By Shelby Brooks
Pakenham’s own king of trivia is sharing his passion for useless facts with anyone who needs a happiness boost during lockdown 6.0.
This month, Jake Ward began a YouTube channel called ‘Daily Dose of Trivia’ giving exactly what the name suggests, a short yet energetic video featuring a few trivia questions each day.
“If I can bring a smile and a bit of laughter then mission accomplished,” Jake said.
“People can tune in while drinking their morning cup of coffee or I’ve heard some people are using the videos to start off their team meetings to create a good vibe to start the day.
“Some people in France have also commented on the videos and are watching.”
Jake’s passion for trivia began at a young age, consuming as many trivia and game shows as he could over the years.
“Growing up, all my life I have loved game shows and my dream was to be a game show host,” Jake said.
He got to have the ultimate trivia experience when he featured on popular Australian game show Who Wants to Be a Millionaire at the beginning of 2020.
While he didn’t become a millionaire, he does believe he won the hearts of Australia.
“I absolutely love game shows – I think they are so much fun,” he said.
“When my wife and I saw an ad on TV to audition for the show it was a no brainer to have a crack.”
Mr Ward sent a photo and small profile about himself to Channel Nine, before he was selected to attend a group audition for the show alongside about 60 other applicants.
When he reached the final phase of the auction process, he was asked to share a story in under one minute with the producers.
“I always need more than one minute,” he laughed.
Mr Ward described his time as a game show contestant as awesome and so much fun – a highlight being the friendship he formed with iconic TV presenter and Collingwood Football Club president Eddie McGuire.
“Eddie was mucking around and having fun with me,” he recalled.
“Having him talk to my wife Jess was great, and also spending the day with her was nice.
“I got to wrestle Eddie a bit and he laid down on the ground for me so I could elbow drop him – the producers were in awe as he has never laid down on the ground for any contestant.”
He said being in the ‘hot seat’ and having a laugh were also huge highlights.
“I would highly recommend everyone to try and get on.”
Over the years, Jake has hosted many forms of trivia and has developed the perfect hosting voice and personality.
He even hosted trivia for his friends and work colleagues at the start of the pandemic.
“In the first big lockdown in 2020 I was doing live trivia on Facebook,” Jake said.
“There was no footy then so I just said to my friends why not tune into me on a Friday night and let me entertain you.”
And how does he come up with so many interesting questions?
“I’m a lover of life,” Jake said.
“I base some questions on obscure basic general knowledge of mine.
“When I’m bored, and it’s great because my wife loves trivia too, we watch other trivia videos to get inspiration of an idea of the question.
“So some of it is research and some is just from playing trivia for years.
“I have so much useless information that you’ll never need in life.”
