From the Stevens Point Journal April 11, 2004:

Station's trivia back on Web

By Kate Garsombke
Central Wisconsin Sunday

Experiencing the world's largest trivia contest outside of Stevens Point will be easier this year for fanatics of the weekend-long event.

WWSP-FM's webcast, which allows listeners to hear the station over the Internet, came back on the air April 1 after a year-and-a-half absence, said station manager Courtney Sikorski. The University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point student radio station began broadcasting on the Web in 1999, but stopped in the fall of 2002 because of licensing problems, she said.

"We just pretty much had to wait for different organizations to reach agreements. It's back for good now," Sikorski said.

Trivia 35: Thanks for the Contest runs for 54 consecutive hours starting at 6 p.m. Friday through midnight April 18. This year's theme is an homage to entertainer Bob Hope.

Having the webcast is good news for Trivia participants like Angel Heinemann, who is just out of reach of the station's signal when she plays the game out of her Wausau home. "It comes in our car, but it doesn't come in on our radio in the house," she said. "The only thing with the stream is it's just a little bit behind the broadcast, but that's a small price to pay."

There is about a seven- to 10-second delay in the webcast from the station's live broadcast.

Heinemann, 40, has been playing on the Stevens Point-based team Freshly Squeezed for four years. In the absence of a webcast last year, she and a handful of friends watched the contest on UWSP's cable access TV channel and used chat rooms and instant messaging to communicate answers to teammates in Stevens Point. This year, the student TV station isn't broadcasting Trivia.

"It's become more fun as the years have gone by. Last year, we had Web cameras so we could see each other, so that adds to the camaraderie," she said.

Although having the webcast will probably help Trivia grow, it's no substitute for being in Stevens Point to play the game, said Jim Oliva, the contest's organizer. "It's the real deal. It's a basement full of stinky people and pizza boxes. Monday morning, it's hauling all this trash out of the basement. That's really where it's at," he said.

Some components of the game require participants to have a presence in Stevens Point - like for running questions, in which teams search the community for answers, and for the Trivia Stone, a scavenger hunt that takes teams around the area throughout the weekend.

If Trivia buffs aren't in town to participate in those portions of the game, those teams won't end up in the top 25 - and Oliva wants to keep it that way, he said.

"I'm more concerned about bringing people to Stevens Point. Ultimately, I'd like to see teams playing on the Internet and that'd be like farm clubs - one year they'd play on the Internet, next year they'd come to Point."

Coming to Stevens Point isn't an option for Nate Christensen, who lives in Castro Valley, Calif. He plays Trivia from his home every year as part of the team Raging Tyrannosaurus of Despair. Christensen, 44, started playing Trivia in 1982, when he lived in Stevens Point, and he picked up the game again in California when the webcast started in 1999.

"It's not as good as being there, but at least you can play," he said.