1: though there can be three. They just visually thought the

812
00:41:56,960 --> 00:41:59,640
Speaker 1: two line questions looked better, so they tried to edit

813
00:41:59,640 --> 00:42:01,080
Speaker 1: them down when possible.

814
00:42:02,000 --> 00:42:05,680
Speaker 2: Yeah, and then I think now, over the years there's

815
00:42:05,719 --> 00:42:12,560
Speaker 2: been about three hundred editions published, and very early on

816
00:42:12,800 --> 00:42:17,399
Speaker 2: they stayed fairly generalist. Although I mean, let me take

817
00:42:17,440 --> 00:42:20,840
Speaker 2: that back. They went from Genus to silver screen edition,

818
00:42:21,360 --> 00:42:25,239
Speaker 2: baby Boomers Edition, and I think a sports edition, but

819
00:42:25,760 --> 00:42:27,960
Speaker 2: compared to some of the editions that they've come up

820
00:42:28,040 --> 00:42:32,960
Speaker 2: with now, those are still pretty generalists. So another one

821
00:42:33,040 --> 00:42:35,719
Speaker 2: was Disney. Disney was the first tie in that they

822
00:42:35,760 --> 00:42:39,360
Speaker 2: had in nineteen eighty five, and that was still pretty general.

823
00:42:39,400 --> 00:42:45,600
Speaker 2: It wasn't like Donald duck backs specifically, right. Weirdly, here's

824
00:42:45,640 --> 00:42:48,720
Speaker 2: a piece of trivia for you. The second brand tie

825
00:42:48,760 --> 00:42:52,840
Speaker 2: in that Trivial Pursuit released a game around was Fame.

826
00:42:53,320 --> 00:42:55,840
Speaker 2: The TV show and movie Oh Wow, Like I'm going

827
00:42:55,920 --> 00:42:59,200
Speaker 2: to Live Forever had its own Trivial Pursuit edition back

828
00:42:59,239 --> 00:43:00,000
Speaker 2: in nineteen ninety three.

829
00:43:00,560 --> 00:43:03,280
Speaker 1: Was the first question, how long did the Fame people

830
00:43:03,320 --> 00:43:04,160
Speaker 1: think they were going to live?

831
00:43:05,520 --> 00:43:06,520
Speaker 2: That's a great question.

832
00:43:07,760 --> 00:43:10,759
Speaker 1: I couldn't have been very as these editions weren't as

833
00:43:10,760 --> 00:43:13,160
Speaker 1: big though, right, there's no way no.

834
00:43:13,360 --> 00:43:17,520
Speaker 2: And that slight article that you referred to the author

835
00:43:18,040 --> 00:43:20,440
Speaker 2: makes a case. They were basically saying, I think the

836
00:43:20,480 --> 00:43:23,040
Speaker 2: whole premise was trivial pursuit lost its way. And this

837
00:43:23,160 --> 00:43:26,960
Speaker 2: is about ten years ago or something. And the premise

838
00:43:27,080 --> 00:43:31,000
Speaker 2: or the thesis this author had was that it went

839
00:43:31,080 --> 00:43:34,480
Speaker 2: from being general where basically anybody could come along and

840
00:43:34,520 --> 00:43:38,000
Speaker 2: try their hand at it, to increasingly more specific, to

841
00:43:38,040 --> 00:43:41,040
Speaker 2: where now you had to know everything there is to

842
00:43:41,080 --> 00:43:44,200
Speaker 2: know about Harry Potter or everything there is to know

843
00:43:44,239 --> 00:43:46,319
Speaker 2: about the Lord of the Rings or Friends or the

844
00:43:46,400 --> 00:43:49,160
Speaker 2: Nightmare before Christmas or that kind of thing, and that

845
00:43:49,360 --> 00:43:52,040
Speaker 2: it just it made it more and more narrow and

846
00:43:52,160 --> 00:43:53,759
Speaker 2: narrowed the pool, so you have to have more and

847
00:43:53,760 --> 00:43:57,920
Speaker 2: more additions to appeal as many people as possible, whereas

848
00:43:57,960 --> 00:44:00,959
Speaker 2: if you just made more generalists versions of the game,

849
00:44:01,440 --> 00:44:03,960
Speaker 2: then you were always going to appeal to the most

850
00:44:04,000 --> 00:44:04,840
Speaker 2: people possible.

851
00:44:05,480 --> 00:44:10,080
Speaker 1: You know, some of those versions are definitely not my thing,

852
00:44:10,120 --> 00:44:12,680
Speaker 1: but I'm not gonna say it lost its way. I

853
00:44:12,760 --> 00:44:15,160
Speaker 1: disagreed with that guy, and like, if you want a

854
00:44:15,160 --> 00:44:17,440
Speaker 1: Harry Potter edish and that's your jam, then like I

855
00:44:17,480 --> 00:44:20,160
Speaker 1: love it. Sure. In fact, I wouldn't mind a Friends

856
00:44:20,280 --> 00:44:23,160
Speaker 1: edition now that I'm thinking of it. I did today

857
00:44:23,560 --> 00:44:25,279
Speaker 1: the Friends Edition I think would be kind of fun

858
00:44:25,320 --> 00:44:28,680
Speaker 1: for me, or Seinfeld Edition because I know those pretty well.

859
00:44:28,760 --> 00:44:35,520
Speaker 1: But I did today by the Greatest Hits Edition, which

860
00:44:35,600 --> 00:44:39,240
Speaker 1: is mainly eighties and nineties and a lot of pop culture,

861
00:44:39,320 --> 00:44:42,640
Speaker 1: and supposedly that's like a gen X feast. So I

862
00:44:42,680 --> 00:44:45,120
Speaker 1: bought that today and hopefully I'll be getting it very soon.

863
00:44:45,400 --> 00:44:49,000
Speaker 2: That's awesome. I will be very disappointed if the Seinfeld

864
00:44:49,160 --> 00:44:52,360
Speaker 2: edition doesn't have a question about who invaded Spain in

865
00:44:52,400 --> 00:44:56,479
Speaker 2: the nine hundreds and the answers the moops right, it's

866
00:44:56,560 --> 00:44:58,000
Speaker 2: got too, it has to.

867
00:44:59,440 --> 00:45:02,279
Speaker 1: Yeah, we could probably write a Seinfeld edition, you and

868
00:45:02,320 --> 00:45:03,240
Speaker 1: I could probably.

869
00:45:04,040 --> 00:45:05,919
Speaker 2: They've come up with some other pretty cool ones too.

870
00:45:06,239 --> 00:45:10,360
Speaker 2: One's called X. It's for it's much more adult edgy questions.

871
00:45:10,400 --> 00:45:13,319
Speaker 2: I think it's for eighteen and up. And it's a

872
00:45:13,480 --> 00:45:16,960
Speaker 2: stamp game where if you get it wrong, they stamp

873
00:45:17,120 --> 00:45:19,520
Speaker 2: an X onto your forehead and inc and once you

874
00:45:19,560 --> 00:45:21,719
Speaker 2: get five stamps on your forehead, you're out.

875
00:45:22,239 --> 00:45:22,719
Speaker 1: Interesting.

876
00:45:23,000 --> 00:45:27,080
Speaker 2: It is interesting. And then the weirdest edition I found,

877
00:45:27,160 --> 00:45:31,480
Speaker 2: Chuck was the EMS edition. Emergency Medical Services came out

878
00:45:31,480 --> 00:45:37,360
Speaker 2: in twenty twelve, wow, and it had categories like trauma, illness, anatomy.

879
00:45:37,520 --> 00:45:39,959
Speaker 1: It's just minor cuts, major cuts.

880
00:45:40,160 --> 00:45:42,760
Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, I'd like to see some of those questions.

881
00:45:42,800 --> 00:45:46,680
Speaker 2: I couldn't find them. And you can also play free online.

882
00:45:46,719 --> 00:45:50,680
Speaker 2: There's a new version that came out this year called

883
00:45:50,719 --> 00:45:55,120
Speaker 2: Trivial Pursuit Infinite uses generative AI to come up with questions.

884
00:45:56,000 --> 00:45:59,400
Speaker 2: And if you are a TV watcher, you can watch

885
00:45:59,440 --> 00:46:02,880
Speaker 2: the new Tripe Pursuit game on the CW that's hosted

886
00:46:02,880 --> 00:46:05,280
Speaker 2: by the lovable LeVar Burton.

887
00:46:05,640 --> 00:46:06,880
Speaker 1: Oh we love LeVar.

888
00:46:07,120 --> 00:46:08,240
Speaker 2: Everyone loves LeVar.

889
00:46:08,560 --> 00:46:10,399
Speaker 1: Who doesn't, no one?

890
00:46:10,840 --> 00:46:12,959
Speaker 2: Yeah, you got anything else?

891
00:46:13,680 --> 00:46:16,000
Speaker 1: I got nothing else. I'm looking forward to playing, you know.

892
00:46:16,040 --> 00:46:17,960
Speaker 1: I do have to say I think I tried to

893
00:46:17,960 --> 00:46:22,200
Speaker 1: play the original Genus sometime in the last like five

894
00:46:22,280 --> 00:46:24,920
Speaker 1: or six years. It's been a minute, but I remember

895
00:46:24,960 --> 00:46:28,200
Speaker 1: it didn't feel like it held up that well. And

896
00:46:28,239 --> 00:46:30,719
Speaker 1: that's that's probably due to the fact that it was

897
00:46:30,920 --> 00:46:33,840
Speaker 1: written in the eighties and it was geared toward boomers. Gotcha,

898
00:46:34,600 --> 00:46:35,480
Speaker 1: but it was still okay.

899
00:46:36,760 --> 00:46:38,920
Speaker 2: Can you give an example of how it didn't hold

900
00:46:39,000 --> 00:46:41,560
Speaker 2: up for a general example, Well, just.

901
00:46:41,560 --> 00:46:44,640
Speaker 1: You know, questions about gun smoke and Richard Nixon and

902
00:46:45,000 --> 00:46:46,280
Speaker 1: and over and over, like they're.

903
00:46:46,080 --> 00:46:48,279
Speaker 2: Gonna say, it was like deeply sexist or something like that.

904
00:46:48,400 --> 00:46:50,400
Speaker 1: No, no, no, no, not like that. It just felt a

905
00:46:50,400 --> 00:46:55,799
Speaker 1: little dated question wise, like, hey, I mean, supposedly the

906
00:46:55,800 --> 00:46:59,960
Speaker 1: Master's Edition is the one I think the Gamer ranked

907
00:47:00,080 --> 00:47:02,840
Speaker 1: in twenty twenty one and a listicle, and the Gamer

908
00:47:02,960 --> 00:47:06,160
Speaker 1: said that the twenty twenty one Master Edition was the

909
00:47:06,200 --> 00:47:11,399
Speaker 1: best edition yet. But that Classic Edition has sold the

910
00:47:11,440 --> 00:47:13,800
Speaker 1: lion's share of those eighty million versions.

911
00:47:13,960 --> 00:47:15,600
Speaker 2: Yeah, pretty impressive stuff.

912
00:47:15,680 --> 00:47:16,080
Speaker 1: Yeah.

913
00:47:16,480 --> 00:47:22,320
Speaker 2: I love these Christmas episodes, the pre Christmas special usually

914
00:47:22,520 --> 00:47:28,160
Speaker 2: Christmas Toy episode. Me too, So happy Holidays to all

915
00:47:28,160 --> 00:47:30,440
Speaker 2: of you out there. And the next time you see us,

916
00:47:30,800 --> 00:47:34,880
Speaker 2: we're going to be on that ad free holiday special

917
00:47:35,200 --> 00:47:37,760
Speaker 2: coming soon. Do you have a listener mail today?

918
00:47:38,239 --> 00:47:38,600
Speaker 1: I do?

919
00:47:39,120 --> 00:47:42,160
Speaker 2: Oh great, Well, since Chuck answered in the affirmative when

920
00:47:42,160 --> 00:47:44,000
Speaker 2: I asked him if he had a listener mail, it's

921
00:47:44,040 --> 00:47:45,040
Speaker 2: time for listener mail.

922
00:47:46,920 --> 00:47:49,279
Speaker 1: Hey, guys, love your September episode on the history of

923
00:47:49,320 --> 00:47:51,440
Speaker 1: music streaming. I grew up in the nineties. I can

924
00:47:51,520 --> 00:47:54,920
Speaker 1: vividly remember being at my friend Ross's house downloading Weezer

925
00:47:55,000 --> 00:48:00,000
Speaker 1: songs off of Napster and burning pirated versions onto CDRs.

926
00:48:00,080 --> 00:48:02,120
Speaker 1: Title suggests I'm an active musician now and I wanted

927
00:48:02,120 --> 00:48:03,640
Speaker 1: to take a quick moment and give a shout out

928
00:48:03,920 --> 00:48:06,160
Speaker 1: to the music streaming platforms that didn't end up in

929
00:48:06,160 --> 00:48:10,319
Speaker 1: the episode, like band camp and SoundCloud. Oh yeah, I

930
00:48:10,320 --> 00:48:11,880
Speaker 1: feel bad we didn't mention these and we just kind

931
00:48:11,880 --> 00:48:15,000
Speaker 1: of went with the big corporate modelists. As an independent artist,

932
00:48:15,080 --> 00:48:17,520
Speaker 1: especially like how band camp allows us to promote shows,

933
00:48:17,600 --> 00:48:20,799
Speaker 1: discover connect with other musicians directly, and the ability to

934
00:48:20,840 --> 00:48:25,200
Speaker 1: customize the look and copy our releases look and copy

935
00:48:25,239 --> 00:48:28,600
Speaker 1: on our releases page. It's made getting gigs and connecting

936
00:48:28,640 --> 00:48:31,600
Speaker 1: with other indie bands so much easier. I also found

937
00:48:31,600 --> 00:48:33,799
Speaker 1: it interesting how the preferred medium of the day has

938
00:48:33,920 --> 00:48:37,840
Speaker 1: informed artists choices, has informed their choices when releasing music.

939
00:48:37,880 --> 00:48:41,520
Speaker 1: In the nineties, albums were so much longer, he says,

940
00:48:41,560 --> 00:48:45,040
Speaker 1: I'm looking at you, Smashing Pumpkins, because a loan CD

941
00:48:45,120 --> 00:48:47,640
Speaker 1: could hold more than a vinyl LP or cassette. Today,

942
00:48:47,719 --> 00:48:50,840
Speaker 1: there are so much music available at our fingertips. Musicians

943
00:48:50,880 --> 00:48:54,520
Speaker 1: are releasing shorter albums, digital mixtapes, and a steady stream

944
00:48:54,560 --> 00:48:57,880
Speaker 1: of albumless singles, all in an attempt to stay relevant

945
00:48:57,920 --> 00:49:01,960
Speaker 1: and capture fleeting attention spans of listeners. I'm curious to

946
00:49:01,960 --> 00:49:05,080
Speaker 1: see what happens over the next decade. Thanks for your

947
00:49:05,080 --> 00:49:09,919
Speaker 1: time in the years of parasocial education and entertainment. This

948
00:49:10,120 --> 00:49:12,200
Speaker 1: is from Chris and Seattle. And we actually met and

949
00:49:12,280 --> 00:49:15,600
Speaker 1: hung out with Chris when many many years ago in Seattle.

950
00:49:16,080 --> 00:49:18,920
Speaker 1: He was a friend of our booking agent at least

951
00:49:18,920 --> 00:49:22,799
Speaker 1: at the time, Josh Lingren. We still our booking agent.

952
00:49:22,840 --> 00:49:24,360
Speaker 1: They were friends at the time, as far as I know,

953
00:49:24,520 --> 00:49:27,479
Speaker 1: friends anymore, because well, I don't know. I just didn't ask,

954
00:49:27,560 --> 00:49:30,080
Speaker 1: but he I was going to text Linger and ask

955
00:49:30,120 --> 00:49:32,680
Speaker 1: if you knew him, but they He came to the

956
00:49:32,719 --> 00:49:34,400
Speaker 1: Neptune Show and I even rode in a car with

957
00:49:34,480 --> 00:49:36,680
Speaker 1: him with Emily to some after party we went to.

958
00:49:36,960 --> 00:49:37,720
Speaker 2: Wowee.

959
00:49:38,000 --> 00:49:39,880
Speaker 1: Yeah. So good to be back in touch with Chris.

960
00:49:39,960 --> 00:49:42,040
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, thanks a lot, Chris, thanks for getting back

961
00:49:42,040 --> 00:49:45,279
Speaker 2: in touch. I think that that's no longer parasocial, that's

962
00:49:45,360 --> 00:49:45,960
Speaker 2: just social.

963
00:49:47,000 --> 00:49:48,040
Speaker 1: Yeah, you're right.

964
00:49:48,600 --> 00:49:50,440
Speaker 2: Well, if you want to be like Chris and remind

965
00:49:50,520 --> 00:49:52,880
Speaker 2: us that we've hung out with you before, and also

966
00:49:52,960 --> 00:49:55,600
Speaker 2: share some pretty great information and correct us for not

967
00:49:55,640 --> 00:49:59,200
Speaker 2: shouting out independent version of something we talked about. We

968
00:49:59,280 --> 00:50:01,719
Speaker 2: love that kind of stuff. You can send us an

969
00:50:01,760 --> 00:50:04,520
Speaker 2: email to Stuff Podcast at iHeartRadio.

970
00:50:04,640 --> 00:50:10,919
Speaker 1: Dot com Stuff you Should Know is a production of iHeartRadio.

971
00:50:11,400 --> 00:50:15,759
Speaker 1: For more podcasts myheart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,

972
00:50:15,840 --> 00:50:17,680
Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.