The Best of Questionist

In article #198, we look at the 19.8 most popular ones so far (we rounded up)

Published December 23, 2023

Happy holidays!

The end of the year is always a good time to take stock, and it’s no different at Questionist HQ. Since our September launch, we’ve racked up tens of thousands of views (thank you!), and put out a fast daily trivia game that’s racked up tens of thousands more – despite only being out a few weeks now (because it’s amazing!).

But we started with stories, and as a publication dedicated to championing knowledge-based entertainment in all its forms, we’ve told some great ones. So settle down by a fire or something, and walk back with us through the most popular articles to date on the weird ship Questionist.

1.  This… Is… Jeopardy? (Sept. 10): That our first weekly column by Andy Saunders should lead the pack is no surprise: People love Jeopardy!, they love reading Saunders write about Jeopardy! daily on The Jeopardy! Fan, and now they love reading his weekly roundups right here on Questionist. Heck, it’s so unsurprising that we won’t say anything about the other ones in this Top 20.

2. The Whole Nine Yarns (Write My Round, Nov. 17): Eric Keihl’s round-writing challenge recaps are always delightful, but something especially captivated our audience about this one on knitting and crocheting. Guess it was just hooky!

3. Second Chances, First Warning Signs (The Jeopardy! Fan, Sept. 17)

4. Questioning the Answers (The Jeopardy! Fan intro, Sept. 7)

5. GO NADS! (Staff, Sept. 9): To re-run this old story from the Geeks Who Drink blog took some cojones, we think you’ll agree. But the hairy tale of the Rhode Island School of Design athletics department re-paid our trust with a jockload of page views. Look for it again next year?

A logo for the RISD Nads hockey team features two hockey pucks suggestively astride a long red hockey stick.
If this logo doesn’t amuse you, maybe just click back to the front page now.

6. Palace Intrigue (The Jeopardy! Fan, Oct. 1)


7. The 2023 Questionist Gift Guide (Staff, Dec. 13): It’s too late to get these for the holidays, of course, but you could probably still get a calendar shipped by 2024. Don’t dawdle!

8. A Capital Idea (Sept. 5): We thought it would be a capital idea to shine a spotlight on one of America’s biggest currently-running trivia gatherings, SporcleCon. Apparently y’all agreed.

9. My Little Runaway (The Jeopardy! Fan, Sept. 24)

10. Don’t Bet the Farm (The Jeopardy! Fan, Oct. 8)

11. Denzel Washington’s Hometown… (Duh!, Sept. 24): One of our early Duh! columns, this one wound up having almost nothing to do with Denzel Washington. But not nothing. Just go read it and see.

12. Beat the Clock to Beat the Bridge (Sept. 14): One thing we like to do is alert you to casting calls for TV quiz shows, in case you’d like to try your luck. This time we even talked to a casting director for some inside dope. You can’t get on this season of this one, but maybe try Don’t Forget the Lyrics?

13. Welcome to the Kinky Shrek Epoch (Fact-Check Footnotes, Sept. 20). We don’t use the word “clickbait” around here, but just saying… of all Mark Gartsbeyn’s fact-check columns, this one surely had the eye-catchingest headline. And it was the most popular one. Just saying.

14. Game On (Sept. 27): Where were you when the WGA strike ended? We were right here, telling you the WGA strike had ended. And considering how much recycled content they’d been using on Jeopardy!, we have to say it wasn’t a minute too soon.

15. A Duel to the Death (Write My Round, Sept. 8): We already saw one of Eric Keihl’s columns on the list, but this one’s a whole other ball of yarn… a round about wallpaper. Technically that’s a mixed metaphor, but it doesn’t really feel like one, does it?

16. Not Quite My Tempo (Write My Round, Dec. 1): Back-to-back WMRs, and this one was on compact Fords J.K. Simmons, who is at least more interesting than compact Fords. But Eric, if you’re reading this, how about a round on compact Fords?

17. Taking Flight (Sept. 10): Our delightful crossword columnist, Chris King, started out strong with a Sue Bird career retrospective. (Sorry, I couldn’t do this one without spoiling the clue.)

18. Triumphs! (Dec. 9): The magnum opus to date for our GA writer Alexia Kontolemos, this is the definitive listing of the best movies ever to bear one-word titles. Mind you, they aren’t all short movies. We’re not saving you any time here. Just… look, people enjoyed the article, okay?

19. Squeaking Through (The Jeopardy! Fan, Oct. 29)

20. Turn the Page (Dec. 12): Remember when we mentioned calendars up there, on #7? Well, this is the making-of interview about one of those calendars. So if you ever wanted to know how a trivia calendar comes together… well, we can help you with one of them anyhow.