IA01: Stay Current

     I listened to a Freakonomics Radio episode by Stephen Dubner titled “An Egghead’s Guide to the Super Bowl.” The episode covered the Super bowl and ways for everyone to enjoy it. The author invited current and past NFL players Tuck, Winston, and Urschel to share their helpful tips for Super bowl 52. They all recommended watching not only the game, but the commercials and halftime show. Plus, there is always the pre- and post-game shows where anyone can hear points of views from their favorite ESPN commentators and analysts. 
     So, what were some of the main ideas? The first was that the Super Bowl is for everyone to watch. You can be young or old, a newbie or an expert, living in the United States or watching internationally and so on. As a business, the Super Bowl and the NFL have it down pat. They've created a business that virtually anyone can enjoy and participate in. The Super Bowl itself has shows before and after to discuss it, plays advertisements during it that people look forward to watching, and invites only the most successful performers to show off their best known songs during halftime.
     Leading up to the Super Bowl, there's regular season and playoffs which both include millions of fans and people gambling on games and creating fantasy teams. The business has convinced one hundred and ten million people to tune in on a Sunday for a football game between the AFC and NFC champions. People paid an average of $5,415 to go to the game, which mainly consisted of Philly fans who hoped the Eagles would win their first ever Super Bowl. And other businesses paid $5.5 million for a 30 seconds long commercial. 
     During the Super Bowl, people bet on everything such as the coin toss, the color of Pink's hair, how many times Brady's age was mentioned and so on. This way people could engage in every single second of the game, spend money and generate talk about it. I think the craziest part is how everyone watching can't wait for commercial breaks. Typically, everyone watches Netflix because there aren't any breaks, but on Super Bowl Sunday that's all anyone talks about. In the podcast, Dubner mentions that there isn't any study or research that even shows that a commercial during the Super Bowl helps generate any more sales. 5.5 million dollars is a bit of an expense for a commercial slot that might not even help in anyway, yet the slots go quickly and to all types of companies. 
     The Super Bowl has managed to create an atmosphere on a particular Sunday every year where so many Americans feel obligated to watch the game regardless of being a football fan. 
     
    My plan for the rest of my individual assignments is to work progressively in completing each one. Currently, I am narrowing down my possible interviewees and beginning to formulate a list of interview questions. For my personal business plan, I am going to start by creating my mission statement and doing a SWOT analysis, and then completing each section of the plan as we cover the topics in class. Individual assignment four requires attendance at an event, eight business cards, and my own card; I need to pick an event that interests me and attend it, as well as continue collecting business cards. I can create my business card and print it at any time. The guest lecture assignment is on going, because I take notes for each guest lecturer and will use those notes to pick a favorite and write on it. 

 Dubner, S. J. (2018, February 2). An Egghead’s Guide to the Super bowl [Audio blog post]. Retrieved February 9, 2018, from http://freakonomics.com/podcast/eggheads-guide-superbowl-rebroadcast-2/

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