Successful Jeopardy contestant Brian Levinson and his circus clown friend Eric Broomfield were rescued from their burning Queens apartment by the FDNY early Saturday morning. 33-year-old Levinson, who won $73K in prize money from Jeopardy in 2008 and has appeared on the game show Cash Cab, retained burns to 12% of his body, including his face, head, and arms. Firefighters helped Levinson out of the building, while Broomfield had to be carried out. "I found him in the bathroom," Ladder 163 Captain Jim Hay tells the Daily News, "It was heavy smoke condition. He couldn't get past the fire." more ›

IBM has been playing a dangerous game—they've spent the last four years creating Watson, a super computer that was built for one terrifying purpose: to crush humanity at Jeopardy! Well, it wasn't actually made just for Jeopardy!, but IBM has decided to test out its giant toaster in that forum. Watson had his first test run today, defeating two of the game's most dominant champions, Ken Jennings (who holds the title for the most consecutive Jeopardy! wins) and Brad Rutter (who holds the title for the most money won on Jeopardy!), during a practice round at IBM's research headquarters in Yorktown Heights, NY. We'll see just how well the calculator does away from home turf when the three meet again for keeps on TV in February. Until then, watch some grainy footage of our robot overlord in action below: more ›

Sometimes, surviving in NYC means becoming obsessive about something, anything really, in order to keep one grounded, functional, and, ironically, sane. It could be an obsession with the garbage upon which this city was built, and which we are constantly surrounded by; it could be the never-ending moebius strip that is the bike lane wars; or it could be a Homeric hunt to find the best Christmas tree vendors. For Harlem resident Jonathan Corbblah, that obsession comes in the form of game shows: Corbblah has the addiction ambition to appear on the most game shows ever. more ›

How do you cast the precocious 9-year-old lead in a movie adaptation of Jonathan Safran Foer's 2005 9/11 novel Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close? If you are director Stephen Daldry and you are casting for a tyke to play against Tom Hanks and Sandra Bullock you look for someone who already fits the bill. And so today comes word that the character of Oskar Schell, whose dad dies in the attacks, will be played by Thomas Horn, a 12-year-old who already proved his precocious chops earlier this year when he won $31,800 on Jeopardy! in October. more ›

Everyone has their own way of making it through these hard financial times, some are just more fun than others. Justin Bernbach of Park Slope just used the Alex Trebek method, and is currently taking home $80,601 during his run on Jeopardy. It's just airing now so he's unable to divulge too many details, but he told the Daily News, "It was great. More fun than I expected it to be. The best thing was that I got to come back again and be the defending champion. I got to walk around the set, and the crew were all calling me 'champ.'" He also noted his most embarrassing moment: confusing Facebook with Twitter. With his winnings he plans on sprucing up his Brooklyn apartment, where he lives with his wife and two kids. He noted, "It's a tough economic time to everybody, so I'm very grateful. This money is going to help." Thanks to the J! Archive, you can see what questions Bernbach faced: Here's day 1, day 2, and day 3 of his spree. more ›

Councilman Eric Gioia's people are pumped because last night the politician finally arrived, getting his name up on the blue board in last night's episode of Jeopardy. And the name-check appeared during Double Jeopardy, no less! Seen here, the clue refers to one of the Queens pol's favorite pet projects. If you guessed, "What are push-ups?" you'd be dead wrong—it's "unpaid parking tickets." (Of course, the Daily Politics was quick to point out that the total amount owed by the top 10 scofflaws is more like $18 million.) And making the five seconds of fame even sweeter, Alex Trebek reportedly pronounced the Gioia's name correctly. We're green with envy—some tech geek needs to create a Jeopardy screen generator (like the famous Disney sign generator) so we can get "Gothamist says grammar scolds can choke on a bag of these" into Final Jeopardy! more ›