You’ve had the reunion tours, the all-star line-ups, but what will concert promoters do next to bring in the audience attention? How about concert mashups?

 How about Metallica & Neil Diamond in concert together? They can take turns.  That way the fan who secretely likes both can see both acts without losing any of their credibility from their friends.

 Or better still. Doesn’t it keep Mick Jagger up at night trying to figure out some flimsy excuse to tour again and make a ton of cash? Why try and write a new album that no one will care about - just sing any old songs.  How about The Rolling Stones do Neil Sedaka? Or Britney Spears does The Beach Boys? (Wait, that last one might deserve a whole new category of idea.)

I work for a certain Financial Services firm and I see various legal and disclaimer text every day. It’s often (sadly) hilarious what requires disclaimers and how unlikely it is to release anything without it.

And it makes me wonder whether disclaimer text has any unconscious effects on consumers. I am not sure that the mere presence of tiny text at the bottom of a page makes me instantly wary or turns me off of the advertisement, but I do know that many times I’ll read some claim in an advertisement and instantly look for an asterix.

So - whether it’s actually legally possible - could a financial institution capture some of those unconsciously disillusioned prospects by discarding the small print?

I could almost imagine faux disclaimers then popping up that say “No disclaimers needed, honest.”

Well, I can dream, can’t I?

So, first there were brands sold as brands and store labels hidden where no one could see them. Then store labels became brands themselves. Now is there anything considered “Generic?”

So in a world that’s branding everything, where your brand can reinforce or even reimagine what your product is, why not brand the products no one thought anyone would ever brand?

What do I mean? Well, consumers are starting to buy anything labeled organic. Brands that promote an earth-friendly, organic element adds & legitmates a premium pricing on anything.

But what about the products that aren’t so environmentally sound? What about the same old, preservative heavy foods our parents grew up on? Why not take a stand and brand them? Make them cool through the power of the brand.

We could have anti-biotic, feed-lot fed milk branded as MELK with the tag line of Discover the Sweetness of Inorganic and reinforced by adding extra sweetness to the mix. Could “organic” get away with that, I think not.

So today, was out, and it rained.

Happens every day in some place in the world, right?

But we’ve got the internet!

So, just as my Google Calendar will send me a text message before my dentist appointment, why can’t I get the weather messaged to me?

Well, that’s not too revolutionary. But what about I only get bothered by the weather when it’s going to bother me? Give me a chance to decide when I want to be notified - let me choose to get an email when there’s a 50% chance of rain, or if it’s going to be a high below 40 F? That way, I can forget about looking, worrying, etc. Just let me know and I’ll plan accordingly.

Okay, I just received an SMS that my toast is done.

How about an office supply store which just carries leftovers from the past? Actual leftovers… old trapper keepers, Pee-Chees, etc. Would hit the nostalgia of all the Gen-Xers looking for some of their youth.

You may or may not have noticed that the dates on these posts seem a little off. At least in the sense that a blog started in 2007 has posts from years before that. Well, I sometimes like to think I’ve been blogging in my head for decades now, but short of that grand delusion of mine - I’m just trying to make posts relevant to when I scribbled down the idea. A sort of ideagraphical journey through time & space.

Okay, it’s only taken me 4 years to get to this first entry, but I guess that’s better than nothing.

Yes, I came up with the idea 4 years ago to have a site to showcase all of the extra ideas I came up with that I had little enthusiasm, or little energy to do anything with.

That doesn’t mean these are bad ideas. Doesn’t even mean they’ve been “used.” But rather it just means they are of a type or a direction, a size or of a nature that I don’t feel like I wanted to persue.

I have followed so many different ideas in so many different directions since I started this web thing back in 1994 (The Electrical Socket). I often wonder how I had so much time back then and how I managed to dabble in so many things. Much of that is due to growing older, getting a life (and a job) as well as some of my sites growing in size where they really do need a lot of time and energy to maintain.

Some I have parted with (The New Baby Name Index) which I gave to a friend to maintain, others I have shut down. But most still exist. Some in fragile forms (The Tribe of Woolgatherers), others at increasingly humungous sizes (The Firm List).

But what to do with all of the other ideas? Well, I’ll attempt to capture them here.

Why? Well, perhaps you’ll find some inspiration? Maybe you’ll take one of these ideas I didn’t have time for and make it come to life? I sure hope so.

And how about you write me when you do, so I can come and check it out?

Thanks,
Matte

How about a book filled with acceptance speeches for all occasions? It could be entitled “Be Prepared” (or something similar) and could give you either the beginning spark for a speech of your own or the whole thing verbatim.

It could include speeches for when you win:

• President of the United States of America
• President of some lesser country (of your choice)
• Nobel Prize (Peace or other one)
• Smaller Prizes (Elk’s Club, PTA, “Best Dad”)

I did some preliminary research, here’s a text file with some awards I found:
award list

Perhaps a little bit morbid, but why not a line of T-Shirts that point out that life isn’t always perfect and happy? Won’t some people want “heavy” t-shirts just to point out the irony of it all?

Here’s a list of slogan ideas:

• My doctor just told me I have 3 days to live
• What does ‘inoperable’ mean?
• My son placed me in this home and all I got was this tshirt
• My wife had me committed and all I got was this tshirt
• Is hair supposed to fall out?
• Bald is sexy, right?
• Ssh! No one knows I am contagious!
• Ebola is a state of mind
• I am terrorized
• Someone bombed my car
• My other car is a bomb
• It’s not ’suicide’ if you set off my explosives
• Autopilot Terrorism
• I only get one chance, so let me get this right
• It’s only Ebola
• Did you get your flu shot? Too bad.
• I forget, how do you spell Alzheimers?
• I can’t feel my legs
• Have you seen my Mommy?
• Have you seen my baby?

How about a line of breath mints called Governmints?

“mmm bureaucralicious!”
“even bigger flavor”
“in incumbent or new challenger flavors!”
“made & approved by the FDA”
“take a bite out of big Governmint”
“only $1,000 for the trial size”