While many fans are happy this weekend after reports surfaced regarding the future of Jeopardy! on streaming, those fans may have set their expectations too high as to what might be coming.
Andy Saunders, the publisher of this website and a Founding Archivist of J! Archive in 2004, is also happy—but he cautions fans to approach the news realistically.
Many fans reacted very happily to the news—where Ken Jennings reportedly said at a recent taping that episodes from “all 41 seasons” would be streaming—with one fan on Reddit expecting that “the J! Archive is gonna be complete now!”
Those fans would be very wise to temper their expectations.
My friends over at Geeks Who Drink have introduced a daily trivia game—Thrice! Existing to make daily clever trivia content accessible to a wide audience, it's a daily challenge that tries to get you to the answer via three separate clues. It has a shareable score functionality to challenge your friends and new questions every day will give you a new daily social ritual. You can find it at thricegame.com.
Are you going on the show and looking for information about how to bet in Final Jeopardy? Check out my Betting Strategy 101 page. If you want to learn how to bet in two-day finals, check out Betting Strategy 102. In case the show uses a tournament with wild cards in the future, there is also a strategy page for betting in tournament quarterfinals.
Are you looking for information on how to stream Jeopardy! in 2024? Find out information here on how to stream from most places in North America!
Do you appreciate the work I do here on The Jeopardy! Fan? Would you like to make a one-time contribution to the site? You may do so here!
You can find game-by-game stats here at The Jeopardy! Fan of all 17 players, now including Adriana Harmeyer, that have won 10 or more games on Jeopardy!
You can now listen to Alex Trebek-hosted Jeopardy! episodes from TuneIn Radio without leaving The Jeopardy! Fan — listen now!
Firstly, it has been on the record for many years now that Sony is not in possession of every single episode of the program; that in itself would very likely preclude the completion of the Archive. Secondly, I think these fans are underestimating the amount of contemporary popular music contained in the show’s famed Audio Daily Doubles of early seasons. The chances that the show will be able to clear all of these pieces of music for streaming will likely be impossible.
One thing that the show did in the past for their episodes on Pluto TV is to either skip episodes (in the case of Ken Jennings’s 2004 games) or rewrite clues that contained unclearable material (which happened with some of James Holzhauer’s 2019 run)—which would certainly complicate Archiving matters, as current J! Archive policy is to Archive from the original broadcast version wherever possible (as the project ostensibly is a record of what was broadcast.)
In conclusion: You’re welcome to be happy with this news—but expecting a 100% complete J! Archive might prove to be an unrealistic expectation.
We have many new offerings at The Jeopardy! Fan Online Store! Here are our current featured items, including our new Masters Season 3 Player List T-shirt:
Become a Supporter now! Make a monthly contribution to the site on Patreon!
Contestant photo credit: jeopardy.com
When commenting, please note that all comments on The Jeopardy! Fan must be in compliance with the Site Comment Policy.
If you are going to quote any information from this page or this website, attribution is required.
Have you had a chance to listen to our podcast game show, Complete The List, yet? Check it out! It's also available on Apple Podcasts.
Honestly the only game that I truly have a strong desire to know about is the Halloween game of 1984. Michael Daunt’s 1st game would also be pretty cool.
Jonathan Groff’s fifth game would also be nice to have!
I am not familiar with rights and clearances – what does this mean?
“rewrite clues that contained unclearable material”
The most prominent example was the May 1, 2019 game, with a category about the Billboard Music Awards. In first-run, the category played with videos. However, when the game aired on Pluto TV, there were no videos—presumably, because the rights to show those videos on Pluto were not obtainable. In some cases, clues were rewritten to remove references to videos.
Thank you very much
Sony should be able to stream every episode since Jeopardy premiered in syndication since it absorbed every company that absorbed Griffin Productions. I can see why episodes of the Art Fleming era were unavailable for archiving since it was common practice to write over videotape then. Besides, any recordings from that era that still exist, wouldn’t they belong to NBC?
As the article says, “it has been on the record for many years now that Sony is not in possession of every single episode of the program.” There are episodes of the syndicated version that Sony, for whatever reason, has been unable to digitize and would therefore not be able to stream. To say, again, nothing about the rights licensing nightmare that Audio Daily Doubles are.
I’d love to see all 5 games of Chuck Forrest’s run in season 2.
I’m thinking, though it might look awkward on screen, streamed episodes could eliminate music audio and place a disclaimer on the screen, “Audio removed.”