the circle jerk of good intentions

January 15, 2006 6:12 PM

Crisis in SinceSlicedBread land. Some of you may remember this from some months back. Service Employees International (SEIU), the union, announced a contest several months ago, looking for ideas that might 'save the country' by putting the U.S. on a corrective course with respect to growing the economy and creating good-paying jobs. [more inside]
posted by vhsiv (15 comments total)

The good news is they got over 22,000 contest entries competing for some $250,000 in prize money. The problem is that SEIU seems to have been unprepared for the deluge of entries they received and were possibly over-hasty about winnowing the first round of 70 finalists down to 21 candidates for the general public to vote on.

It looks as though the do-gooders have created a circular firing-range for themselves – contestants are angry because there are numerous similar entries and the judges haven't honored the earliest entries with similar goals and the apparent mediocrity of the finalist ideas...

Some of the entrants have apparently started contacting the judges on their own....
posted by vhsiv at 6:17 PM on January 15, 2006

I don't see a single original idea in the 21 finalists. You could have gotten those same 21 finalist ideas by just asking some 8th graders what America should do in the future.
posted by mathowie at 6:43 PM on January 15, 2006

Exactly. These are topics for a debate contest, not "new ideas."
posted by rxrfrx at 7:00 PM on January 15, 2006

The brilliant idea was not "sliced bread". It was to slice it before you sell it.
posted by longsleeves at 7:11 PM on January 15, 2006

If the product is "sliced bread," that kind of implies that it's been sliced before presentation to the consumer, no?
posted by rxrfrx at 7:37 PM on January 15, 2006

a-HA!
posted by longsleeves at 7:53 PM on January 15, 2006

No. Since the term "greatest thing since sliced bread," and it's aggregates, does not necessarily imply a product on the store shelves so much as a sliced loaf of bread without any further context, it is not implied in the phrase that it is a consumer sold product of any kind. Therefore it could be read into the phrase that it was the idea of using a knife to slice bread that was so remarkable. Longsleeves, therefore, intended to differentiate between that misreading of the phrase and it's actual origin.

Unless he's wrong. Are you wrong, longsleeves? I will be very upset if you're wrong. very.

upset.
posted by shmegegge at 8:02 PM on January 15, 2006

I am not wrong. This time.
posted by longsleeves at 8:16 PM on January 15, 2006

The genius part is that people are too lazy and/or inept to slice their own %$*&$# bread, let alone make it.

P.S. bread machines rock
posted by longsleeves at 8:38 PM on January 15, 2006

What we need is a bread machine that makes sliced bread.
posted by soundofsuburbia at 2:12 AM on January 16, 2006

If someone invents the greatest thing since sliced bread, that would make them the greatest inventor since Otto Frederick Rohwedder, wouldn't it?
posted by Faint of Butt at 4:42 AM on January 16, 2006

The genius part is that people are too lazy and/or inept to slice their own %$*&$# bread, let alone make it.

Well, the bread that comes sliced at the store (e.g. Wonder) is too soft to easily slice by hand. It's much easier to have it sliced by machine, and slicing machines are expensive to purchase for home use.

Good bread (i.e. real bread) comes unsliced because it's easy to slice at home, and would get stale too quickly if you sliced it before selling.
posted by rxrfrx at 7:41 AM on January 16, 2006

Good bread does indeed come unsliced at home. My yeast expires this month.
posted by longsleeves at 7:44 PM on January 16, 2006

Hot tip: you can use instant dry commercial yeast for years after the expiration date, if you've been keeping it in a sealed container in the freezer.
posted by rxrfrx at 4:59 AM on January 17, 2006

sincere thanks. I have frozen the new little jar of dried yeast.
posted by longsleeves at 4:43 PM on January 17, 2006