"Seize the Day" #3 - Now I get it.

The AJC today finally addressed the question that's been nagging at me for weeks: How these two motivational, celebrity-filled, day-long programs advertised at $1.95 and $4.95 could possibly break even, when they've been spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on newpaper ads, with speaker fees as high as $100,000 for some. Even selling every seat in the 71,250 seat Georgia Dome wouldn't pay for the advertising alone, I figured.

Turns out, it's the old bait-and-switch advertising. Yes, you can get a seat for $1.95 or $4.95, somewhere like a football field away from the speakers' stand. And if you want to sit up front it will cost more like $200.

And the real reasons: there have been complaints against such meetings for the high pressure tactics used to sell expensive, continuing programs to help you realize all that potential to get rich, etc.

The big celebries do actually talk about something inspiring and informative. But they are mostly the crowd draw -- it's the products they sell where they make money.

So -- OK. Now it makes sense. Maybe some people will get fired up and actually start that small business venture or write that book. More power to them.

I still don't know why I cared so much to get the bigger picture. Maybe it's envy that they would pay someone like Sarah Palin or Rudy Guiliani big bucks to utter a few words. Maybe it's wanting to poke fun at the whole thing.

Whatever. Now I can quit thinking about it; and soon those insistent, daily, full page ads will be gone; because the events will have already happened and everybody will have gone home.

Ralph