Had I gotten that daily double on music the guy got last night, and had $20K to blow, I would have bet it all. That was pretty simple.

Unfortunately for him, he only had a grand.

A: This color rhymes with urple.

Q: What is light urple?

No, what is "burple". Yes, that is a real color.

Joanie Loves Chachi (I think I spelled it right)

Chachi is Penis in Korea or something like that

More mounting evidence that Quiksand of Annapolis, Md is really Ken Jennings of Salt Lake City, Utah: Today, when talking to the guests, Alex questioned Ken about his grammar nazi'ism

SI

If he wins today, it's see you in September.

If you're avoiding spoilers, don't read the ESPN stories about him because they have his results from today.

SI

Gawddamn!

They've taken down the spoiler ridden page.. it's now only updated through yesterday's game.

Bah. I want the spoilers.

then search for Ken Jennings on news.google.com AP wire has an update on him :)

Right on... thanks.

Anyone get the feeling he was saving up for tonights (Friday July 23rd) run?

He even brought up a couple of my favorites, too. The "less" versus "fewer" thing gets to me as well.


Great showing tonight, though - damn.

Not going to say what the "question" was (since I know QS doesn't watch it until later), but did anyone here not know that Final Jeopardy Answer? These Final Jeopardy questions are easier than the normal ones. :D

You know, if Ken were 90 percent of the rest of the population, he wouldn't come back in September until Jeopardy! decided to pay him an appearance fee. Ratings are up 50 percent since his run started. Jorja Fox on CSI was holding out for more money and she already makes twice as much money he's making and has zero effect on ratings.

Of course, I'm fairly certain that paying guests an appearance fee violates any number of ethical if not legal boundaries ...

Whats the under/over on how much he ends up winning in total? $3,500,000?

I think it'll be harder for him to keep going following this break, if ya think about it he's been in a rythem for a long time now, having that rythem broken up can't be seen as a plus. I wonder about the producers, etc. of the show, do they go out and try to get a super genius to try and beat him or do they keep feeding him the schlubs he's been playing against. While i'm not suggesting that they're outright rigging it, it certainly has to factor in who they pick to compete on the show, say they get a guy who has a 150 IQ and just blasts all the preliminary tests, do they maybe set him aside till after Kens ride is done or do they let him go head to head with him, i'd love to sit in on those meetings.

But why bother? Let him blitz through all the game show records (most consecutive wins, most money won, etc) for the first few weeks of next season so you get keep getting high ratings. He's fairly affable and other than the "I hate everybody" and "I just want to see him lose" people, you've got most people cheering for him so why try to break that up. Sure, they're going to lose a lot of the bandwagon viewers they've gained but that's going to happen whether he loses on day 1 or day 45 but at least if he keeps going until day 45, it's going to keep those "Ken Jennings" fans watching, it's not going to chase away the regular Jeopardy crowd, and you might even get some added viewers for other milestones.

SI

I honestly doubt that there's any sort of foul play involved in the slightest. I'm sure that S & P have been taking a very close look at all of the Jeopardy's staff's choices during Ken's run - more so than usual. Plus, I don't think that they'd want to risk a scandal where they've purposely made it easier for Ken. We've been down that road before, and it very nearly killed off game shows. Since most of the staffers have depended and will continue to depend on game shows for their livelihood, I don't think they'd want to risk it by even slightly stacking the deck in Ken's favor.

The thing that interests me is that the new season begins taping in August. That means all of Ken's opponents from now on have been able to watch the shows and read the press clippings. I would not be surprised to see an opponent who has practiced their button-pressing ability and who is willing to take a huge risk in a DJ DD situation knock Ken off early in the next season.

The arguments that there is foul play afoot are absurd. As are the arguments that Ken has only been put up against lousy opponents.

Ken kicks ass, that's it. If you're up against him, you simply find that he knows an awful lot of the answers, and he's quicker than you with the buzzer. How hard is this to comprehend?

Of course he can lose... but I agree, his rivals are going to play knowing that they need some luck -- so he'll definitely be up against players who will bet aggresively, knowing that they probably can't win a fair fight. Good stuff.

He doesn't get "the call" because he suffers from Ralph Kramden disease.

This is weird... I had a dream last night about an older woman beating Ken by less than $1K, as a result of him not betting enough in Final Jeopardy. Posting it here in case I'm a psychic. :D

Interesting...not only are you dreaming about Ken Jennings...but also an old woman :).

Guess who's back!

Same song, different verse.

My wife and I were discussing this today and we're a little confused as to when they started filming for the new season. We know that the shows we will be seeing this week (and next?) were filmed in April - the same batch that we saw before the summer break. But when did they stop filming at the end of the Spring?

I read in the USA Today (website) that these were filmed in August.

Last night's game was pretty interesting -- Ken faced two pretty smart, pretty quick opponents. Both guys played well, both guys doubled up on a DJ fairly early to stay competitive, but Ken got the third DJ and put them away down the stretch. It's amazing that for him, it's a very exciting game when there is any doubt at all about the outcome -- the real excitement was to see whether he would double up the second place person before Final Jeopardy!, not whether he would actually be behind.

Actually, I think the fact that both opponents were pretty good served Ken well -- if only one had been good and had gotten some of those breaks, he might have had a shot. (Plus, Ken missed the very answerable FJ question, leaving open the "what if" scenarios)

My wife figured the baseball category was put in there to throw him off and/or give another player - you know, one with a life - a chance to run the category. And it pretty much happened. That one guy had a $4K swing by not knowing Johnny Vandermeer AND guessing wrong.

i find myself rooting for anyone but Ken now

I root for him. My 5-year old, for some reason, loves the guy. She's on a first-name basis with him whenever he's on the screen - "There's Ken, is he winning?"

if you DONT want to know how this all ends, dont go snooping around on the 'net.

it will eventually leak out, but it may soon be tough to avoid it. (and dont check out ew.com, for starters)


to be clear: ew.com will tell you what happens to ken jennings run on jeopardy.

Just don't anyone post it here!:)

well hopefully you don't watch PTI because I think they blabbed today and they surely will as the outcome becomes more public.

OK, I don't wanna give out spoilers, but concerning the spoilers, is it a fact what they say or is it just leaked 2nd hand knowledge? I didn't read much of the story (it was right on yahoos friggin front page so I couldn't avoid it) but what I did read didn't say that what was being reported was concrete.

it's prob correct. Jennings can't say legally, and of course Jeopardy won't say.

Does anyone else think Ken is getting dumber each show? I mean, he's only gotten 1 final jeopardy since the break, and they haven't been taking. Catch-22 as a turn of the century novel turned into a 70's movie (I don't remember the exact question). I can say I knew the presidents question solely because I was a poli-sci major, but still, I've gotten 3 out of 4, and I missed the Houdini/Doyle one because I said Houdini/Hemmingway. He just seems ripe for the picking, but everyone else is too dumb/can't buzz in.

And does anyone else's wife/gf constantly glare at them while watching jeopardy because you answer the question too fast? I've gotten to where I wait until final jeopardy is completely over before sharing my answer, almost apologetically so that she doesn't feel bad.

I think that falls under the category of "live with it or go in the other room" unless you only have 1 tv in your house/apartment.

SI

They actually announced the details of Ken's run ending - including how many shows he was on - on the local sports radio station's news breaks.

Is that legal?

Isn't it like if somebody found out who won Survivor before Survivor ended?

I don't know but I smell a legal issue here...

I am aware that Ken or Jeopardy didn't say anything, but still, is it right that every news station on the planet just reported it?

USA today has an aritcle on it today.

I guess that it means that Jeopardy's ratings will go down until that day when it will spike.

We've survived the dreadful college tournament - now back to the real thing.

Go Ken!

Huzzah.

SI

For those who watch Jeopardy! (or anyone, really) we now have an 11-day champion who is doing pretty well. David Madden, an American student who lives in Berlin, narrowly won last night after trailing leading into the final jeopardy question, when the leader missed it because she gave a technically incorrect answer, using a colloquial name for the "Ode to Joy" rather than referencing Beethoven's entire ninth symphony.

In any event - David has been tough, but perhaps not overpowering. He also has a completely empty personality, in my judgment, making him a guy I now root against.

If you're inclined to watch the show... I guess this makes things more interesting.

Time to resurrect an old thread from the archive:

'Jeopardy!' to pit humans against IBM machine - Yahoo! News

SI

Uh, okay...

This makes very little sense. More than half of your success on Jeopardy is related to how quickly you can hit the button after the question has been read (in the studio, there's a light surrounding the game board signaling the opening). A computer would presumably be able to react much more quickly to the signal and would buzz in every time.

no talk about watson the computer competing for 3 episodes starting today? i think ken jennings is back, too, no?