Are quizzes and puzzles dying in the era of the internet - where any answer is seemingly a click away - or can they be Google-proofed?

This week, we ask our in-house crossword expert to tell us what types of questions create answers that are hard to search for, how a puzzle question should be structured, and what features make for a good puzzle. We also discuss what makes something un-Googleable and consider the implications for human knowledge sharing. If listening to this podcast doesn’t make want to go to your next local pub quiz night, nothing will.

A few things we mentioned in this podcast:

- Quizmaster devises Google-proof questions to stop pub quiz smartphone cheats https://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/quizmaster-devises-google-proof-questions-to-stop-878011

- Google-ability and Google ability http://ken-jennings.com/blog/archives/46

- ‘How Google Works’, according to Google developers (note: this doesn’t tell you how Google works) https://developers.google.com/search/docs/advanced/guidelines/how-search-works

- The ‘Tip of my Tongue’ subreddit https://www.reddit.com/r/tipofmytongue/

- Cognitive Engineering podcast: Why do we like puzzles? https://alephinsights.com/podcast/2021/01/why-do-we-like-puzzles

For more information on Aleph Insights visit our website https://alephinsights.com or to get in touch about our podcast email [email protected]

Image via BristolLive