4 January 2013 Last updated at 00:37

Quiz of the week's news

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News quiz

It's the Magazine's 7 days, 7 questions quiz - an opportunity to prove to yourself and others that you are a news oracle. Failing that, you can always claim to have had better things to do during the past week than swot up on current affairs.

1.) Multiple Choice Question

Royal Mail's commemorative stamps for 2013 will feature icons of literature, sport and industry. Which anniversary will be marked in January?

1. 50 years of Doctor Who
   
2. 200 years of Jane Austen's Pride And Prejudice
   
3. 150 years of London's Tube
   

2.) Multiple Choice Question

Dennis Lehane - author of Shutter Island and Mystic River - has promised to name a character in his new novel after whoever helps him...

1. Solve a long-standing family mystery
   
2. Name his new book
   
3. Find his missing dog
   

3.) Multiple Choice Question

On 1 January, more than 400 new laws took effect across the US. What is it now illegal for employers to ask employees and job applicants about in certain states?

1. Whether they are married
   
2. If they smoke or drink
   
3. Social media passwords
   
4. Childcare arrangements
   

4.) Multiple Choice Question

Nestle has just overturned a legal decision that would have allowed rival Cadbury to do what?

1. Make four-fingered chocolate bars
   
2. Use red packaging
   
3. Use the Kit-Kat typeface
   

5.) Multiple Choice Question

What has been banned in Mauritania, after being blamed for some 70% of the deaths of cattle and sheep in the capital Nouakchott?

1. Plastic bags
   
2. Post-wedding gunfire
   
3. Dropping cigarette butts
   

6.) Multiple Choice Question

The US Senate Intelligence Committee is reported to be looking into contact between the CIA and the makers of the film Zero Dark Thirty. What is Zero Dark Thirty?

1. An unspecified time early in the morning
   
2. US code name for Osama Bin Laden
   
3. Nickname for special forces unit involved in his death
   

7.) Multiple Choice Question

A list of 2012's most-viewed articles on the 35 busiest versions of Wikipedia has been released. Which was the most-searched topic on the German language site?

1. Autobahn
   
2. Cul-de-sac
   
3. Deutsche Bahn (German Rail)
   

Answers

1. It's the London Underground - the world's first underground railway. Meanwhile, Pride and Prejudice will be commemorated in February, and the Doctor's anniversary will be marked in March.
2. He wants help to find Tessa the Beagle, who has been missing since Christmas Eve.
3. It's social media passwords. California and Illinois have become the first two states to make it expressly illegal for employers to make such demands.
4. It's produce chocolate bars with four fingers. Cadbury had previously won a trademark case which would have allowed it to produce Kit-Kat-shaped products. But this has just been overturned. In 2012, Cadbury was able to trademark its purple Dairy Milk wrapper.
5. It's plastic bags, now banned to protect the environment and the lives of animals and fish. An environment ministry official in the West African country said cattle and sheep eat discarded bags.
6. Zero Dark Thirty is a military term for very early in the morning. Kathryn Bigelow, director of the film about the hunt for Osama Bin Laden said, "tt refers also to the darkness and secrecy that cloaked the entire decade-long mission."
7. It was cul-de-sac, or sackgasse. The data was published by a Swedish software engineer Johan Gunnarsson as part of the Wikitrends project, but gave no explanation as to why Germans read about cul-de-sacs 10,206,548 times.

Your Score

0 - 3 : Stuck in a rut

4 - 6 : Coasting

7 - 7 : Motoring

For past quizzes including our weekly news quiz, 7 days 7 questions, expand the grey drop-down below - also available on the Magazine page (and scroll down)

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