STRIP FOR Aug 16, 2002

Opening with a lowball is a standard negotiating technique. But it doesn't apply to a creative process like developing an ad campaign. At least, ideally there should be no reason for it to enter the process. A marketing firm offers ideas, not man-hours or materiel. It doesn't cost them anything more to create an ad with a green blob than one with a gray blob (if it does, e.g. printing brochures in color, that is likely to be a cost covered by the client). As a result a non-dysfunctional marketeer would be collaborative rather than defensive when discussing a proposal with a client. That's all part of the joke here in this strip. We could judge subjectively that the marketing firm is not creative because the textless, formless form is uninspiring. However, slightly more subtle but also somehow much more stark is the way the goateed man treats ideas in frame 2: as an inventory that has been exhausted. The beauty of creativity is that there is no limit to novelty. I do not doubt that like all creative workers Adams often sits down to work, draws a blank, and feels discouraged that he has used up all his ideas as a writer. The humor of this strip is a reminder that "all the good ideas" is not actually a finite list one can look into with "some checking".