Re: Mr. Sorenson's posting on TVBARN's little, uh, "rant." I sent a letter to Aaron Barnhart (the man behind the usually-reliable TV Barn), dissecting and questioning his commentary (if you look at the AP story Aaron based his commentary on, he basically dismisses NAQT as a "game show" and accused WWTBAM of recruiting only quiz bowl players and veteran game show contestants for its shows). When I did my interviews with WWTBAM, I made ZERO mention of my experience with quiz bowl (I only mentioned I was a fan of game shows since I was 6-7 years old - my first memory being Lt. Thom McKee's legendary run on Tic Tac Dough) - I talked about my work with VOA, CSB (broadcasting school), my love of travel, unusual jobs I've held and the like. Only when they interviewed my sister (who was my guest) did the "quiz bowl secret" come up. Kerrie mentioned TRASH, GW Quiz Bowl, CBI Regionals titles, etc. (Her exact quote - I remember every April for 3-4 years, there was one weekend he'd be on a plane to compete for the College Bowl title :) ) to the interviewer. She (the interviewer) then asked me about quiz bowl, and I talked about it for 2-3 minutes. When I finished my interview, I did mentioned that if I did get far, I wanted Regis to discuss my jobs, my travel and what Kerrie called my "perseverance" (two years to get on WWTBAM, two years to get a major-market broadcasting job) before quiz bowl. They agreed. It wasn't that I'm embarrassed about quiz bowl, I just wanted people to know that there's more to me than question-writing and trivia. As far as whether being a quiz bowler could be a "liability" on game shows - I know that Weakest Link (as Hayden noted earlier) is looking more for personality and enthusaism than what you know. They wouldn't care whether you played quiz bowl or not - as long as you can say "WHAZZUP," they'll consider you. Greed and 21 were of the same vein when it came to their contestant searches. I don't see a "backlash" against quiz bowlers on game shows - I noted to Mr. Barnhardt that, as of today, there are more quiz bowlers to have goose-egged on WWTBAM (me, Martin Poteralski, Stan Wu) than to have won the jackpot (Kevin Olmstead, Dave Goodman). To conclude that, well, quiz-bowlers are ruining WWTBAM borderlines on ridiculous. Just remember, Aaron Barnhardt is a TV critic - he gets paid to criticize, no matter how minute and dopey the criticism is. James
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