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The Associated Press Will Answer Your Random Trivia Questions

By Neal on January 18, 2008 1:55 PM

The Associated Press wants to help you win at Trivial Pursuit, Quizzo and The Big Quiz Thing. We were just informed that the wire service has launched a new syndicated Q&A column, Ask AP.

This week’s questions:

  • What ever happened to Baghdad Bob?

  • Background (my numbers maybe a little off, but you will see my point): About five years ago, oil sold for around $20 per barrel and gasoline was around $2 a gallon. Now oil is about $100 per barrel and gasoline is $3.25ish per gallon. Over the past five years, no new significant oil wells have come into production and no new refineries have come on line. So…
    How can oil go up in cost by a factor of five and the cost of gasoline go up by a factor of two? We can only get so much gasoline out of a barrel of oil and our refining efficiency has not improved significantly. The math just does not make sense.

  • What happened to Meredith Emerson‘s dog Ella?

  • What is the difference between a caucus and a primary?

  • What is a “redshirt freshman”? It seems college teams (and announcers) are always talking about “redshirt” players. Has to be something about eligibility, but I just don’t know what the phrase means.

    This week’s questions were answered by Brian Murphy, John Wilen, Debbie Newby, Mike Glover and Ralph Russo of the AP. Questions can be submitted to newsquestions@ap.org for your bar trivia entertainment and edification.

    Official press release after the jump.


    AP Press Release

    Jan. 18, 2008

    The Associated Press launches a Q&A initiative, called ‘Ask AP’

    NEW YORK — The Associated Press today launched a new Q&A initiative, called “Ask AP,” where journalists from the world’s largest newsgathering organization will answer written questions from the public about the news. Topics covered in the first column range from college football eligibility to the mechanics of the U.S. presidential primary season.

    Readers are invited to send questions to the e-mail address newsquestions(at)ap.org, with “Ask AP” in the subject line. The answers will appear in periodic installments of the new Q&A column, both online and in newspapers. Each column will end with a call for additional questions AP journalists should pursue.

    For the first column, the AP received questions from around the United States on a wide variety of topics. Eric Carvin, a supervisor in the news department who is overseeing the initiative along with Deputy Managing Editor Tom Kent, assigned reporters and editors to answer questions that fell within their areas of expertise. The column was made available today, for use by AP members both online and in print.

    “No matter how thorough a news story might be, there will always be readers who want to know more,” said Carvin. “With ‘Ask AP,’ they’ll be able to ask those follow-up questions — and get answers from AP journalists who cover the very topics that inspired their curiosity.”

    ABOUT THE AP
    The Associated Press is the essential global news network, delivering fast, unbiased news from every corner of the world to all media platforms and formats. Founded in 1846, AP today is the largest and most trusted source of independent news and information. On any given day, more than half the world’s population sees news from AP.

    On the Net: www.ap.org

    Contact: Jack Stokes, AP Corporate Communications, 212.XXX.XXXX

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