Faith + Reason = Truth

I found myself at a gathering last night, playing a spirited neighborhood version of "The Newlywed Game" (GREAT way to get to know your neighbors in ways you never thought possible, for better or for worse).  Some people had been married for 20+ years, and some not that long at all.  A diverse mix of folks.

At one point, while sequestered with some other husbands, we were flipping channels and came across SNL, at which point I asked if anybody watches.  Nobody had in years, all agreeing that it wasn't funny anymore.  I told them they might tune in and give it a chance every now and then because there's some pretty funny stuff being done in the form of SNL Shorts, then explained to them the short video concept, the Lazy Sunday phenomena (they HAD heard of it, though not all had seen it), the D In a Box, etc., and told them they could find it on Youtube.

Then, the unimagineable happened:  one of them asked, "what IS Youtube?"  Stunned, I momentarily fell silent.  Seeing my reaction, he quickly backpedaled and said "I mean, I know it's where you can see funny videos online, but what is it?"  He was joined by a chorus of similar sentiment expression by the others.  I explained that it's simply a place to go and click a play button and have a video play in your browser right there, immediately, without downloading any special players or software.  Ease of use, as it were.  They said "oh, I get it," but I don't really think they did.  They had never bothered to try to watch or upload video over the web before, so they had no idea what a barrier to entry had been overcome by those 3 guys that started it.

What else is out there to be done, something that we all assume needs extra and/or superfluous (this is the perfect word for what I'm trying to express, by the way) steps or processes involved to make it happen, but in reality just needs to be rethought and executed in a way that skips or eliminates those barriers/processes altogether?  I've got one off the top of my head:  the U.S. Presidential Election Process.  And I've got a fun, entertaining, fair, profitable, direct-and-to-the-point alternative to the current gyrations, which I'll detail here in the next few days!