I am an object of internet ridicule, ask me anything (2013)
Ohboyohboyohboy, it seems I dodged bullet with an idea that I had 5-6 years ago that was very similar to this guy's: My idea was to sit beside a sign that said something along the lines of "Celebrate yourself Through Poetry" in the morning in downtown Chicago in front of a large office building. People going in would commission a poem in the morning, I would finish it and write it in calligraphy on a nice piece of paper by 4pm for a fixed cost, say $20. They would either buy or not buy the poem after I show it to them. A poor person's Francois Villon, if you will.I've never mentioned this to anyone other than my wife (who used to work in that building) and she laughed her head off. Now that I write it, I feel like I might do this in the future. What do you think, would you buy such a thing for $20-$30 a piece? OTOH, I've gotta admit: I think most of the customers would be young women, so that would make me seem more of an object of ridicule / creep than this guy. Still ...EDIT: OK, now that I've read my entry I feel like I have to admit something that makes the above proposition more insane or interesting, depending on your POV: I cannot write poetry, like not at all! My proposed strategy was to lean in to my NLP skills and get software help to find interesting ideas, rhymes, etc. Sort of auto poem creation with human tweaking.