Take Your Pick Answers
MEDIA & PUBLISHING
1. Led to the formation of Amar Chitra Katha by Anant Pai
2. The Times Group / Bennett, Coleman & Co
3. Malayala Manorama
4. Reader's Digest
BANKING
1. Axis Bank
2. Standard Chartered
3. Grameen Bank
4. WaMu (Washington Mutual)
CONSTRUCTION & REAL ESTATE
1. Tuvalu
2. DLF
3. TDR (Transfer of Development Rights)
4. L & T
RETAIL
1. Trent / Westside
2. Staples
3. Pantaloons
4. Marks & Spencer
THE NOBELS
1. Ribosome
2. Isolation of Deuterium / Heavy Water
3. Murray Gell-Mann
4. Frederick Sanger
INVENTORS & INVENTIONS
1. SCUBA / Aqualung
2. TEL (Tetra-Ethyl Lead)
3. Browning
4. Radiocarbon Dating
SOFTWARE & IT
1. Lotus
2. Matroshka
3. Gnutella
4. Windows 7
TERMINOLOGY
1. Survival of the Fittest
2. Cloud Computing
3. Inferiority Complex
4. Red Eye Effect
Zed
Monday, February 8, 2010
Quark Open Quiz 2010 - Long Visual Connect Answers
Long Visual Connect Answers
1. NESTLE
1. NESTLE
The guy is Gene Wilder as Willy Wonka, a brand owned by Nestle. The woman below is Liliane Bettencourt, CEO of L'Oreal. Bettencourt and Nestle each control a a quarter of the shares and voting rights at L'Oreal. The pic to the right of Willy Wonka shows the Chinese milk scandal of 2008 when the Hong Kong government claimed to have found melamine in a Chinese-made Nestlé milk product. The logo to the right of Bettencourt shows Novartis. Nestle has agreed to sell Alcon, the world's largest eye-care company to Novartis in 2010. The other logos are Perrier and San Pellegrino, mineral water brands of Nestle.
2. HERSHEY'S
The guy shown with the quote is Milton Hershey. Row 2 shows the writer O'Henry (extreme left), the name of a choclate brand marketed by Hershey's in USA. The pic to the right of O'Henry shows the Hershey Bears, a premier team in the American Hockey League. The pic to the right of Hershey Bears shows Walter Murrie who was President of Hershey for 20 years and then founded M & M. The pic in row 3 shows three Hershey mascots at the entrance of the Hershey's theme park.
3. CADBURY
John Cadbury. The pic to the right of Cadbury shows Bournville which has been associated with Cadbury from the outset. The engine has Cadbury Bournville on it and formed part of Cadbury's epic factory at Bournville. The pic to the right of Bournville shows Salmonella, the bacterium that Cadbury products were purported to contain during the Salmonella Cadbury scare. Below Salmonella is the Great Root Bear, the mascot of A & W Root Beer which is currently owned by Dr Pepper Snapple Group (formerly Schwepped which was with Cadbury). The pic below John Cadbury shows the logo of the Cadbury World, their entertainment park.
4. KRAFT FOODS
Kraft Foods began as a processed cheese manufacturer. They used to own Duracell and Tupperware. Altria (Philip Morris) owned Kraft at one point. Kraft Foods replaced AIG in the Dow Jones Index after the latter's collapse. Kraft purchased Groupe Danone's biscuit and cereal division for US $7.2b in 2007. Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway has an acquired an 8% stake in Kraft worth US $4b in 2008. The woman below Buffett is Irene Rosenfeld, the current CEO of Kraft.
5. RBS
The logo above Banco Santander is Fortis. Fortis, Banco Santander and RBS bought ABN AMRO in 2007, the largest banking takeover in history. The logo to the right of Fortis is Natwest (National Westminster Bank) owned by RBS. The man below the logos is Sir Fred Goodwin (longtime CEO) associated with the excesses that led to the downfall of RBS and its subsequent nationalization. RBS printed a 5 pound note as a tribute to Jack Nicklaus. RBS owns an insurance arm called Churchill Insurance. To distinguish it from Winston Churchill, they have the logo (to the left of Churchill) with a large bulldog.
6. Defence strategies to hostile takeovers
When faced with a hostile takeover, a company's response can be called any of these.
Crown Jewels Defence - Selling one's prized assets so as to make the buyer less interested
Nancy Reagan Defence - She was famous for her 'Just Say No' stance in the anti-drug programs of the 80s. So when a company just isn't open to being acquired, it is termed as such.
Pacman Defence - When a company offers to buy the prospective buyer (from Pacman when a certain mode or object allows you to devour the ghosts that are intent on devouring you)
Jonestown Defence - Named for the Jonestown suicide triggered by Jim Jones, leader of the People's Temple religious cult. When a company divests all its assets in a bid to avoid the buyout, it is termed as such.
Scorched Earth Defence - Similar to the generic war practice (eg - Russians adopted it when Nazi Germany invaded during WWII, Iraqis adopted it during the Gulf war - the burning of the Kuwaiti oilfields is shown) and similar to the crown jewels defence. A company makes itself seem less attractive to the prospective buyer.
The final connect is, as must be obvious by now, the Kraft buyout of Cadbury. The principal players are Kraft and Cadbury. The US $7.2b loan is funded by RBS. The possible defence options for Cadbury might have been those in the answer to question 6. Nestle and Hershey stand to be affected.
Zed
Quark Open Quiz 2010 - Visual Connect Answers
Visual Connect (Sci-Tech) Answers
3. BUTTERFLY EFFECT
It is essentially a fancy name for 'Sensitive dependence on initial conditions' in chaos theory, namely that small differences in the initial condition of a dynamical system may produce large variations in the long term behavior of the system. The graph of this is shown. The man in the pic to the right of the graph is Henri Poincaré, the French polymath who laid the foundations for Chaos Theory. The man to the left of Poincare is Edward Lorenz, the meteorologist who discovered that linear statistical models for weather patterns may not be accurate. Small variations led to drastic differences in the endpoint. He was unable to come up with a title for his talk at the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 1972. Someone chipped in with "Does the flap of a butterfly’s wings in Brazil set off a tornado in Texas?" as a title. This is shown in row 2 of the collage. The pics in row 3 show plots of the Lorenz attractor.
4. WAR OF CURRENTS / AC vs DC / EDISON vs TESLA
Thomas Edison (the only person in the collage) favoured direct current while Tesla was a proponent of alternating current. Edison opposed capital punishment, but his desire to disparage the system of alternating current led to the invention of the electric chair. Harold Brown, who was at this time being secretly paid by Edison, constructed the first electric chair for the state of New York in order to promote the idea that alternating current was deadlier than DC. Experts announced proposals to harness Niagara Falls (pic to the right of Edison) for generating electricity, even briefly considering compressed air as a power transmission medium. Against GE and Edison's proposal, George Westinghouse, using Tesla's AC system, won the international Niagara Falls Commission contract. Westinghouse started Westinghouse Electric Corporation and was a lifelong champion of Tesla's AC. His company later became Columbia Broadcasting Systems (CBS) - whose eye logo is shown. The final stage where the battle was settled was the World's Fair of 1893 whose iconic image is that of the Ferris Wheel (shown below the electric chair). Tesla won the contract and demonstrated the efficiency of AC. The stamp commemorates the first use of transmission lines (using AC) at Frankfurt railway station.
An ironic corollary to this rivalry is that Westinghouse was awarded the Edison medal by the IEEE.
5. HYBRID CAR
The man (with a moustache) is Ferdinand Porsche (of Volkswagen fame). He was also the first to invent an electric car in 1900. While Rewa is claimed to have the first assembly line dedicated for the manufacture of an electric car, the Woods Motor Vehicle Company was a manufacturer of electric automobiles between 1899 and 1916. In 1915 they produced the Dual Power with both electric and internal combustion engines and this continued until 1918. The man in the TIME cover is the writer Hermann Wouk whose brother Victor Wouk whose PhD thesis titled "Static electricity generated during the distribution of gasolene" led to his successful conversion of a Buick Skylark vehicle with a 20-kilowatt direct-current electric motor and an RX-2 Mazda rotary engine. The electric equipment for this car was provided by Eureka Vacuum Cleaner Company. Henney Kilowatt was an electric car made in 1959. The person below Porsche is Dr Andrew Frank, who is considered the father of modern plug-in hybrids.
6. DDT
The man is Paul Hermann Muller won the 1948 Nobel for Physiology or Medicine for his discovery of DDT as an effective poison against several arthropods. The woman is Rachel Carson, whose Silent Spring triggered the anti-DDT revolution and led to the eventual banning of DDT at the Stockholm convention of the UNEP (United Nations Environment Programme) whose logo is shown. DDT is particularly toxic to birds as it causes eggshell thinning and has been directly linked to the endangered status of birds such as the Bald Eagle and the Osprey.
Zed
1. FINGERPRINTING
William Herschel (pic to the left of Uranus) discovered Uranus. His grandson (another William Herschel) initiated fingerprinting for practical purposes while working for the Indian Civil Service. The man in the pic to the right of Uranus is Alphonse Bertillon, the creator of anthropometry - an identification system based on physical measurements. Bertillon's method would later be supplanted by fingerprinting. The pic to the right of Bertillon features the frontispiece of Bertillon's Identification anthropométrique (1893) illustrating the idea. The man below William Herschel is Francis Galton (eugenics). After having studied the fingerprints during ten years, Galton published a detailed statistical model of fingerprint analysis and identification and encouraged its use in forensic science in his book Finger Prints. He had calculated that the chance of a "false positive" (two different individuals having the same fingerprints) was about 1 in 64 billion. The pic to the right of Galton shows the structure of the skin with the Eccrine glands, which are responsible for fingerprints.
2. JOHN MCCARTHY
xkcd strip about Lisp (the words blacked out) which was invented by John McCarthy. He coined the term Artificial Intelligence. The TIME mag cover shows Marc Andreesen of Netscape fame. In 1999 he formed a company called LoudCloud, whose logo is seen to the left of the cover. This was the first company for commercial exploitation of the Cloud Computing concept (now formally called Saas - Software as a Service, seen in the rough sketch). This concept was first anticipated by John McCarthy. The buildings with the unique architecture are part of MIT's famous CSAIL whose present structure and function owe their existence to John McCarthy and Marvin Minsky (on the pic to the left of CSAIL).
xkcd strip about Lisp (the words blacked out) which was invented by John McCarthy. He coined the term Artificial Intelligence. The TIME mag cover shows Marc Andreesen of Netscape fame. In 1999 he formed a company called LoudCloud, whose logo is seen to the left of the cover. This was the first company for commercial exploitation of the Cloud Computing concept (now formally called Saas - Software as a Service, seen in the rough sketch). This concept was first anticipated by John McCarthy. The buildings with the unique architecture are part of MIT's famous CSAIL whose present structure and function owe their existence to John McCarthy and Marvin Minsky (on the pic to the left of CSAIL).
3. BUTTERFLY EFFECT
It is essentially a fancy name for 'Sensitive dependence on initial conditions' in chaos theory, namely that small differences in the initial condition of a dynamical system may produce large variations in the long term behavior of the system. The graph of this is shown. The man in the pic to the right of the graph is Henri Poincaré, the French polymath who laid the foundations for Chaos Theory. The man to the left of Poincare is Edward Lorenz, the meteorologist who discovered that linear statistical models for weather patterns may not be accurate. Small variations led to drastic differences in the endpoint. He was unable to come up with a title for his talk at the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 1972. Someone chipped in with "Does the flap of a butterfly’s wings in Brazil set off a tornado in Texas?" as a title. This is shown in row 2 of the collage. The pics in row 3 show plots of the Lorenz attractor.
4. WAR OF CURRENTS / AC vs DC / EDISON vs TESLA
Thomas Edison (the only person in the collage) favoured direct current while Tesla was a proponent of alternating current. Edison opposed capital punishment, but his desire to disparage the system of alternating current led to the invention of the electric chair. Harold Brown, who was at this time being secretly paid by Edison, constructed the first electric chair for the state of New York in order to promote the idea that alternating current was deadlier than DC. Experts announced proposals to harness Niagara Falls (pic to the right of Edison) for generating electricity, even briefly considering compressed air as a power transmission medium. Against GE and Edison's proposal, George Westinghouse, using Tesla's AC system, won the international Niagara Falls Commission contract. Westinghouse started Westinghouse Electric Corporation and was a lifelong champion of Tesla's AC. His company later became Columbia Broadcasting Systems (CBS) - whose eye logo is shown. The final stage where the battle was settled was the World's Fair of 1893 whose iconic image is that of the Ferris Wheel (shown below the electric chair). Tesla won the contract and demonstrated the efficiency of AC. The stamp commemorates the first use of transmission lines (using AC) at Frankfurt railway station.
An ironic corollary to this rivalry is that Westinghouse was awarded the Edison medal by the IEEE.
5. HYBRID CAR
The man (with a moustache) is Ferdinand Porsche (of Volkswagen fame). He was also the first to invent an electric car in 1900. While Rewa is claimed to have the first assembly line dedicated for the manufacture of an electric car, the Woods Motor Vehicle Company was a manufacturer of electric automobiles between 1899 and 1916. In 1915 they produced the Dual Power with both electric and internal combustion engines and this continued until 1918. The man in the TIME cover is the writer Hermann Wouk whose brother Victor Wouk whose PhD thesis titled "Static electricity generated during the distribution of gasolene" led to his successful conversion of a Buick Skylark vehicle with a 20-kilowatt direct-current electric motor and an RX-2 Mazda rotary engine. The electric equipment for this car was provided by Eureka Vacuum Cleaner Company. Henney Kilowatt was an electric car made in 1959. The person below Porsche is Dr Andrew Frank, who is considered the father of modern plug-in hybrids.
6. DDT
The man is Paul Hermann Muller won the 1948 Nobel for Physiology or Medicine for his discovery of DDT as an effective poison against several arthropods. The woman is Rachel Carson, whose Silent Spring triggered the anti-DDT revolution and led to the eventual banning of DDT at the Stockholm convention of the UNEP (United Nations Environment Programme) whose logo is shown. DDT is particularly toxic to birds as it causes eggshell thinning and has been directly linked to the endangered status of birds such as the Bald Eagle and the Osprey.
Zed
Quark Open Quiz 2010 - They Add Up Answers
They Add Up Answers
Set 1
1. Enron (Jeffrey Skilling)
2. Tupolev's Tu-144 (Soviet Union's answer to the Concorde)
3. Accor
4. Renault
ACCENTURE
Set 2
1. Sara Lee Corporation (Owns Kiwi & Goodknight)
2. Kingfisher Red (Air Deccan is now Kingfisher Red)
3. Karbonn Mobiles
4. Walt Disney Company (the pic shows "the nine old men of Disney" - the original group of nine animators used by Walt Disney for 30-40 films)
KAWASAKI
Set 3
1. Nokia (World Mobile Throwing Championships)
2. Timken
3. Varig (Brazil's national airline)
4. Lenovo (the Thinkpad owes its origin to the Shōkadō bentō, a traditional black-lacquered Japanese lunch box)
VALENTINO
Set 4
1. Dabur
2. Nestcape (called Mosaic originally)
3. Fortis (Shivinder Singh (Malvinder Singh's bro) owns Fortis which acquired Wockhardt)
4. Volkswagen
VODAFONE
Set 5
1. Tang
2. Starbucks (How Starbucks built a company one cup at a time)
3. Allianz (Allianz Arena)
4. Videocon (Venugopal Dhoot who is an accomplished flautist)
ALTAVISTA
Set 6
1. Pillsbury (Charles Pillsbury)
2. Cadillac (named after Antoine sur de la Mothe Cadillac, founder of Detroit)
3. Territorial Army
4. Arcelor (before the buyout)
CATERPILLAR
Zed
Set 1
1. Enron (Jeffrey Skilling)
2. Tupolev's Tu-144 (Soviet Union's answer to the Concorde)
3. Accor
4. Renault
ACCENTURE
Set 2
1. Sara Lee Corporation (Owns Kiwi & Goodknight)
2. Kingfisher Red (Air Deccan is now Kingfisher Red)
3. Karbonn Mobiles
4. Walt Disney Company (the pic shows "the nine old men of Disney" - the original group of nine animators used by Walt Disney for 30-40 films)
KAWASAKI
Set 3
1. Nokia (World Mobile Throwing Championships)
2. Timken
3. Varig (Brazil's national airline)
4. Lenovo (the Thinkpad owes its origin to the Shōkadō bentō, a traditional black-lacquered Japanese lunch box)
VALENTINO
Set 4
1. Dabur
2. Nestcape (called Mosaic originally)
3. Fortis (Shivinder Singh (Malvinder Singh's bro) owns Fortis which acquired Wockhardt)
4. Volkswagen
VODAFONE
Set 5
1. Tang
2. Starbucks (How Starbucks built a company one cup at a time)
3. Allianz (Allianz Arena)
4. Videocon (Venugopal Dhoot who is an accomplished flautist)
ALTAVISTA
Set 6
1. Pillsbury (Charles Pillsbury)
2. Cadillac (named after Antoine sur de la Mothe Cadillac, founder of Detroit)
3. Territorial Army
4. Arcelor (before the buyout)
CATERPILLAR
Zed
Quark Open Quiz 2010 - Infinite Bounce Answers
Infinite Bounce Answers
Biz
1. Gardener
2. Basmati Rice
3. Tally Solutions
4. Monster Jobs
5. Brooke Bond
6. Saint Gobain
7. John Maynard Keynes
Sci-Tech
1. Joseph Fourier
2. Tamiflu
3. X - Lady Ada Lovelace
Y - Charles Babbage
4. Chandrayaan-I
Took off from Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota and landed at Shackleton (Ernest Shackleton of Endurance fame) crater on the Moon.
5. Uncanny Valley is a hypothesis regarding the field of robotics. The theory holds that when robots and other facsimiles of humans look and act almost like actual humans, it causes a response of revulsion among human observers. The "valley" in question is a dip in a proposed graph of the positivity of human reaction as a function of a robot's lifelikeness.
6. Intelligent Design
Zed
Quark Open Quiz 2010 - Prelims Answers
Prelims (Non-Visuals)
1. Dokomo / Docomo
2.
A- Jack Welch
B - Jeffrey Immelt
C - Boeing
D - Robert Nardelli
E - Chrysler
3. Weta Digital (Peter Jackson)
4. Pranav Mistry, SixthSense
5. Google Earth
6. Quantum Entanglement / Entanglement
7. Vespa
8. Spinal Tap
9. AstroTurf
10. Perpetual Motion
11. Ecole Polytechnique
12.
X - Wolfgang Pauli
Y - Carl Jung
13. Alfred Wegener
14.
a. Credit Rating and Information Services of India Ltd.
b. Earnings Before Interest, Tax, Depreciation and Amortization
b. Earnings Before Interest, Tax, Depreciation and Amortization
15. Transformers (the toyline, the 1984 buyout was by Hasbro)
16. Jack Kilby
17. Johnnie Walker (they're moving out of Kilmarnock after 189 years)
18. Sir Isaac Newton
19. Fabindia
20. Teeth (Odontoceti, Baleen whales have baleen plates for chewing and intake)
21. Detecting landmines
22.
A - George Lemaitre
B - Big Bang
C - Fred Hoyle
23. Vanity Fair
Prelims (Visuals)
1. Dr Vijay Bhatkar (the man behind CDAC and PARAM)
2. Twitter (Jack Dorsey)
3. Aerostatic Flutter
4. Scrabble
5. Medea & Gaea
Medea was the wife of Jason (and the Argonauts). Out of spite for Jason when he left her for another woman, she killed her own kids (fillicide). She is considered the archetype of the bad mother.
Gaea is the Greek Goddess of the Earth and is considered the archetype of the good mother (mother earth).
Medea Hypothesis - Postulates an inherently suicidal earth waiting to self-destruct
Gaea Hypothesis - Postulates the presence of an inherent homeostasis (regulating mechanism) so that when something changes drastically, the other components change to restore balance
6. Maxwell's Demon Paradox
Sadi Carnot's Reflections of the Motive Power of Fire led to the Second Law of Thermodynamics.
James Clerk Maxwell proposed a thought experiment featuring Maxwell's, supposedly an acutely perceptive creature whose interference would lead to a reduction in entropy over time (a violation of the 2nd law)
7. They are brands that have become generic terms.
Tarmac, Jacuzzi, Frisbee and Kleenex
Zed
Quark Open Quiz 2010 - Take Your Pick
Take Your Pick
Originally intended as a buzzer round modeled along the lines of University Challenge, we had to make it a Take Your Pick sort of round.
The biz picks were Media & Publishing, Retail, Construction & Real Estate, Banking
The sci-tech picks were The Nobels, Inventors & Inventions, Software & IT, Terminology
MEDIA & PUBLISHING
1. What significance does the question “Who was Rama’s mother?” have in Indian publishing?
1. What significance does the question “Who was Rama’s mother?” have in Indian publishing?
2. 360 Degrees is the event management wing of which Indian conglomerate?
3. K M Mammen Mapillai is known for the Madras Rubber Factory (MRF). His father, K C Mammen Mapillai was imprisoned in 1938 for his inflammatory editorials. Which daily was he the editor of?
4. Which magazine has its current slogan as “Life Well Shared”?
BANKING
1. Of which Indian bank is Shikha Sharma the CEO?
2. Which bank has signed a sponsorship deal with Liverpool FC to commence at the start of the 2010/2011 English Premier League season and last for four years?
3. There is no legal instrument between this bank and its borrowers. The system works entirely on trust. The Bank also incorporates a set of values embodied by the Sixteen Decisions. At every branch, borrowers recite these Decisions and vow to follow them. Which bank are we talking about?
4. As of now, which is the largest bank failure in US history?
CONSTRUCTION & REAL ESTATE
1. Which country made revenue from the sale of its internet domain name in 1998?
2. How do we know the company founded as Raisina Cold Storage and Ice Company in 1946?
3. In a dense downtown area, there may be a building of historical value surrounded by skyscrapers. This building is only three stories high, but each building in the area has the right to thirty-five stories of airspace. The municipal government may permit skyscraper developers to purchase the right to build a taller building. In this case, a skyscraper developer may purchase the unused 32 stories of air rights from the owners of the historic building, giving them the right to build a skyscraper to a maximum height of 67 stories. What concept is being illustrated?
4. This firm was conceived during a holiday in Matheran when Søren Kristian read a report quoting Mahatma Gandhi – “I am not leading a movement to rid India of its white colonial masters in order to substitute them with brown ones”. Which firm?
RETAIL
1. What resulted from Tata’s selling of their 50% stake in Lakmé to HLL for Rs 200 Crore?
2. In 1985, Thomas Stemberg was working on a proposal for a business and needed a ribbon for his printer, but was unable to obtain one because his local dealer was closed for the Independence Day holiday. Which business came about as a result of this?
3. Which retail outlet came out with the tagline ‘Even the Odds’ when it introduced odd numbered shirt sizes (39, 41, 43) for the first time in India?
4. To which retain chain is the famous motto “The customer is always and completely right!” attributed?
THE NOBELS
1. Venkataraman Ramakrishnan won the Nobel Prize in Chemsitry for 2009 for studies regarding the structure and function of which intracellular component?
2. Harold Urey is famous for the Miller-Urey experiment. In recognition of what was he awarded the Nobel for Chemistry in 1934?
3. The Nobel citation for Physics in 1969 read - "for his contributions and discoveries concerning the classification of elementary particles and their interactions". He was among the earliest proponents of Quantum Chromodynamics. Who?
4. Marie Curie. Linus Pauling. John Bardeen. Who completes this exclusive club of four in Nobel history?
INVENTORS & INVENTIONS
1. What invented is credited to Jacques-Yves Cousteau?
2. Thomas Midgley Jr. improved the process of synthesis of CFCs and led the effort to use CFC as refrigerant. His legacy involves one more invention that has resulted in serious consequences for the environment. One historian remarked that Midgley "had more impact on the atmosphere than any other single organism in Earth's history." Name the other invention.
3. He had made his first firearm at the age of thirteen out of a piece of scrap metal. Over the course of his career, he went onto have 128 gun patents. He is also the founder of the eponymous firearms company. Who are we talking about?
4. What concept / invention would one associate Willard Libby with?
SOFTWARE & IT
1. Mitch Kapor derived the name for his company from the Padmasana position in Yoga. What company did he found?
2. The .mk format series can hold an unlimited number of video, audio, picture or subtitle tracks inside a single file. This is akin to a container which can hold inside it other containers deriving its name from a Russian word. What does mk stand for?
3. The name of this file sharing concept is partly derived from the fact that its developers Justin Frankel and Tom Pepper supposedly ate a lot of a hazelnut spread brand by the Italian chocolate manufacturer Ferrero. Identify.
4. Which product recently out grossed Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows to become the highest grossing pre-order in Amazon’s history?
TERMINOLOGY
1. Although attributed to Charles Darwin, this phrase was actually coined by Herbert Spencer in his Principles of Biology. Darwin later picked it up for use in paralleling his own term ‘Natural Selection’. Which phrase?
2. As a concept, this dates back to 1960 when John McCarthy opined that “computation may someday be organized as a public activity”. The first attempt at deriving commercial value out of this concept was made by Marc Andreesen of Netscape fame. Name the term.
3. Which term in psychology was coined by Alfred Adler?
4. This is a phenomenon observed in animals which do not have a tapetum lucidum. It is caused by the circulation of blood in the choroid, which nourishes the eye, and also depends on the amount of melanin being present behind the retina. So the effect is more pronounced in albinos. Which phenomenon?
Zed
Quark Open Quiz 2010 - Long Visual Connect
This was actually 6 visual connects with a further connect among the answers of the connects.
So,
So,
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
Zed
Quark Open Quiz 2010 - They Add Up
They Add Up
This was similar to the round in last year's edition except for the fact that I couldn't find six perfect 8-lettered 4-syllabic (2 letters in a syllable) brands this year so only some of them have this attribute. So I didn't go with the syllable part and specified how many letters to take from the answer for each visual. Also, it wasn't an print ad based round and had general visuals.
All the answers were brand names / companies. On occasion when a picture pointed to two brands / companies:
Pic 4 in set 1 - there was a specific question like. This man is the CEO of Nissan. Name the other company he is the CEO of?
Pic 3 in set 2 - Who sponsors the Cape Cobras?
Pic 4 in set 3 - Which company currently owns the product which this Japanese culinary item inspired?
2 letters from 1,2,43 letters from 3
2 letters from 1,2,3,4
2 letters from 1,2,33 letters from 4
2 letters from each
2 letters from 1,3,43 letters from 2
4 letters from 1
4 letters from 12 letters from 2 & 4
3 letters from 3
Zed
Quark Open Quiz 2010 - Infinite Bounce
Infinite Bounce
Biz
1. Subroto Bagchi was a cofounder of MindTree Limited in 1999. His first book ‘The High Performance Professional’ was followed by ‘Go Kiss the World – Life Lessons for Professionals’. In 2008, his role in MindTree was re-designated. What is his designation?
2. In 1997, a Texas based company called RT won a patent for which it faced international outrage over allegations of biopiracy. It had also caused a brief diplomatic crisis between India and United States with India threatening to take the matter to WTO as a violation of TRIPS. Both voluntarily and due to review decisions by the United States Patent Office, RT has lost most of the claims of the patent. This was a huge victory for Indian farmers who could have faced enormous economic losses from the patent. What was the patent regarding?
3. The business in question was set up in 1986 by S S Goenka, who founded a small company called Peutronics Pvt. Ltd with the aim of using computers to simplify accounting. His son Bharat was responsible for the development of the software product which led Peutronics Pvt. Ltd., into changing its name and becoming the company it is today. Name the company.
2. In 1997, a Texas based company called RT won a patent for which it faced international outrage over allegations of biopiracy. It had also caused a brief diplomatic crisis between India and United States with India threatening to take the matter to WTO as a violation of TRIPS. Both voluntarily and due to review decisions by the United States Patent Office, RT has lost most of the claims of the patent. This was a huge victory for Indian farmers who could have faced enormous economic losses from the patent. What was the patent regarding?
3. The business in question was set up in 1986 by S S Goenka, who founded a small company called Peutronics Pvt. Ltd with the aim of using computers to simplify accounting. His son Bharat was responsible for the development of the software product which led Peutronics Pvt. Ltd., into changing its name and becoming the company it is today. Name the company.
4. Identify the advertiser.
5. The name of this Unilever brand was chosen by its founder in this manner: one part came from his surname and the other simply because it sounded pleasing to his ears. Founded in 1845 in Lancashire, the first shop opened in Piccadilly in 1869. Name the brand.
6. Jean-Baptiste Colbert, French minister of finance to King Louis XIV, had ambitious plans for French self-sufficiency in industry. One of his visions involved freeing France from the monopolistic practices of Venice with regard to a certain product. To this end, he gave direction to the establishment of a firm. How do we know it today?
7. Identify.
Sci-Tech
1. This man believed that keeping the body wrapped up in blankets was beneficial to the health. He is credited with the discovery of the Greenhouse Effect in 1824. Who?
2. How do we better know the drug Osteltamivir?
3. Section G of X’s notes contain an algorithm to compute a sequence of Bernoulli numbers intended for an invention of Y. It is considered to be the world’s first computer program. X was described by Y as “The Enchantress of Numbers”. Name X and Y.
1. This man believed that keeping the body wrapped up in blankets was beneficial to the health. He is credited with the discovery of the Greenhouse Effect in 1824. Who?
2. How do we better know the drug Osteltamivir?
3. Section G of X’s notes contain an algorithm to compute a sequence of Bernoulli numbers intended for an invention of Y. It is considered to be the world’s first computer program. X was described by Y as “The Enchantress of Numbers”. Name X and Y.
4. Connect
5.
6. Although used previously as a descriptive term, this term gained its current context and meaning after the 1987 US Supreme Court Edwards vs Aguillard case regarding creationism. It became popular after the publication of the book 'Of Pandas and People'. Name the term.
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Quark Open Quiz 2010 - Prelims (Non-Visuals)
Prelims (Non-Visuals)
These are the questions for the prelims (non-visuals).
1. What is the Japanese equivalent for “everywhere”?
2. In 2001, A quit his post as Chairman and CEO of the company. Among the 3 contenders for the top job, B won through and has been the CEO till date. One of the other contenders James McNerney left and became CEO of 3M and later C. D went on to head The Home Depot before moving to E where the position he once held is now held by Sergio Marchionne. Name A, B, C, D and E.
3. Name the visual effects company behind the flora and fauna of Avatar’s Pandora.
4. Technology Review is a magazine published by Technology Review Inc, a media company owned by the MIT. It comes out with a list ever year called TR35 recognizing 35 innovators under the age of 35. The list for 2009 has five persons of Indian origin – Shwetak Patel, Ranjan Dash, Vik Singh and Ashoke Ravi along with X. Name X and his innovation/invention.
5. Deja became Google Groups. Dodgeball became Google Latitude (allows a mobile phone user to allow certain people to track their location). Measure Map became Google Analytics. What did Keyhole graduate into?
6. During the development of Erwin Schrödinger's famous thought experiment, Schrödinger’s cat, he coined the term Verschränkung. This concept has been elaborated since and is now defined as property of a quantum mechanical state of a system of two or more objects in which the quantum states of the constituting objects are linked together so that one object can no longer be adequately described without full mention of its counterpart—even if the individual objects are spatially separated in a spacelike manner. What term defines this property? (The English equivalent of Verschränkung)
7. The first prototype was given the initials MP5 and baptized "Paperino", the Italian name for Donald Duck, a nickname given to it by the workers because of the strange shape it had. Enrico Piaggio did not like the design and asked Corradino D'Ascanio to redesign it which he did with a more aeronautical-derived aerodynamic look.
When the second prototype MP6 was shown to Enrico, he heard the buzzing sound of the engine and exclaimed: "Sembra una ___________!" ("It resembles a _________!") The name stuck and from there on it went on to become one of the most recognized brands in the world.
Identify this revolutionary brand/product.
8. How do we more popularly know a medical procedure called "lumbar puncture", a diagnostic and at times therapeutic treatment?
9. Monsanto Company is a U.S based multinational agricultural biotechnology corporation. It is the world's leading producer of genetically engineered seeds (it sells 90% of the world's G.E seeds). In 1967, three employees of the company, Donald L. Elbert, James M. Faria and Robert T. Wright, invented something and sold it under the name "Chemgrass".
How do we know "Chemgrass" today?
10. The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has made an official policy which is given below:
With the exception of cases involving _________ ______, a model is not ordinarily required by the Office to demonstrate the operability of a device. If operability of a device is questioned, the applicant must establish it to the satisfaction of the examiner, but he or she may choose his or her own way of so doing.
And, further, that: A rejection [of a patent application] on the ground of lack of utility includes the more specific grounds of inoperativeness, involving _________ ______. A rejection under 35 U.S.C. 101 for lack of utility should not be based on grounds that the invention is frivolous, fraudulent or against public policy.
So in other words, the USPTO will not patent such a device, no matter what.
Fill in the blanks.
11. Nicknamed X, this 200+ years old institution was originally started as a military academy and began admitting women in 1972. Alumni are referred to as “Xnnnn”, where nnnn stands for the year of admission into the school. Among its alumni are two Nobel prizes winners, three presidents and many CEOs (Paul Hermelin, Bernard Arnault).
Name the institution.
12. This phenomenon is a reference to the apparently mysterious anecdotal failure of technical equipment in the presence of certain people. It is named after X of whom it was said that he was such a good theorist that any experiments would self-destruct simply because he was in the vicinity. X himself was convinced that the effect named after him was real. He confided in his beliefs about Synchronicity (the experience of two or more events that are causally unrelated occurring together in a meaningful manner) to Y, a pioneering psychologist. Y for his part began interpreting the dreams that X began to have during his breakdown. Their correspondences are published today as Atom and Archetype. Name X and Y.
When the second prototype MP6 was shown to Enrico, he heard the buzzing sound of the engine and exclaimed: "Sembra una ___________!" ("It resembles a _________!") The name stuck and from there on it went on to become one of the most recognized brands in the world.
Identify this revolutionary brand/product.
8. How do we more popularly know a medical procedure called "lumbar puncture", a diagnostic and at times therapeutic treatment?
9. Monsanto Company is a U.S based multinational agricultural biotechnology corporation. It is the world's leading producer of genetically engineered seeds (it sells 90% of the world's G.E seeds). In 1967, three employees of the company, Donald L. Elbert, James M. Faria and Robert T. Wright, invented something and sold it under the name "Chemgrass".
How do we know "Chemgrass" today?
10. The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has made an official policy which is given below:
With the exception of cases involving _________ ______, a model is not ordinarily required by the Office to demonstrate the operability of a device. If operability of a device is questioned, the applicant must establish it to the satisfaction of the examiner, but he or she may choose his or her own way of so doing.
And, further, that: A rejection [of a patent application] on the ground of lack of utility includes the more specific grounds of inoperativeness, involving _________ ______. A rejection under 35 U.S.C. 101 for lack of utility should not be based on grounds that the invention is frivolous, fraudulent or against public policy.
So in other words, the USPTO will not patent such a device, no matter what.
Fill in the blanks.
11. Nicknamed X, this 200+ years old institution was originally started as a military academy and began admitting women in 1972. Alumni are referred to as “Xnnnn”, where nnnn stands for the year of admission into the school. Among its alumni are two Nobel prizes winners, three presidents and many CEOs (Paul Hermelin, Bernard Arnault).
Name the institution.
12. This phenomenon is a reference to the apparently mysterious anecdotal failure of technical equipment in the presence of certain people. It is named after X of whom it was said that he was such a good theorist that any experiments would self-destruct simply because he was in the vicinity. X himself was convinced that the effect named after him was real. He confided in his beliefs about Synchronicity (the experience of two or more events that are causally unrelated occurring together in a meaningful manner) to Y, a pioneering psychologist. Y for his part began interpreting the dreams that X began to have during his breakdown. Their correspondences are published today as Atom and Archetype. Name X and Y.
13. Straightforward. Who proposed the theory of continental drift?
14. Expand a. CRISIL b. EBITDA
15. A company called Takara Tomy created this product and branded it Diaclone. They produced it until a buyout in 1984. After the buyout, the product was marketed with an innovative tagline – “More than meets the eye”. What product?
16. Zhores Alferov and Herbert Kroemer were two of the three Nobel awardees for Physics in 2000. The person – a legend by then and receiving his due 42 years down the line - they shared the prize with mentioned this in the introduction to his speech. “The reality of what people have done with it has gone far beyond what anyone – including myself – imagined possible at the time. Charles Townes won the Nobel for his work with maser technology, and he summed up how I feel. Townes said “It’s like the beaver told the rabbit as they stared at the Hoover dam. ‘No, I didn’t build it myself. But it’s based on an idea of mine!’”. Name the person.
14. Expand a. CRISIL b. EBITDA
15. A company called Takara Tomy created this product and branded it Diaclone. They produced it until a buyout in 1984. After the buyout, the product was marketed with an innovative tagline – “More than meets the eye”. What product?
16. Zhores Alferov and Herbert Kroemer were two of the three Nobel awardees for Physics in 2000. The person – a legend by then and receiving his due 42 years down the line - they shared the prize with mentioned this in the introduction to his speech. “The reality of what people have done with it has gone far beyond what anyone – including myself – imagined possible at the time. Charles Townes won the Nobel for his work with maser technology, and he summed up how I feel. Townes said “It’s like the beaver told the rabbit as they stared at the Hoover dam. ‘No, I didn’t build it myself. But it’s based on an idea of mine!’”. Name the person.
17. This iconic logo was created in 1908 by illustrator Tom Browne as an accompaniment to the slogan “Born 1820 – Still going Strong”. The most notable cultural appearance of this logo was in Haruki Murakami’s novel Kafka on the Shore. In 2009 the advertising agency Bartle Bogle Hegarty created a short film called The Man Who Walked Around the World, outlining the history of the brand. Which brand is being talked about?
18. The United Kingdom was the first of the great industrial powers to switch from the silver standard to a gold specie standard. In 1717, the then master of the Royal Mint established a new mint ratio between silver and gold that had the effect of driving silver out of circulation and putting Britain on a gold standard. In 1816, the Royal Mint introduced the gold sovereign coin. In 1821, the United Kingdom was formally put on a gold specie standard. Soon to follow was Canada in 1853, Newfoundland in 1865, and the USA and Germany in 1873. A huge divide between silver-based and gold-based economies resulted. The worst affected were economies with silver standard (India) that traded mainly with economies with gold standard.
Question: Who headed the Royal Mint in 1717?
19. John Bissell left his position as a buyer for Macy's New York and worked as a consultant for the Ford foundation where he was given a two-year grant to instruct Indian villagers in making goods for export. He firmly believed in the emerging Indian textile industry and was determined to showcase Indian handloom textiles with a way to provide employment to traditional artisans. What did he start in 1960?
20. The order Cetacea includes Whales, Dolphins and Porpoises, noted for their high intelligence. It comprises of two suborders – Mysticeti (Baleen Whales) and Odontoceti (Dolphins, Porpoises and other Whales). What is the primary basis for this classification?
21. Aresa Biodetection, a Danish firm has developed a flower that is likely to solve a major problem that the world faces. What is this flower for?
22. A proposed his theory in 1927 in Annals of the Scientific Society of Brussels. Einstein’s comment upon reading it was – “Your math is correct, but your physics is abominable”. It received little recognition until Arthur Eddington’s enthusiastic endorsement in 1930. A did not intend for his theory to be called B and this name came about as a result of a disparaging remark by C whose stance on this topic was nearly opposite to that of A. Name A, B and C.
21. Aresa Biodetection, a Danish firm has developed a flower that is likely to solve a major problem that the world faces. What is this flower for?
22. A proposed his theory in 1927 in Annals of the Scientific Society of Brussels. Einstein’s comment upon reading it was – “Your math is correct, but your physics is abominable”. It received little recognition until Arthur Eddington’s enthusiastic endorsement in 1930. A did not intend for his theory to be called B and this name came about as a result of a disparaging remark by C whose stance on this topic was nearly opposite to that of A. Name A, B and C.
23. In 1996, this magazine carried an exposé on the tobacco industry entitled "The Man Who Knew Too Much". The article was later adapted into a movie ‘The Insider’ (1999). Also, after more than thirty years of mystery, an article in the May 2005 edition revealed the identity of Deep Throat (W. Mark Felt), one of the sources for The Washington Post articles on Watergate. Name the magazine.
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Quark Open Quiz 2010 - Prelims (Visuals)
Prelims (Visuals )
1. Identify
2. This is a preliminary sketch by the founder while envisioning his idea. What did it result in?
3. The picture below shows the collapse of the newly built Tacoma Narrows Suspension bridge in 1940. When subjected to 64 km/h winds, it twisted and vibrated violently in a manner never seen before. The instability in winds inspired the nickname Galloping Gertie. The bridge's collapse has had a lasting effect on science and engineering. The reason for its failure is generally attributed to a phenomenon where aerodynamic forces on an object couple with a structure's natural mode of vibration to produce rapid periodic motion. Name the phenomenon.
4. What product is being advertised in the print advertisements?
5. The pictures below show two female figures from Greek mythology. Connect.
1. Identify
2. This is a preliminary sketch by the founder while envisioning his idea. What did it result in?
3. The picture below shows the collapse of the newly built Tacoma Narrows Suspension bridge in 1940. When subjected to 64 km/h winds, it twisted and vibrated violently in a manner never seen before. The instability in winds inspired the nickname Galloping Gertie. The bridge's collapse has had a lasting effect on science and engineering. The reason for its failure is generally attributed to a phenomenon where aerodynamic forces on an object couple with a structure's natural mode of vibration to produce rapid periodic motion. Name the phenomenon.
4. What product is being advertised in the print advertisements?
5. The pictures below show two female figures from Greek mythology. Connect.
6. Connect
7. Identify the commonality
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Quark Open Quiz 2010
Conducted the Quark Open Quiz 2010 at BITS Pilani, Goa (Feb 6). Was strapped for time with only a week to prepare the questions. Plus this year's event was a Biz + Sci-Tech quiz which meant I had a lot of reading up to do (sci-tech is not my cup of tea). Finished it somehow and wouldn't have been able to do it without inputs from Nakul Gopalan and Laxman Pai, friends and colleagues at Wipro.
The quiz was won by Rajiv d'Silva, Harshvardhan Batkuly and Aniruddha Sen Gupta of SEQC (Sunday Evening Quiz Club), Goa.
Format (the usual) - Prelims (30 questions). 6 teams in the finals. 5 rounds - Infinite Bounce (Biz & Sci-Tech), They Add Up (Biz), Visual Connect (Sci-Tech), Long Visual Connect (Biz), Take your pick (Biz & Sci-Tech).
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