Here are the marks for the top scoring contestants in this years Christmas Quiz:
| Initials or Name | Marks out of 57 (+ one possible bonus point) |
| MH | 53 |
| djal26 | 53 |
| JW | 53 |
| PGB | 52 |
| EP | 52 |
| timbeau | 52 |
| JH | 51 |
| Fbfree | 51 |
We hope to be in touch with the top scorers (in bold) concerning token prizes in the next week or so.
From the perspective of setting it, the answers to this year’s quiz was particularly satisfying. No-one got all the answers correct but all questions and parts of questions were answered correctly by a reasonable number of people. So nothing was set that was too difficult for everybody.
A stumbling block for many was either Question 11 (north and south of the river) and/or Question 15 (Thameslink questions). A lot of people were doing quite well up to that point.
Unusually, the Sir Herbert Walker team did not appear at or near the top but we suspect that is due to changed composition of the members. timbeau sent his answers remarkably soon after the quiz was published which is something he has managed in the past. A couple of remaining ambiguities were sorted out thanks to him.
A particular mention is deserved for Fbfree who writes “[h]aving only stepped in London once, at Heathrow, I think I have a decent solution set for you“. This was not the only reasonable attempt from a long way away and is probably testimony not only to the people involved but also just how much can be found from the world wide web despite efforts made to make the questions ‘unGoogleable’.
At least, at present, ChatGPT and similar programs are not yet capable of supplying an answer and, if they are, there is no guarantee their answer is correct. It is certainly getting harder to produce photo questions that can’t be identified by some smart program and, of course, Streetview can be very helpful in assisting or verifying a suspected answer.
Thanks to all who sent in answers. Even if you couldn’t answer a lot of the questions it was helpful to see what type of question was found to be difficult and which ones could be answered by almost anyone. And, as is the case every year, some of the extra information provided is quite enlightening.
In an unusually positive sign for next year, concord and I have already come up with ideas for specific questions for next year or have germs of ideas left over from this year’s rejections.
If there are any past winners around who never received their promised prizes please get in contact at Pedantic [at] londonreconnections.com and we will try to rectify that omission.