Wednesday, January 15

Wednesday, January 8

Sunday, December 29

Julius Ceasar and Veblan Effect

At 23, Julius Caesar was a junior politician on the way up.

But he had an advantage: confidence and brains.

Sailing across the Aegean Sea, he was captured by Sicilian pirates.

They demanded a ransom: 20 talents of silver.

(That's about 620kg, worth about $600,000.)

Caesar told them they were being ridiculous.

He couldn't possibly allow himself to be ransomed so cheaply.

The pirates hesitated, they were confused.

Caesar insisted the ransom must be raised to 50 talents of silver.

(Around 1,550kg, worth about $1.5 million.)

Now the pirates didn't know what to make of this.

Normally, their captives tried to escape as cheaply as possible.

They didn't understand what was going on.

But if he said he would double the ransom, why argue?

They let Caesar's men go back to Rome to raise the money.

And in Rome, in his absence, Caesar suddenly became very famous.

No-one had ever been ransomed for such a vast sum before.

He must be very special, he must be incredibly important.

That ransom demand put Caesar on the political map.

He had just invented the Veblen effect.

Although Thorstein Veblen wouldn't give it that name for another 2,000 years.

The Veblen effect is when consumers perceive higher-priced goods to be worth more, simply because they cost more.

Caesar had effectively made himself a Veblen brand.

He'd placed a value on himself greater than anyone in Rome.

But, as far as anyone in Rome knew, it wasn't him who had done it. 

It was an independent valuation.

So it must be true.

And because Caesar was now so highly valued, his men had little trouble raising the ransom money.

They returned to the island and freed him.

But Caesar wasn't going to allow the pirates to keep that sort of money.

As a now important and famous man, it was easy to raise a force.

He hunted down the pirates and took back all the money, plus everything else they had pillaged, then executed them all.

So Caesar was now both very rich and very famous.

And in time, with that same combination of confidence and brains, he became ruler of all Rome.

And he presided over the golden age of the Roman Empire.

Expanding it from Spain to Germany, from Britain to the Middle East.

Because Caesar knew that reality begins in the mind.

So the most important piece of real estate in which to stake a claim is the human mind.

How you stake a claim in the mind is by creating a perception.

And how you create that perception is by controlling the context.

Control the context and you control the mind.

Control the mind and you control reality.

Saturday, December 28

Suicide Bombers Go On Strike

BBC News - UK Suicide Bombers Go On Strike - A Spoof
 
 Suicide bombers in Britain are set to begin a three-day strike on Monday in a dispute over the number of virgins they are entitled to in the afterlife.The unrest began last Tuesday when Al Qaeda announced that the number of virgins a suicide bomber would receive after his death would be cut by 25%, this February- from 72 to 54.

 The suicide bombers' union, the British Organization of Occupational Martyrs (B.O.O.M.) responded with a statement saying the move was unacceptable to its members and called for a strike vote. General Secretary Abdullah Amir told the press, "Our members are literally working themselves to death in the cause of Jihad. We don't ask for much in return".

Speaking from his shed in Tipton in the West Midlands, Al Qaeda chief executive Haisheet Mapants explained, "I sympathize with our workers concerns but Al Qaeda is simply not in a position to meet their demands. They are simply not accepting the realities of modern-day Jihad in a competitive marketplace. Thanks to Western depravity, there is now a chronic shortage of virgins in the afterlife. It's a straight choice between reducing expenditures or laying people off. I don't like cutting benefits but I'd hate to have to tell 3,000 of my staff that they won't be able to blow themselves up."

 Spokespersons for the union in the North East of England, Ireland, Wales and the entire Australian continent stated that the change would not hurt their membership as there are so few virgins in their areas anyway.

 According to some industry sources, the recent drop in the number of suicide bombings has been attributed to the emergence of Scottish singing star, Susan Boyle. Many Jihadists now know what a virgin looks like and have reconsidered their benefit packages.

Negotiations are underway to include male virgins in the afterlife to accommodate the current changes in preferences.
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