This comes from faithful FOP Jon Lebensold, who saw it first on Boing-Boing, and figured it would make us at Surprise Central equally happy.
He was right. (There's more where this came from. Click here to see 'em.)
The Hans Brinker Hotel in Amsterdam is famous (infamous?) for its conditions, and its honesty. This statement from its retro-simplistic site:
NO PARKING, NO SAUNA, NO BELLBOYS, NO AIR CONDITIONING, NO MINIBARS, NO ROOM SERVICE...but you will find clean basic rooms in central Amsterdam"
If you dig that, check out their equally-honest (and hilarious) Eco-Commitment and their promo videos here.
One of the nine major tactics in creating Surprise (#7 actually, as outlined in the upcoming Pow! book) is something called "Business Stupidity." I concocted this as the antithesis of Business Intelligence, where things are done so ridiculously wrong, they're right. The tactic urges users to: "Forget the smart thing to do; twist logic and act like an idiot."
Would anybody be writing about this hotel if it were yet just another budget overnighter, a Motel 6-clone? No chance in hell. The Hans Brinker folks have made their deficiencies into their strengths, and can get away with murder by doing so.
Can't wait to see what they do next.
Or what YOU do...if you have the guts to adopt Tactic #7.