Da rulz

Ever wondered what the Official Rules of a game show look like? Well, neither have I. But I had to write something today, so I peeked at the high-and-mighty rulebook published on Millionaire's web site.

While not as tangled and lengthy as, say, the football rulebook, the laws of Millionaire grind pretty fine. There are ten sections in all, with a zillion subsections down to the small-roman-numeral stage.

The first three sections don't even get to the game. Instead, they're all about contestant qualifications and other legal bits and pieces. Turns out you can't appear on any other game show for a year before or after, except cable shows. So you can show your baggage to Jerry Springer and answer Meredith's nagging questions in the same week, if you're so inclined.

The actual rules of the game run through sections four and five. And boy, do they get detailed. After plowing through all that stuff, I'm amazed anybody can figure out how to play this here game.

The last five sections are more legal stuff. You know what I mean. "No purchase necessary. Void where prohibited." (Those exact words begin section seven.) One interesting sentence hearkens back to the rigging scandals: "If it is determined in the sole discretion of the judges that the technical difficulty, mechanical failure or human error corrupted [emphasis mine] Game play, the question in play will be discarded and a new question will be played."

Corrupted? Gives me a little chill thinking about Dan Enright and Charles Van Doren and all the rest of 'em. Did Twenty One even have rules? I know they didn't obey some important rules, but I wonder if they bothered to put the legalese in writing.