I would not have rejected that TV question and almost never reject any based on difficulty (unless it's something about a very specific scene from a very specific episode of a show; single Qs are not the place for these) because who knows how difficult people will find it?

Now, had it been accepted and gone through the game, chances are it would have gotten quite a low % answering correctly. Even general TV questions on wildly famous shows aired all over the planet often do. Many people will see it who have never seen the show at all and will have no idea as to the answer. I generally do lets these types of questions through though to see how they fare in the game, even if its obscure to me when I see the question as an editor

Having thought a bit more about this, one of the things that a good FT question can do is inform, as well as just test one's knowledge. All historians of broadcast comedy agree that Tony Hancock was a seminal figure, and the fact that he lived at that address was a well-known and important part of the character, often mentioned for the sake of a laugh at his expense (such a boring suburban address being so at odds with his inflated opinion of himself). It's not like asking an obscure point of detail, mentioned in a single half-hour show.

And of course, even if the player got the question wrong, the "interesting information" could point out what a brilliant comedian Hancock was, and mention that extracts from his radio and TV shows are available on the net. That player may then think "Hmm, I'll just check it out on YouTube" - and discover what they'd been missing. One more soul won for civilisation.

Personally, I would only rarely reject a "QQ" question for being too obscure - and only then after I'd done a bit of research. If other players don't like the question when it appears, they will rate it badly, and it will disappear. The system is thereby self-regulating.

I'm never quite sure what constitutes obscure either. Surely questions about album tracks, little known books, films, etc are obscure, but these all seem to get through.

When the QQ game first started I took great trouble to draft a question, to which the answer was 'The Red Bull Air Race'. This event takes place on all continents barring Antarctica and has been won by a variety of nationalities. It was rejected from the sports section as being too obscure. It was eventually accepted in a rewritten form in the World section.

My own opinion is that the number of people getting it right sorts out how obscure it is. I think it's putting too much on individual editors for them to decide on the relative obscurity of the question.

Who @? isn't much of a question. The example here didn't allow any extra info (Australian, Canadian, Irish, British, South African or USA TV?). It didn't tell us if it was a comedy, drama or variety show. It didn't offer any clue as to time of running (50s, 60s, 70s...) or even if the person was the lead of the show. So, in this case obscurity may not have meant too trivial information but lack of information.

The main point of this query was not the question itself, but continuity in what are acceptable questions and what are not.

I'd say that a question which might be seen as obscure is a lot more likely to be accepted if some context is given.

At first glance, this question would appear to be a very picky number question, the kind of thing we have ample evidence nobody likes. Some indication, in either the way the question is asked, or in the info section, that this is not the case, makes it a lot easier for an editor to make that judgement call.

"Obscurity" can be a function of several factors.

"Who was standing to the left of Character A when he bought his coffee in Episode B of the series 'C'?" is obscure for anyone except dedicated fans of the series "C", and should be disallowed, IMO.

For me, pretty much any question involving sports is difficult, because it's not an area of interest for me. Personal strengths and weaknesses shouldn't, of course, be a criterion for labeling a question "obscure."

What's common knowledge in one country is a mystery in another, as in the case of the "Railway Cuttings East Cheam" question. In that case, my opinion is that it should have been allowed, as FunTrivia is an international site and should contain questions appropriate for all members. If I, as an American, miss the question, it's my opportunity to walk in the shoes of non-Americans dealing with questions regarding "I Love Lucy."

Unfortunately this is a bit unlikely to happen. "Too obscure", "too difficult", "too easy", etc. are all very subjective things - there's no yardstick we can look too that tells everyone universally "yep, that's too ____, no doubt about it". There are something like 20 different editors who accept/reject questions, from all over the world, who all specialize in different topics. There will be some inconsistency on these subjective matters. I personally make it a point to accept more than reject if I'm unsure on one of these subjective points, but I can't speak for everyone.

This is something that's been brought up before. We (the staff) decided that while we do try our best to be on the same page, we are all our own people. I have an extensive knowledge of Video Games; a lot of our editors do not. What's super easy for me is going to be very difficult for another editor. A question asked about a Japanese version of a game could be completely different from the American version...or the European version.

All that can be said is that we do try our best to uphold a certain standard. With the single questions it can be a bit harder to maintain the same consistency simply because they are a whole other beast unto themselves.

EVERYTHING is obscure for me, heheheh

What rating causes a question to disappear? (I have been submitting more questions lately - because of the Daily Challenge - and can see from the ratings that my submissions have a way to go.)

I think any that finish with a negative ( less than zero) rating isn't used further

It depends on the game. In "easy" rated games, questions with low difficulty and high ratings are added. There is actually a pretty good correlation between difficulty and ratings.

As far as the subjective nature of the whole thing... yep, it's subjective.

Pretty much, I ask editors to ask themselves if a question has a hope of ever being useful in any FT game. If it's so obscure or weird that you wouldn't want to see it in "who's the smartest", then it's probably better rejecting it than subjecting it to players in the new player game where it will ultimately fail to be used anyway.

Could we have a new button for the New Questions then please?: Obscure :p

I have had some doozies recently

I'm a bit confused. Is a score of 0.3650 considered above or below zero?

Above. A below zero score would be a negative number.