Scott Adams's Blog, page 379

Your Helpful Abusive Advice

Humans are usually polite. That can be stressful, especially if some mass hole has earned a serious verbal smack down, and you're too nice to deliver it. It's bad for your health to keep that sort of venom all bottled up.

Now is your chance to let it out. Think about the last person who needed your practical and yet rudely abusive advice, and leave your monologue here in the comment section. You don't need to describe the person or the situation, unless it's absolutely necessary. It will be ...

March Madness

CBSSports.com contacted me last week. I assume they thought of me because I'm so sporty. They have a web service that lets you watch live college basketball games, on demand, during March Madness. The web page wisely includes a Boss Button that allows viewers to switch to a business-looking screen when footsteps approach. They asked if I would be willing to design a page that cleverly looks like legitimate work from a medium distance, and yet is clearly a joke up close.

My first reaction wa...

Leadership Energy

I have a hypothesis that people instinctively want to be led by whoever has the most energy. Sometimes that energy manifests itself in fiery speeches, Hitler being a good example. Winston Churchill was famous for only needing 5-6 hours of sleep per day, and working his staff late into the night. You often hear about how much energy American presidents have for jogging, chopping wood, or campaigning. In Russia, Putin likes to be photographed with his shirt off, wrestling with bears and whatno...

Another Problem with Complexity

If there's a theme to my blog posts, it's something along the lines of Complexity is Killing Us. The complexity of investment options is why you're afraid to put your money anywhere but inside an old sock. Complexity is why the healthcare system in the United States is apparently unfixable. Complexity is why scientists can't convince a large segment of the public to believe in evolution or global warming. Complexity is why your computer spends all morning begging you for updates instead of ...

Backwards Economics

Regular economics involves someone starting a company and then hiring people to fill positions. That seems like a sensible model. But I wonder if the Internet gives us a way to flip that around, at least in times of high unemployment.

Imagine a web site in which the unemployed, and underemployed, can register their skills and the sorts of jobs they would be willing to do. The site then suggests the sort of business that would fit in a particular community based on the available pool of labor...

Stalker Watch

I decided to not delete all of the crazy Canadian stalker comments coming in today so you could see what I have been dealing with for about seven years. Just sit back and watch. It's fascinating in its own way. Her comments are on the strip page as well as here.

She might change her user name from Stigmada sometime today, but it will be pretty obvious which comments are hers.

Man Points

Yesterday I decided to make some man points. (-1 for knowing I need them.) Recently we purchased online a big metal rack to hold free weights. (+1). The delivery guy left the package outside the door when we were gone. I wasn't strong enough to carry it inside. (-1 for having no upper body strength.) So I tipped it on its end and "walked" it into the garage. (+1 for using science to move a heavy object.)

The rack required assembly. This was a problem because all of my tools had been stolen fr...

Curiosity

Curiosity is one of the most underrated phenomena in the world. It's ironic that people aren't more curious about curiosity. It's a powerful thing.

For example, if you ever wondered if someone is attracted to you, the answer lies in curiosity. If someone asks personal questions about your past, your plans, your likes and dislikes, that is an unambiguous sign of attraction. If someone tries to steer you into the bedroom without some conspicuous data gathering, that is a sign of simple hornine...

Crazy or Disciplined?

There's a fine line between crazy and entrepreneurial. If you bark at the moon to make it go away, you are considered crazy. But if you start a business for which there is less than a 5% chance of success, you are considered an entrepreneur.

If you feel the need to turn a light switch on and off exactly seven times before leaving a room, you have OCD. If you need to run exactly five miles every day before breakfast to feel right, you are considered disciplined and athletic.

On one hand, it i...

Usability Testing

I got a strong reaction when I criticized Gmail's interface. A few people mentioned that you can activate hot keys so you can just press the r key to reply. Fair enough. I burrowed into the Settings and activated the hot key feature. It was a good idea, but nothing happens when I press r. You'll tell me this is a case of operator error, which obviously it is, and that is my point. Why is it so easy for the operator to make an error?

Someone mentioned that clicking the big unlabeled white box...