Another lottery ticket?

Why do folks buy lottery tickets?

It’s certainly not based on any rational analysis of financial risk or reward.

So, why do something that almost never seems to work?

Because it actually works every single time.

What it does is release a hit of dopamine,

• first when we think about buying one,
• then again when we decide to buy one,
• and then a third time when we actually buy it.

For regular players, these three moments of hope and joy demolish the sadness that comes from actually losing. It’s a hope rush.

What’s that got to do with Pavlov?

Well… the same thing is true for the billion of us folks carrying around that Pavlovian box in our pockets.

The smart phone (so called in honor of the profit-seeking companies who were smart enough to make them!) is an optimized, tested and polished call-and-response machine.

So far, Apple’s made a trillion dollars by ringing our bell.

But we are hooked, so we put the phone in our pocket and wait for it to happen again.

Every time it pulses, we get a hit. Every time we realize we haven’t checked it in two minutes, we get a hit.

Hit, hit, hit. Again and again.

The box vibrates, we feel hope and fear and our loneliness subsides, then we check, and then we lose (again).

Ring a bell? Snoopy doesn’t have to figure it out, but nevertheless, it’s still true!

P.S. Thanks to Seth Godin for today’s “food for thought!”