Question Wording

It's all in the writers, and how they think a question will get their most desired result (walk or answer correctly-nobody roots for the question to be missed) However, these styles, among other reasons, are part of why I'm so successful at trivia-I learn a style, and latch on to it, from interests, to using the context to aid me. The Aussies seem to like a minimalist concept, the UK writers like a bit of background, so it's more of a full sentence.

As someone from the States, I find there are two styles of how they wrote third tier questions, including Million Dollar ones. Basically came across this when I wrote down all the MDQs we had here. In Regis/non-syndie era, the questions resembled much like the UK ones, about Jeopardy! length, and a full sentence, with the notable exception of Tim Shields', which was never aired. However, once it got to be Meredith, Cedric, and Terry's syndicated show? The questions tended to be a bit longer, often with superfluous information, as to slightly detract the player from the focus of the question, though not always. Sometimes, there would be a rather large hint in question, as seen in Ralph Cambeis' or Keilani Goggins' questions; for the former, most would only recognize The Last Supper as a 'treasure' of the four choices, though this was more common for questions awarding a six-figure prize. It led me to so many answers over the years that I would not have gotten otherwise over the years.

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Though, @mcvolester, looking at Tony Westmoreland's MDQ, what words are all that complex in that question and/or require a strong vocabulary? That aside, should you get to that level, I'd HOPE you'd be able to understand the words at that point, because none of them seem like anything beyond a 4th grade (age 10) understanding of the English language.

If you've read John Aubrey's Brief Lives, or more likely, Patrick Garland's adaptation of it there's no reason you couldn't get that, regardless of vocabulary, as Aubrey's account reads, "The Snow so chilled him that he immediately fell so extremely ill, that he could not return to his Lodging... but went to the Earle of Arundel's house at Highgate, where they put him into... a damp bed that had not been layn-in... which gave him such a cold that in 2 or 3 days as I remember Mr Hobbes told me, he died of Suffocation."

I always figured that MDQs in the US tended to be worded more thoroughly due to the fact that Americans tend to be more litigious than other countries, so the legal department wants these questions to be absolutely above reproach.

"In the U.S., the Sony Walkman personal cassette player was originally marketed in 1979 under what name?"

You want there to be no question what you're talking about, so you clarify that the Walkman is a "personal cassette player", and you mention 1979 just to be extra clear which marketing campaign you're talking about.

"For ordering his favorite beverages on demand, LBJ had four buttons installed in the Oval Office labelled "Coffee", "Tea", "Coke", and what?"

Asking "What was LBJ's favorite beverage?", even with an "According to his autobiography" clause in it, would be far too subjective to pass the legal test, so they make it so specific that the fact cannot be disputed by anybody. That fourth button said "Fresca" on it.

Have noticed about those questions and how whilst watching Hot Seat on Challenge, then seeing the normal UK show before, realised they had a different question writing style.