Brainiac

Brainiac - Adventures in the Curious, Competitive , Compulsive World of Trivia Buffs (ISBN 1-4000-6445-7) is a book written by Ken Jennings. The book was published in 2006 by Villard Books, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group.

The book tells two stories that see their narration from Ken switch off. First, it tells the story of Ken's 2004 run on the game show, Jeopardy!. The second story is a history of trivia and quiz competitions, including some discussion of College Bowl, ACF, and NAQT.

Chapter 3 ("What is Erudition?") focuses mostly on quizbowl within the context of the greater history of trivia contests and competitions.

Among those interviewed or mentioned in the book:

• Eric Hillemann and the Carleton College team.
• David Frazee of Michigan - an early College Bowl critic
• R. Robert Hentzel - president of NAQT
• Subash Maddipoti - Chicago player who owned the 2003 ICT
• Craig Barker - former Michigan player
• Kevin Olmstead - former record holder for most money won on quiz shows
• Andrew Yaphe - Chicago player who had a stellar collegiate career
• Tom Waters - former longtime Emory player who was dominant from the late 1970s through the 1980s
• Sam Lederer - then captain of Thomas Jefferson, champions of the 2005 HSNCT.

Among the non-quizbowl topics covered are: pre-twentieth century trivia writings, the rise of radio quizshows, and the transition to television, the 1950s quiz show scandal, the rise of college trivia competitions, the emergence of Trivial Pursuit, and pub trivia.