QI in America

I swear, I will eventually get around to a post that isn't about game shows. However, this crossed my path today, and I felt that I must share it. One of my favorite British game shows is QI (Quite Interesting), which has been increasingly popular across the pond. The show plays out as a semi-topical quiz, with the exception that the questions are very near impossible. This is where the hilarity comes in. Points are awarded for correct responses, as well as those that are wrong, but still quite interesting. Points are taken away for obvious incorrect answers (accompanied by a few flashing lights and klaxons). At the end of each show, you walk away having laughed a few pounds off, and gained a few interesting tidbits of information.

While stumbling around the QI website, I noticed a sidebar mentioning a petition to bring British QI to American airwaves. Naturally, I jumped at the chance, and signed the petition. The mere thought of QI here excites me, since now after years of spouting off random bits of information to friends, they can now see that I'm not that looney.

One thing that's really appealed to me about this show is that it makes learning fun. Teachers stuggle to make this connection with their students everyday, when all they've really needed to do is get Stephen Fry and Alan Davies to come in and banter around a bit. Granted, the show does make gratuitous use of sexual humor (Brits can get more things past censors), but the joking around makes the venue much more fun than if we were to just have everything read to us by our humanities professor. I would love to have the opportunity to sit in with the chaps and banter around with them a bit, although the closest I could (reasonably) do is go to see a taping (which is a possibility, considering the tapings mostly occur May-Juneish).

Anyway, to try to sway some others to joining me in the petition, here's a video from the fourth season of the show, which ironically, has a line or two of America-bashing. Worth the price, I'd say.



Click here to read and sign the petition.