Found an incredible Reddit thread, "What's a rule that was implemented somewhere that massively backfired?"
Here are the best ones 🧵
1/ Alcohol bans at college football games led to increased intoxication problems b/c fans were getting really drunk before entering the stadium.
2/ When @dominos said all pizzas would be delivered in 30 minutes or less OR your pizza was FREE.
The delivery drivers kept getting into car accidents to get your pizza to you on time, so it wouldn’t come out of their pay check.
The promotion didn't last too long.
3/ "English law in Wales set the death penalty for stealing a sheep. Welshmen caught stealing sheep would claim to be making love to them.
They would get a lesser penalty for beastiality. The consequence of this is Welshmen gained a reputation as 'sheep shaggers'." 🐑
4/ Employees at one company were getting a bit liberal with lunch time, so their boss made everyone text when they started and ended lunch.
One dude started texting every detail: start time, order, price, address, end time, random emotions.
They cancelled the policy.
5/ In 209 BC, a band of 900 Chinese soldiers were marching to defend a city in Northern China. A flood stopped them halfway.
Qin law dictated that the government would execute anyone that was "late" for government orders. Rather than face execution, the soldiers rebelled. ⚔️
6/ “‘You have to eat whatever you touch’ was a rule in my kindergarten which led to all the children touching all the food to call dibs on it.” 🥦
(Editor's Note: I definitely remember this one hahahahah)
7/ Washington State made it mandatory for schools to drop their room temperatures to save on electricity.
The result: teachers brought their own heaters into their offices and use of electricity increased. 🌡️
8/ In Athens (late 80s), the government tried to limit pollution by having odd-numbered and even-numbered license plates drive on alternating days.
Result: everyone bought a second (shittier and with worse emission) car as their backup. Streets stayed clogged, pollution worse.
9/ In Alberta, strip club patrons must keep a 2m buffer from dancers The only currency that can travel that far are metal loonie ($1) & twoonie ($2) coins:
"The goal was to protect the safety & dignity of dancers but the dancers have become reduced to fleshy coin toss targets”
10/ A college bar had a happy-hour promotion: $0.50 a beer until anyone in the bar peed.
Some crazy shit started happening: 1) people wore adult diapers; 2) others would covertly pee in trash cans or hidden corners.
The bar cancelled happy hour. 🍺
11/ One city had an issue with loud bikes, so they installed decibel readers as a deterrent.
People started driving up to the machine and revved up their vehicles to see who could “win” by being the loudest.
The city took the reader down.🚗
12/ INSANE SOCCER STORY PART #1
Barbados played Grenada to qualify for the 1994 Caribbean Cup. Per tournament rules, a goal in extra time would be worth 2x goals for qualification purposes.
@ end of regulation, Barbados was winning 2-1 but it wasn’t enough goals to qualify...
13/ INSANE SOCCER STORY PART #2
...to get to extra time (& chance for 2x goal), Barbados scored an own goal. Then Grenada did the same.
For the final 7 mins, each team defended the OTHER team’s net to stop own goals. In the end, Barbados got to extra time & netted the 2x goal!
14/ Here's the original Reddit piece (more good stuff at the source):
The invention of bánh mì is a combination of climate, trade and urban layout of Saigon in late-19th century designed by French colonist.
When the French captured the area in 1859, most economic activity in the region took place along the Saigon river.
The population built makeshift homes tightly bundled by the river banks. Outgrowth from this eventually lead to narrow alleyways between many buildings that is trademark of the city (the Khmer named the region Prey Nokor then French renamed it Saigon and then it was renamed to Ho Chi Minh City in 1976 after end of Vietnam War).
Over decades, the French created European street grids and built wide Paris-type boulevards in the city to funnel commerce to larger markets (also make the city easier to administer).
It was at these markets that French baguettes were introduced and traded.
Bánh mì bread is known for being flaky and crispy on the outside while fluffier on inside (so god damn good).
Two features of Saigon helped create this texture:
▫️Climate: The heat and humidity in Southeast Asia leads dough to ferment faster, which creates air pockets in bread (light and fluffy).
▫️Ingredient: Wide availability of rice meant locals added rice flour to wheat flour imports (which were quite expensive). Rice flour is more resistant to moisture and creates a drier, crispier crust.
Fast forward to the 1930s: the French-designed street layout is largely complete. Now, the city centre has wide boulevards intersected by countless narrow alleyways.
The design was ideal for street vendor carts. These businesses were inspired by shophosue of colonial architecture to sell all types of goods as chaotic traffic rushed by.
Vietnam has some of the most slapping rice and soup dishes, but many people on the move in the mornings wanted something more portable and edible by hand.
Bánh mì was traditionally upper class fare but it met the need for on-the-go food.
Just fill the bread with some Vietnamese ingredients (braised pork, pickled vegetable, Vietnamese coriander, chilies) along with French goodies (pate).
Pair it with cà phê sữa đá (aka coffee with condensed milk aka caffeinated crack) and you’re laughing.
Haven’t lived in Saigon for 10+ years but ate a banh mi every other day when I did.
While there, I also sold a comedy script to Fox (pitch: “The Fugitive meets Harold & Kumar set in Southeast Asia”).
reminder that no “asian guy and stripper” story will ever top Enron Lou Pai’s “asian guy and stripper” story
Totally forgot Lou Pai got the stripper pregnant.
If this story was transplanted to 2020s, Pai would probably have been a whale on OnlyFans and gotten got…anyways, I wrote about the economics of OF here: readtrung.com/p/onlyfans-sti…
Boston Consulting Group (BCG) trained an AI slideshow maker called “Decker” on 900 templates and apparently gotten so popular that “some of its consultants are fretting about job security.”
Sorry, called “Deckster”. That excerpt was from this BI piece that also looked at McKinsey and Deloitte AI uses: businessinsider.com/consulting-ai-…
The Mckinsey chatbot is used by 70% of firm but same anonymous job board said it’s "functional enough" and best for "very low stakes issues." x.com/bearlyai/statu…
Here’s a r/consulting thread based on Computer World last year. Deckster was launched internally March 2024…some think it’s BS…some think it helps with cold start (B- quality): reddit.com/r/consulting/s…