The quiz master from a local British pub has caused quite a stir. He announced on social media that a team will no longer be allowed to participate in the weekly quiz at the Barking Dog pub in Urmston. He had caught them cheating.
He said the quiz was intended to be a fun and approachable quiz, but it started losing entrants after the same team won every week, taking home the £30 prize pool. “We had a team that kept winning and got even the obscure answers right,” he said.
“That led to us having to impose a complete ban on the use of smartphones. We never thought we would have to enforce that, because most people actually like it.”
Their investigation into the cheaters really started when he received an anonymous phone call from a regular quizzer with a tip. The following week he asked his fellow quizmaster to keep an eye on one particular table. The man saw how the participants whispered into their smartwatch to identify songs during a music round, for example. “He caught them red-handed and as a result we have banned them from future quizzes,” he said.
The owner said he posted the message on social media to get back his lost customers. But in his post, he declined to reveal the name of the team. Which led to a real “whodunnit”. The pub received several calls from quizzers wanting to find out who exactly had cheated. “I only put it online because I thought, let’s try to get back the good teams that dropped out,” he said. “It takes away some of the fun when you know people are cheating.”
According to the man, the cheaters are still welcome in the pub. However, they are no longer allowed to register for the weekly quiz.
