suggestions for my music test?

[cosmusic]

I made an OkCupid test. I actually started it last year, have been adding questions bit by bit as I think of them, ever few weeks or months. I got to 40 questions this weekend so decided to make it public:
Music of the World testIt really should have at least 50 questions, but that might've taken me until next year at this rate :) Would you try

Comments

[jbsegal]

Hey look! I got an 80%. I know about as much as you do. :)

That said: Include a link to an answer key - maybe annotated with links - on the results page.

Oy. There were a few questions that were somewhat over-clever, but I don't remember which. I'll try to remember to go back and look later. (They were in the 1st 20... I remember that.)

[bikergeek]

i got 66%. I really don't know enough about non-Western music to be able to offer an opinion on the test, sorry.

Question #10 made me want to reach for a roll of masking tape and a sharpie. (Three channels on any mixing console at a live gig are inevitably labled "KIK / SN / HAT".)

[cos]

I always went for the more minimalist K / Sn / H :-)

[bikergeek]

yeah, but then does the "K" stand for "kick" or "keyboard"? Often I wasn't the only person behind the mixing desk, and other people would have to make sense of what I'd written.

[pyrogenic]

I'm pretty ignorant and got a 57%, FYI.

I'd suggest breaking it up into multiple variables -- like Modern / Traditional / Historical / Technique or somesuch, more interesting than one variable.

Witty names and descriptions for levels of musical knowledge at the end. Remember, random chance = 25%; so if I knew 30 questions, I'd still (on average) get 35 right and get a 70% instead of 60%. Unless you had lots of trick answers. Just something to think about. Cause I don't have anything better to do than make up suff I forgot from statistics.

[cos]

I forgot to reply to this way back then but happened across it again now. Random chance doesn't quite work the same way you think it does. For some questions, you lose points for answering incorrectly, so if you don't know the answer, the right answer is to skip it. Also, some questions are worth more than others, and often there are answers that are sort of right that get partial credit, and answers that are way wrong (only someone who had no clue about this particular question would pick that!) that lose more points.

I worked out what a "good" score would be based on the scoring rules I set up.

[pyrogenic]

I hadn't actually seen the mechanics and flexability available to test makers at that point eirther, I don't think.

I still think more variables would be fun, though.

[drglam]

I thought it was pretty hard, and got 63%. I agree with JB about a link to an answer key.

[firespeaker]

I also thought it was pretty hard (much of that stuff I know little to nothing about, but much of it I also know quite a bit about), and got a 57%. Some of those questions seemed like trick questions. An answer key would be nice.

Btw, Sámi and Lapp are usually used synonymously, the latter being the English name, and the former being the native name. Different Lapp groups have different spellings of Sámi, and the Finnish name for them is Saami (Finnish itself being Suomi).

[cos]

What I learned is that "Lapp" is deprecated. It's like "Eskimo", and used to be the word others called the Sami, but is considered derogatory, and everyone's been moving away from it. My older Finnish book labels their territory "Lappi" but newer ones all call them "Saami".

Several people have asked for an answer key, so someday when I have time I'll make one... :)

[firespeaker]

In English, Lapp is still used by most [..people who know who the group is], just like the word Eskimo. Yes, it does kind of have that feel to it, of a term that's somewhat outdated but just the most convenient word if you need to communicate with people.