The Trouble With World Records

My old quizmaster pal Sir James got in touch the other day to point out a lapsed fact on one of the dpquiz tiebreaker pages about the record number of hours for DJ-ing, which had recently been broken.

He shared this tip for dealing with 'world record' questions:

"Whenever I write the Guinness records question myself these days I tend to say "In (year record was broken) (name of record breaker) did this amazing thing - but how long/many etc.?

This way the answer is always "correct" and I can see how recently the record was broken at a glance. As records tumble all the time I find this little fail safe a real stress-saver."

It's good advice from Sir James, particularly as there are all kinds of weirdos out there continually trying to break world records to "get in the Guinness Book", including several records which are not noteworthy enough to gain much coverage when they are broken.