Jeopardy! Contestant Loses Saying By 'Gangster' Instead Of 'Gangsta'

For Nick Spicher, a museum educator from Everett, Wash., it’s no minor matter of dialect.

His pronunciation cost him a $1,600 answer on his “Jeopardy!” appearance on Monday, and the show’s decision has since been hotly debated.

He was prompted with the answer, “A song by Coolio from ‘Dangerous Minds’ goes back in time to become a 1667 John Milton classic.

Nick responded with, “Gangster’s Paradise Lost.” Mr. Spicher answered, seemingly correctly.

“Yes,” Mr. Trebek responded.

But soon, the host delivered bad news.

"Our judges have re-evaluated one of your responses a few moments ago, Nick. You said ‘gangster's' instead of ‘gangsta's' on that song by Coolio.

That bumped Spicher from first to 2nd place.

Because he got the answer wrong, an additional $1,600 was taken from his score meaning the flub ultimately cost him $3,200.

This caused Spicher's total to drop from $12,000 to $8,800. This dropped him out of the lead.

In the official blog, Jeopardy producers offered an explanation for the change:

"Although Nick’s response of 'Gangster’s Paradise Lost' was initially accepted, the hard R sound caught the ear of one member of the onstage team, who immediately followed up with a quick check," the blog post said. "It turns out that 'gangsta' and 'gangster' are both listed separately in the Oxford English Dictionary, each with its own unique definition. Nick changed not only the song’s title but also its meaning-making his response unacceptable."

The TV moment went viral and generated a range of Internet memes.

A video of the clip tweeted by Roy Wood Jr. from The Daily Show has already been viewed about 2.2 million times.