“Unlimited choice is paralyzing. The Internet has made this form of paralysis due to option overload a standard feature of comfortable modern life.”
Susan Orlean
You are thinking of getting a new mouthwash (too much alcohol in the old one), but what brand should you purchase?
You want the best available product of course, but again which one is the best?
Well, you were not born yesterday… You know the routine. You will query the Internet.
“Hello T.A. (trusted advisor), which is the best mouthwash on the market?”
And your computer will obligingly present you with at least 10 different brands that all claim to be the best.
How could that be?
In any contest, there can be only one winner. That’s what Pierre de Coubertin decreed a long time ago.
So, who decides which is the best product anyway? Some learned old man or some pimply kid masquerading as an expert?
Don’t laugh. Kids who just started to shave now run the world.
If you don’t believe me, go to a movie theater nearby and check out The Intern with Anne Hathaway and Robert de Niro.
The kids are running the show. It is frightening and sobering at the same time.
And who by the way is carrying the nuclear “football”? Another kid?
Jiminy Cricket! I don’t want to think about it…
I could of course ask Tamara (she knows), but overreliance on a single adviser (e.g. Grigori Rasputin) can be addictive, even dangerous.
So you will have to do your homework. Sift through all the claims and try to find an elusive consensus.
You will need a little patience and maybe a few cups of coffee (or a few shots of “White Lightning”) for sure.
In the old days though, it was much easier.
“Any customer can have a car painted any color that he wants so long as it is black.”
So said Henry Ford (a noted SOB) who knew that too many choices could be paralyzing.
I agree. That’s why by the way I hate to see a restaurant menu with over 50 items.
As a child my family’s menu consisted of two choices: take it or leave it.
Buddy Hackett
The good old days…
But don’t get me wrong. I want to have choices… but I want impartial experts (are there such animals?) to agree on what is what.
Is it asking too much?
Alain