Thanks for your ideas, Booklover!
Issue #1: Speed vs Correctness
I think I agree with Tony on this one. The method you suggested makes a lot of sense, and would be ideal -- except that there are always a few bad apples who want to cheat. Yes, even in the Blyton world there are those who think it would be a great idea to spend a couple of hours looking up answers in an effort to get 30 questions right -- and your method would allow them to bask in the number one spot. It hasn't happened here yet, but I bet it will soon. And it'll likely be people who aren't members of the forums.
Perhaps this doesn't matter to most. It might be that most of you are interested only in how many you genuinely get right, regardless of time taken and points scored. But there are most likely others who like the competitive side to it and want to compete in a fair manner. That's the dilemma Tony and I faced when setting this up, hence the current system where correct answers matter most but time does affect your score if you're not careful.
Issue #2: Calculating the Deduction
You're absolutely right here. The system sort of evolved as I created it so I didn't fully consider my point system until after it went live. When the February quiz starts I will adopt this idea, only it might be better still if we extend the idea so that one correct answer is worth 60 seconds/points.
Eg:
23 correct answers = 1380
(23 x 60)
in 3 mins 53 secs = 233
(3 x 60 + 53)
Total score 1147
(1380 - 233)
I believe that's the fairest and most accurate way?
Issue #3: Standard Time
This is another possibility I thought about, but I think Tony and I would like to stick with the current idea for the moment (although with a different point system as above).
Issue #4: Help Compile the Quiz
That's Tony's area. I should think it would helpful to have a bunch of questions sent in. They could be individually pigeon-holed (sorted by series) so that if Tony needs a question for the Secret series he can just reach in and pluck one out.
Finally, about the quiz times: I'm mystified as to how anyone can get through the questions in anything less than 1:45. I mean, most people probably read faster than I do, but even so you need time to digest the question, to understand what's being asked, and then more time to seek the answer. Maybe not
much more time, perhaps no more than a fraction of a second... but 30 questions in, for example, 1:33 (the current number one) means 3.1 seconds per question. Granted, I would immediately skip some questions if I recognize something like "Malory Towers" (because I still haven't read those!) but other questions would surely cause a long delay as you rack your brains trying to remember if the gardener was Johns and James or whatever.
Just curious. Most of the times speak for themselves, typically 2-4 minutes. But it's interesting because I wonder if some people, for instance Mimi (sorry to pick on you!!), skim through quickly in the hope of a faster score but at the expense of one or two correct answers. With the point system as it is, an extra correct answer is worth more than 15 seconds shaved off the reading time... for instance, if Ming had spent an extra 15 seconds pondering an answer, she might possibly have scored 22 correct and remained at number one!
Hmmm...
