A few Sundays ago, as yours truly flipped through TV channels, a quiz show for school students made us stop and give it a dekko. It was a glitzy affair — slick, digitized AV, graphics and displays, a snazzy-looking set, a nattily-dressed quizmaster (a senior TV journalist), engaging formats and envious prizes for the taking. The concept was attractive and fast-paced. The participants, mostly teens, were dressed in denims and school tees, and seemed quite clued in to current affairs. Anything outside the realm of the Internet was left unanswered.

Then came the bouncer. In one round, teams were allowed to browse the Internet to arrive at the answer. Some lapped up the open-book-test-like idea, while others messed it up (how is that even possible?). "Sorry, time's up," quipped the quizmaster. We watched in dismay as a participant was unable to do a smart 'Google search' in the stipulated time. Had we just witnessed the new-age avatar of the quiz show? We slipped back to a different time — the early days of the TV quiz show.