Many business owners and company employees find their younger colleagues irritating. Guess what? The feeling is mutual, as Millennials and Gen-Z often lack respect for their older co-workers. Chris DeSantis has studied generational differences for 18 years and believes the generational friction that is so prevalent these days can be leveraged to the benefit of […]

“STAY AWAY FROM MY SISTER, YOU’VE ALREADY DIED ONCE. GET THE HINT!” You might be confused, let me explain. It was a rather boring day at Meadowlands high. Normally Philip Loon, the English teacher’s son, makes something explode in science class. Or Molly Billsborough goes around selling free homework answers. But today, the silence was deafening. It was […]

“World class cereal-eating is a dance of fine compromises. The giant heaping bowl of sodden cereal, awash in milk, is the mark of the novice. Ideally one wants the bone-dry cereal nuggets and the cryogenic milk to enter the mouth with minimal contact and for the entire reaction between them to take place in the […]

“People who see the world as a dark and scary place with conspiracies under every doorstep and the world on the edge of collapse owe this worldview to the social media 24/7 news-cycle. Hollywood has turned Fear Mongering into a high-dollar industry.  No matter how amazing our world becomes, it will still be filled with anxious, […]

The written word has no meaning until it has been translated into the spoken word in the mind. Listening to the repetitive notes in the music of Johann Sebastian Bach inspired Ernest Hemingway to write A Farewell to Arms. Listening to Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 4 inspired James Michener to write 20 or 30 pages before […]

ROYGBIV: A Pixar Supercut from Rishi Kaneria on Vimeo.

“I painted it around, I guess, 1993 when I met Don Freed [her boyfriend] for the first time. He said, ‘How are you?’ And I said, ‘Undervalued.’ [Laughs.] And I was. I was very frustrated because the normal outlets for getting your product marketed in my business, those doors had been closed to me, and […]

GEORGE LUCAS: This scene is set in the roughest bar you can imagine, filled with violent scumbags who will cut your arm off if you look at them sideways. JOHN WILLIAMS: What kind of music will they be playing? GEORGE LUCAS: Light jazz

“When Glenn left the house, the sky was a satin Spinnaker Blue with White Feather clouds, the still-moist lawn and street were glossy Sunlit Glade and Bastion Grey, and, contemplating the to-do list jotted on Ivory Cream notepaper as he started the Sundance Yellow hatchback, Glenn knew he would go flat Condition Red berserk if […]

What keeps me from dressing like that 24/7? JeanLuc Godard said, ‘All you need for a movie is a gun and a girl.’ Men are fascinated by girls and by guns.Girls: bringers of life.Guns: bringers of death. For what purpose does the gun exist – even the humble .22 hunting rifle – if not for delivering […]

“After shooting the bastard, the girls debated where to bury the body. But neither of ’em had the foresight to bring a shovel.” – caption proposed by Tom Grimes of Amarillo

“People who see the world as a dark and scary place with conspiracies under every doorstep and the world on the edge of collapse owe their worldview to the social media 24/7 news-cycle. Hollywood has turned Fear Mongering into a high-dollar $$$ industry.  No matter how amazing our world becomes, it will still be filled with […]

“For around 15 minutes in the early eighties I visited with Sam Walton in Broken Arrow inside a Walmart store. The inside lining of his old sport coat was coming out. He asked an associate for needle and thread so he himself could sew it up. We had a fun visit. Only wish I had a […]

The first is a thought that I’ve long held and it has served me well. The second is a derivation that hit me today and I find pretty damming of our healthcare systems. 1) Information gaps are easily filled with paranoia. 2) Healthcare gaps are filled with quackery. – Tim (Eye of the) Storm

Get out your piggy bank… A Chinese company is looking to sell three major U.S. resort hotels at a combined price tag of $1.3 billion, seeking to cash out these holdings during a powerful surge in leisure travel and resort business.  Dajia Insurance Group Co. is putting up for sale the Montage in Laguna Beach, […]

I recently spent $10,000 on a registered Black Angus bull. I put him out with the herd but he just ate grass and wouldn’t even look at a cow. I was beginning to think I had paid more for that bull than he was worth. Anyway, I had the vet come and take a look […]

How did Newton Minow ruin television?

“You can take one of the greatest of all cosmic perspectives that exist, and it’s the revelation that emerged – mid 20th century – that the atoms of our body are traceable to the crucibles in the centers of stars, that then later exploded, scattering that enrichment into pristine gas clouds that then formed star […]

Hunter S. Thompson to Richard Nixon: “Let me ask you a question, sir: what is this country doing for the doomed? There are two kinds of people in this country, the doomed and the screwheads. […] I was never really frightened by the bopheads, and the potheads with their silliness never really frightened me either, […]

“My, but it’s nice an’ cold this mornin’! The thermometer’s done fell up to zero! Mrs. Wiggs made the statement as cheerfully as if her elbows were not sticking out through the boy’s coat that she wore, or her teeth chattering in her head like a pair of castanets. But, then, Mrs. Wiggs was a […]

Steve Curtin has been officially ranked as one of the top 30 customer service experts in the world. His clients include Carnival Cruise Line, NAPA Auto Parts, and TJ Maxx. Steve believes every owner and every manager needs to have “the conversation” with every employee about why their job matters, and why their company matters. […]

Roy and Pennie, Talya and I are visiting with Avital and Ben in St. Thomas. It is lovely here.   I’m sending the Oct 3 MMR description now, so that I don’t inadvertently overlook it during the hectic week to come. (We are supposed to leave for Florida mid-week, but Hurricane Ian may beat us there.) […]

“Columbus’s real achievement was managing to cross the ocean successfully in both directions. Though an accomplished enough mariner, he was not terribly good at a great deal else, especially geography, the skill that would seem most vital in an explorer. It would be hard to name any figure in history who has achieved more lasting […]

Why it’s Important to Take Chances by Gideon Williams (12) Have you ever had a dream, a dream where you’re on a vast stage in front of an audience waiting to present yourself? Well I have every night since I was seven years old, and so I started performing on stage presenting myself for who […]

Indy, a few Memo’s back you mentioned Andrew Carnegie of Carnegie Steel. He dedicated his life to give the profits of his company away, more than $300,000,000. Later he sold Carnegie Steel to J.P. Morgan for $350,000,000 making him the richest man in the world. Carnegie’s philanthropy built libraries all over America, some big towns but primarily small […]

Six times a year, Jonathan Dahl produces a magazine that reaches 1.8 million global executives and business owners. He also publishes a weekly online newsletter that has gets more than 3.5 million annual page views. Jonathan generates dazzling corporate content for a privately held consulting firm. “Whether your company has 5 employees or 5,000,” Jonathan […]

Meet Vi WickamMeet Mick Torbay @vib3.machine You can make these. I promise. #edsherran #dre #tameimpala #portugaltheman #ariannagrande #lizzo #deftones #producersoftiktok #songwritersoftiktok #bassplayersoftiktok #guitartok #vib3machine @@danwilsonmusic@@output@@applemusic@@theneedletok@@zanelowe@@venture_music@@thekount@@snoopdogg ♬ original sound – ViB3 MACHiNE

The wizard suggested this ad language to his friends for their Hawaiian VRBO listing. – Indy Hale Malanai is a Cottage-on-Stilts by the Sea You walk up a flight of stairs and are immediately pulled by the view of the ocean onto the lanai. The jungle-like foliage, the smell of flowers, the sand, the ocean, […]

Out walking in the frozen swamp one gray day, I paused and said, ‘I will turn back from here. No, I will go on farther—and we shall see.’ The hard snow held me, save where now and then One foot went through. The view was all in lines Straight up and down of tall slim […]

“The young man who has not wept is a savage, and the old man who will not laugh is a fool.”– George Santayana, Dialogues in Limbo (1925) ch. 3

Eighty-eight percent of the Fortune 500 companies that existed in 1955 are gone. Poof. Half of them withered because they had a manager in the role of CEO when they desperately needed a leader. The other half were destroyed by a leader when a manager could have held the company together and grown it incrementally. […]

Jeff Sexton and Chris Maddock have been teaching at Wizard Academy since its inception. Brilliant, brilliant ad men.

Sean Castrina has launched more than 20 companies over the past two decades and most of them have been successful. He says there are 8 unbreakable rules that entrepreneurs must follow if they want to succeed. Do you want to succeed? Learn the 8 rules! Right here. Right now. MondayMorningRadio.com

“To make a scary face, just turn a happy face upside down.” This meme is a good example of how the human brain unconsciously interprets complex symbols. My suspicion is that the designers working for George Lucas did this consciously, not  unconsciously. The best evidence is how the breathing apparatus of the storm trooper is […]

Robert, here’s that billboard mock-up I promised you.  “Frameline Magnetism” refers to the eye being magnetically drawn to the edges of an image, unconsciously filling in the parts that extend beyond the borders or “framelines”. The idea is that the diamond is too big to fit on the billboard. Ciao for Niao, Roy Ads can […]

Elmer, I love the billboards.  All of them are awesome, except for the one where you look like you have a tiny peanut head.  Billboard designers often make this mistake. Too much shirt, too little face.  I have attached my REVISED layout to cure the peanut-head problem.  You’re Welcome.  Roy

Whiners piss me off. I’m not trying to be shocking or crude, I’m just trying to make a point. The reason whiners piss me off, I think, is because they seem to believe that injustice and hardship have somehow singled them out for a special beating. Listen, whiner, everyone is ambushed by catastrophe occasionally. Quit acting […]

Among the robber barons of the late 19th century, none was more ruthless and unscrupulous than Jay Gould, who used to commute to work up the Hudson River on a 200-foot yacht. Gould controlled the country’s largest railroad and the New York World newspaper and he made a fortune bigger than the Rockefellers. Jay Gould is […]

CT scan vs. CAT scan: What’s the difference? A CT scan and a CAT scan are the same thing. CT stands for computerized tomography and CAT stands for computerized axial tomography. By my definition, Preventive medicine is focused on diet and exercise and supplements and colonoscopies. By contrast, Predictive medicine is focused on an annual, non-invasive […]

Zoom in and look around. – Indy

  JayMistry@WizardOfAds.com Dylan@WizardOfAds.com Here’s a transcript of Dylan’s Video: Defeated, the client came to me. For as long as they’ve been running, digital ads, they’ve been paying by the hour to manually update their digital media metrics, spending $500 per week, and still having to look at individual ad managers to get the information that […]

Rick Willis is a Master Analyst and a Wizard of Ads Partner. This short video was his gift to the other partners at last week’s partner meeting in Austin. Rick Willis here, and I’d like to pose a question and throw out a few thoughts. What do you do when you find your client has […]

For any vendors wishing to participate in Skiatook’s Third Thursday in the Park event, the deadline is next Thursday. The chamber of commerce is no longer accepting food vendors, as they have reached capacity.   This month’s event is set to take place on May 19th at Skiatook’s Central Park beginning at 6 p.m. In […]

The Wizard’s Guest Cottage – designed by Princess Pennie – can be seen on three different websites, each one featuring 50 photos of the Wizard Academy campus: vrbo.comairbnb.comwizardsguestcottage.com  

I guess there’s a first time for everything… I was unable to finish the rabbit hole this week because I was helping the wizard fight a whirlwind of stuff that was coming at him all at once. I’ll make it up to you next week. Aroo,Indy Beagle

The Wizard’s Guest Cottage is on the campus of Wizard Academy and is listed on Airbnb. The Wizard’s Guest Cottage is also listed on VRBO.

“In the 1960s, I discovered Simon and Garfunkel as a kid who wasn’t supposed to be listening to such “hip” stuff. In 1983, I set off on a cross-country road trip to discover America’s blue highways with Cathie, my friend and my obsession, only to discover that Simon and Garfunkel had already paved the way. […]

Memories light the corners of my mind,Misty water-colored memories of the way we were.Scattered pictures of the smiles we left behind,Smiles we gave to one another for the way we were. Can it be that it was all so simple then?Or has time rewritten every line?If we had the chance to do it all again,Tell […]

Karla,1. I don’t pretend to be a graphics artist.2. This isn’t necessarily the logo you will choose.3. You might not use this brand or color of van.4. The fonts and colors I used for “I Want To Be Your Guy” and “Plumbers, Electricians, H-Vac Technicians” will almost certainly be different in the final layout executed by the […]

Send indy@wizardofads.com a link to the song you feel is most overlooked.