Scott Adams's Blog, page 376

The Value of Ideas

My Google Alert recently picked up a lot of chatter on the Internet about a rumored Dilbert movie in the works. The rumor is ahead of the reality, as the project hasn't been funded, and there isn't yet a director, writer, or actor signed on. But I was fascinated by the reactions of the many movie web sites that weighed in with their opinions on whether it was a good idea to create a Dilbert movie.

What?

Evaluating whether an idea is good enough for a movie is a bit like an automobile expert ...

Who's Your Fodder?

If you're at work, summarize the last conversation (or e-mail) you had prior to reading this post and include all relevant buzzwords. The more mundane the better. Bonus points if your last conversation was completely unintellible when taken out of context. I'll turn one of your entries (maybe more) into a comic.

Don't try to pick the funniest or most ironic conversation. Pick the most recent.

And thank you for doing half of my work today.

The Adams Theory of Content Value

The Adams Theory of Content Value: As our ability to search for media content improves, the economic value of that content will approach zero.

I heard someplace, albeit unreliably, that 90% of all music that people own for personal use is stolen. Let's agree that the real figure is some large number, if not 90%. And you can already obtain every top-selling book, TV show, and movie on the Internet for free, assuming you don't mind mixing your shopping with your copyright crime sprees. Newsp...

Betting on the Engineers

I'm fascinated by BP's attempts to stop the oil leak, especially today with the Top Kill operation underway. I've had multiple nerdgasms following the story. I mean, seriously, I'm sitting in my home office in California and watching an oil leak a mile below the surface, on a live submarine cam, as scientists try to save the Gulf from destruction. You know this will someday be a movie, and I'll watch it again.

As I mentioned in an earlier blog, I bought some BP stock recently because I liked...

Coincidences

The other day I did something I haven't done in about ten years. I watched a new episode of The Simpsons as it was being broadcast, commercials and all. Normally I would record it. So let's say there have been 230 episodes of The Simpsons in the past ten years, and I watched only one of them live.

This particular episode featured the judges from American Idol as themselves. American Idol is one of my favorite shows. So let's say there are a few hundred shows on television, and maybe five of t...

Winner of The Attention Contest

The winner of The Attention Contest is Lukeout. I have edited his piece and republished it below. I gave it a heavy edit, but no more than a magazine editor would do for an unknown writer. I found the piece to be interesting, inspiring, and to the point. That's rare.

You probably wonder why I didn't pick one of the entries that had far more reader votes. I rejected bathroom humor, anything that seemed dated, anything that seemed familiar (derivative), and anything that couldn't be brought ...

The Attention Contest

Let's test the business model I described in yesterday's blog. If you would like some attention, write a 500 word or less opinion, product review, humor, interesting true story, how-to, hypothesis, peeve, or anything else you believe is worthy of attention (except fiction), and put it in the comments to this blog. Give your work a title. At the end of your piece, and clearly separated from the work, give yourself up to 50 words of credit, advertising, marriage proposals, or anything else yo...

The Value of Attention

Most people enjoy getting attention. It's one of our basic needs. Little kids go through a "Look at me!" stage that lasts years. I believe we never grow out of that. All we do is learn how to be more subtle in saying, "Look at me!"

There are lots of strategies for getting attention. Perhaps you like to select clothing that will make people spend a bit more time looking at you. Maybe you excel at your job, or at a team sport, so people will notice you. I believe that personal attention is a b...

Brain Management

It's easy to do two things at the same time, as long as one of those actions is a practiced skill that you can do almost automatically. For example, walking and talking is easy.  And some people can play the guitar and sing, as long as they have practiced both of those skills until one requires virtually no conscious thought. But you can't do two things at the same time that both require original thinking. I know this first hand because my wife, Shelly, likes to bring up conversations in th...

Engineers to the Rescue

According to the often stated (at least in this blog) Scott Adams Theory of Predictable Disasters, this would be an excellent time to buy stock in BP. Yes, yes, you'd vomit in your own mouth when you executed the trade, but follow me on this argument.

The financial wonks will tell you that the cost of the clean up and settlements are "already baked into the stock price." That's probably true(ish). Still, no one can really predict how much this thing will cost BP in the end. The stock could s...