Million Dollar Money Drop TV Game Show

Quote: pacomartin

Almost perfect answer 4:58 , 5:55 and 8:33.

Good trick question. I must have listened to all three of those songs well over 100 times each. I think Bohemian Rhapsody just seems longer because when it is over you feel like you just sat through an opera.

Quote: Wizard

Good trick question. I must have listened to all three of those songs well over 100 times each. I think Bohemian Rhapsody just seems longer because when it is over you feel like you just sat through an opera.

I think Queen's song feels longer because it's divided into different styles. American Pie starts slow, then speeds up, then slows down again, but it's the same melody the whole time. I don't know the third song.

Quote: Nareed

. I don't know the third song.

Its a Classic. On a side note. A variation of the Allman Brothers Band song Jessica is used as the theme to Top Gear, Britain and the worlds favourite Car programme.

Quote: pacomartin

I am not sure why Jewish names are so popular for American baby boys. Latin names have almost vanished. There is not the wholesale shift to Jewish names for girls in the USA, and Jewish names are not so dominant in the UK/

Isn't it obvious? Everyone wishes they were Jewish...

Quote: teddys

Isn't it obvious? Everyone wishes they were Jewish...

A fe years ago the most popular names for British male babies was Jack, Oliver, Thomas, and Harry (none of which are Jewish).

Quote: pacomartin

A fe years ago the most popular names for British male babies was Jack, Oliver, Thomas, and Harry (none of which are Jewish).

What constitutes a Jewish name? There are plenty of names derived from the Bible, both from the Old and New testaments. I assume names from the Old are Jewish and names from the New are not.

And how would you categorize "Irving"? :P

Quote: Nareed

What constitutes a Jewish name? There are plenty of names derived from the Bible, both from the Old and New testaments. I assume names from the Old are Jewish and names from the New are not.

You would assume wrong. I doubt there is a comprehensive list of jewish names, but like the famous definition of indecency "you know one when you see one."

Quote: Nareed

What constitutes a Jewish name? There are plenty of names derived from the Bible, both from the Old and New testaments. I assume names from the Old are Jewish and names from the New are not.

And how would you categorize "Irving"? :P

I suppose I should say Hebrew instead of Jewish. That way it would be associated with a language instead of an ethnicity.

The etymology of most names is pretty well known. John is a Hebrew name, but as the most popular name in world history it has been copied into virtually every language on earth. Irving is Gaelic.

But specifically Jacob, Irving, and Ethan were clearly Hebrew names that were of fairly limited popularity in the early part of the 20th century. They have clearly been adopted by many people who have no cultural identifications with Judaism.

Trivia question: Without looking it up, the term "lingua franca" originally meant:
1) French
2) Arabic
3) Italian
4) Italian combined with Arabic vocabulary

Quote: pacomartin

Trivia question: Without looking it up, the term "lingua franca" originally meant:
1) French
2) Arabic
3) Italian
4) Italian combined with Arabic vocabulary

I'm going to say 1).

The correct answer is #4, but that would be impossible to guess. Early arabs had a habit of calling all Europeans "Franks" after the old Latin word for the people who lived in present day France. The common language of trade was Italian with a strong arabic vocabulary which the arabs called "lingua franca".

Nowadays we use it in the more generic sense of being a language that everyone can speak, even if no one speaks it as a native language. English is the common "lingua franca" of India.

Aircraft maintenance manuals use a very sharply defined subset of English. A common example is that you can use "close" as a verb, but not as an adjective.

Quote: pacomartin

The correct answer is #4, but that would be impossible to guess. Early arabs had a habit of calling all Europeans "Franks" after the old Latin word for the people who lived in present day France.

Precisely why I chose French. I know that words like "frank" or "franc" and derivatives often reffer to France and French.

Of course, I should have taken into account that French spread much later in time, when no one used Latin much any more.

Oh, well. Outsmarted by my meager knowledge of Latin ;)

What an idiot on the show tonight. 1)basketball, 2)football, 3)hockey puck, 4)baseball - Which is heavier?
The guy wasn't even close! He deserved the contempt of his wife.

I didn't see the show, but I can just imagine throwing each one. I'd say that the Basketball is heaviest, despite being full of air.

Quote: pacomartin

What an idiot on the show tonight. 1)basketball, 2)football, 3)hockey puck, 4)baseball - Which is heavier?
The guy wasn't even close! He deserved the contempt of his wife.

I hate to profess my ignorance, but I'm not sure of the answer by any means. The problem is the hockey puck; I'm not sure that I've ever held one. I can eliminate the football. It seems obvious that would be lighter than a basketball. For me it comes down to the basketball and the hockey puck. I'd put 75% on basketball, 25% on hockey puck.

Quote: Wizard

I hate to profess my ignorance, but I'm not sure of the answer by any means. The problem is the hockey puck; I'm not sure that I've ever held one. I can eliminate the football. It seems obvious that would be lighter than a basketball. For me it comes down to the basketball and the hockey puck. I'd put 75% on basketball, 25% on hockey puck.

Your reasoning is sound, but think about getting hit in the face with a basketball and how much it hurts. Can you imagine how dangerous a hockey puck would be if it weighed as much as a baketball? You would have some serious injuries. The pads only cover crucial body parts.

Season wrap up:
A total of 12 out of 16 teams lost all their money:
- 3/12 teams lost $1 million on first or second question
- 6/12 teams made it to the final (7th) question and lost
The 4/16 winning teams won $40K, $80K, $240K, and $300K.

The British Version has 8/22 teams win £25K,£25K,£50K,£50K,£50K,£75K,£75K,and £200K.
The British play with more money (£1M instead of $1M), but the British game only has 40 bundles instead of 50 bundles in American version.
Less bundles mean it is more difficult to do repeated hedges.

One British team lost heartbreaking £525K=$850K on the final question with only 2 possible answers.
The maximum money lost for an American team on the final question is $200K.

Average British win has been £25K while the average for American win is $41.25K which are worth almost the same amount.
The maximum win for both the British (£200K) and American ($300K) teams is similar in value (within 8%).

Would you rather play the British game with a jackpot worth 61% more and 40 bundles, or the American version with 50 bundles?
Assume the questions are the same.

Quote: pacomartin

Would you rather play the British game with a jackpot worth 61% more and 40 bundles, or the American version with 50 bundles?
Assume the questions are the same.

To answer my own question, I would clearly choose the American game. Having 50 bundles over 40 bundles makes it significantly more likely you will get to the win . It doesn't matter that the jackpot is smaller by 33% ($1 million vs £1 million).

They used this concept of dropping people down chutes in an incredibly low budget game show called Total Darkness.

I should warn you that from the first episode, this game show is the most boring one I have ever seen.

The only clever thing is they make people jump onto a trap door to find out if it drops them or not. In Money Drop the trap door just opens underneath them. I assume the next variation will be to drop them into a bucket of slime.

Quote: pacomartin

They used this concept of dropping people down chutes in an incredibly low budget game show called Total Darkness.

The American game shows Russian Roulette and Who's Still Standing? and the Australian game show Shafted also did this, although they weren't necessarily "chutes". (The American show Pitfall also did this in its bonus round, and these were chutes, but the drop was very slow.)

It's a clever premise, but I got frustrated at the quality of the questions. A good trivia question should be (1) interesting, (2) not impossible and (3) robust. By "robust" I mean it's a very bad sign when you have to add all sorts of qualifiers to the question--such as "first studio album" or "according to this survey" or similar qualification. The "password" question falls into this category. There was a game show called Greed a few years back that had the same problem of boring questions. One of them was something like, "According to Domino's, in 2005, its most popular topping, BY WEIGHT, was ____________". Terrible question.

Id prefer the UK version. UK winners do not pay tax on their winnings. US players will be taxed.