That got me to thinking – why not have a service that specializes in telling you what you already know, (but since they are not directly affected) but shorn of cognitive bias.   There is no way that the judge could have requisite technical knowledge, but they could improve decision making and speed the process along. I envision it working similar to Net-Arb.

Some examples on how this has worked in the past:

I needed to get another server for Stronico, but adding another one seems expensive at my current host.  A friend reminded me that previous prices are irrelevant to any decisions, and had me actually do a proper Cost-Benefit analysis.  Did I already know that?  yes, I did, but I was stuck on the price and deluded myself into thinking it mattered more than it did.

Another example: I was previously in an early stage venture with two people and a bad partnership agreement.  We estimated that we would each need to put 1000 into the project before it was viable.  I agreed to the contract with misgivings (they were in a situation where they could not do quality work, much to their protestations to the contrary) and soon found myself in the business equivalent of a loveless marriage.  I was determined to slog through it – things might turn around, and I had put 100 hours into the venture at that point, compared to 30 hours for each of the other partners.  If I backed out of the project I would be cheating myself.  A different friend pointed there was no way to get those hours back, and the true cost of continuing was NOT 900 hours spent on an iffy venture, it was whatever else I could build in 900 hours, which turned out to be a lot of things.

Those are two examples of a friend being in the right place at the right time to help me through some of my cognitive biases.  It would be very handy (and worth paying for) it I had someone like that available in some form 24-7.

photo credit: brunkfordbraun

I wrote about my desire to form a secret society several months ago and so far have found no suitable web application to help me do that. IMind seems to be the closest complete solution but it seems too jumbled to accomplish much (I’m judging them purely from their website, I have not tried the product.)  Recently I came across BrainTrustHQ.com and I think it supply the collaboration tools needed for a workable secret society.  I’ve signed up for their free version and I’ll let everyone know how it goes.

photo credit: conorwithonen

• Idealizes: caring, tolerance and balance
• Prone To: Hugging

The Right Wing Temperament -

• Idealizes: Cleanliness, organization and order
• Prone To: Personal space

There are many political overtones and exceptions to the above sweeping characterizations, but in terms of temperament they are true (just trust me on that).

You’ve probably noticed that vitamins, natural/organic foods, and homeopathy are marketed almost exclusively to the left wing temperament and almost never to the right wing temperament.  That neglect means that there is a market opportunity to seize the right leaning side of the population.  After all, if smut on the airwaves angers someone, why should preservatives in their steak get a free pass?   If the complexity of the tax code angers them, why would the jumbled supply chain of mega farms be any different?

How to create this new company?  Just take existing marketing material for organics and vitamins and:

• Replace the word “Balance” with “Order” in the marketing material
• Point out that this is the way people “used” to eat (in the case of natural foods)
• Point out that this is the best that can be done the best that can be done to replicate the way people used to eat (in the case of vitamins) and the product (whatever that is) follows established scientific rules
• Re-shoot all of the marketing stock photography to show smiling, healthy people standing 2-3 feet away from each other

and presto!  You will dominate a large market!

Thoughts anyone?

photo credit: bansidhe

Home Maker Inc – A service that would mimic many of the offerings of the good homemaker, solely in the care and maintenance of the home and retirement planning.  There would be no actual in-person services rendered by the Homemaker Inc (heretoafter called HMI) just financial  and long-term home matters.  The business would largely be by mail, phone, and internet.  The retirement and financial planning would be largely limited to enforcing Ramit Sethi’s I will Teach You To Be Rich book (which covers about 80% of what you need).

The home maintenance would consist of:

• Paying all utility bills (though the customer’s account), and notifying them of any deals (like on natural gas or the like) that come around.  The customer would be given a monthly statement of the expenses.
• HMI would hold all warranties in a central and findable location, and handle all home repair services.  HMI would also hold all insurance policies.
• HMI would schedule and arrange all home maintenance tasks (like annual servicing of appliances) that never actually get done.

That way the house could be maintained at limited expense, and things would actually get done.  Just a thought.

Sadly there does not seem to be any company devoted to forming and maintaining secret societies.  I think it could exist, and most of it would happen on the web.  Such a company would have the following features.

• Maintenance and storage of the purpose, the history, and the minutes of the group
• Keeper of the secret punches, recipes, or whatever secret intellectual property that is one of hte features of the group.  Traditionally secret societies have their own punch, but it could be a distinctive micro-brew, health formula, whatever.
• Listing of requirements for membership – it would give the designated enforcer of rules knowledge and authority to keep the integrity of the group intact.

Basically the site/company would serve as a grizzled member of the group – similar to Bobby Elvis on the show Sons of Anarchy.  It could also offer discounts on membership card, mugs, events, etc.    I would like to join the bluegrass and woodworking versions of these.

photo credit: ChrisDag

As an addendum, please read the seminal Derek Sivers blog post -Ideas are just a multiplier of execution.  The first business idea will follow soon.

Addendum – one requirement of all of these ideas is that I would buy them if I had they did exist at a reasonable price.