Students test knowledge outside classroom with app

QuizUp awards titles to players based on the number of points they acquire. Senior Jeffrey Fastow has earned the title “Captain of the Pequod,” a reference to the novel “Moby Dick.”

Amy Kang

QuizUp awards titles to players based on the number of points they acquire. Senior Jeffrey Fastow has earned the title “Captain of the Pequod,” a reference to the novel “Moby Dick.”

Cara Maines, Assistant Online Editor

With categories ranging from Periodic Table to Celebrity News, trivia app QuizUp has garnered many devotees, especially among members of the quiz bowl team.

QuizUp allows users to play against people from across the world and to engage via social media sites like Facebook.

“It’s such an original, fun idea,” senior Daniel Bland said.

Bland is level 13 in Logos and level 12 in Lord of the Rings trivia on QuizUp.

Senior Jeffrey Fastow has earned the title “Captain of the Pequod” by achieving high scores in literature. In addition to being level 41 in Literature, Fastow is level 26 in General Knowledge and level 19 in General History.

“Memorizing a bunch of book titles and authors for quiz bowl tournaments definitely gives one a leg up against QuizUp opponents, but also quiz bowl forces you to think on the fly — to draw connections between different concepts and produce an answer faster than the other guy,” Fastow said.

Although senior Carlo De Guzman often plays in the categories Classics, Paintings, Name that Artist and Classical Music, he also enjoys playing sports categories, including Basketball and Football.

“Overall, I tend to play the categories that mirror my areas of quiz bowl expertise,” De Guzman said. “I think my knowledge base from quiz bowl helps in not just answering questions, but also guessing the answers to questions I don’t know since it’s all multiple choice.”

De Guzman’s total score, which adds all the levels of all the categories he has played, is 381. He is currently ranked level 60 in Poetry, his favorite category.

“I like being able to play against random people throughout the world at any time, and I always look forward to competing against the highest ranked players in my top categories,” De Guzman said.

Like De Guzman, senior Claire Jones enjoys non-academic categories, supplementing European History and Book Quotes with categories like Game of Thrones and Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

“Quiz bowl help QuizUp; QuizUp helps quiz bowl,” Jones said. “I’ve always liked trivia, and this is another way to do it.”

In addition to offering over 100,000 questions and over 250 topics, QuizUp allows users to play games against people they know.

“I like playing against someone who I’m with physically because then we’re getting the questions at the same time and there’s commentary and trash talking,” Bland said.

Sophomore Alex Hammerman also enjoys the opportunities QuizUp provides to play with his friends. Hammerman has reached levels 28 in General Knowledge, 19 in Baseball, 11 in Walking Dead and 8 in World Capitals.

“Sometimes there’s lag when playing with friends over Wi-Fi, but other than that, I would have to say that QuizUp is one of the most well put together and consistent apps I’ve ever used,” Hammerman said.

De Guzman prefers competing against strangers, especially those highly ranked in his favorite categories.

“I once beat the number one ranked poetry player in a match,” De Guzman said. “It was quite intense.”