News from DENSA, the low IQ society.  The Guinness Book Of World Records used to be packed overwhelmingly with interesting and useful facts.  Recently however, alongside legitimate achievements, it seems to be catering for those inflicted by a sub-Warholian craving for their devalued 15 seconds of fame.

Concerning the 'World's Longest Mind Map', we are unable to accept this as a Guinness World Record.  We receive over 60,000 enquiries a year from which only a small proportion are approved to establish new categories.  These categories are not 'made up' to suit an individual proposal, but rather 'evolve' as a result of international competition in areas which naturally invite superlative achievements of the sort that we are interested in.  We are of course bound to favour those that reflect the greatest public interest.

I therefore decided to take a look for myself to ascertain whether Guinness is dumbing down or not, and to discover if their response is an honest appraisal of the situation or pure hypocritical cant?

In the edition I checked there is no indication that any Mind Sports titles have ever existed.  Indeed, the total space devoted to mental  world records in the entire book is less than that  given to the following - now infamous - feat by Kathryn Ratcliffe (UK), who:

"...on 25 October 2003 and with a tally of 138, broke her OWN record for the most Smarties eaten in three minutes using chopsticks”.

Does this reflect - as Guinness themselves claim of their criteria - something not made up to suit an individual proposal, but rather an exploit mirroring the greatest public interest in an arena of evolved international competition?  I think not!