There should be an automated hotline for idea testing. You call, you tell the computer your idea, and it calculates whether your notion is spectacularly good or ridiculously bad.

For example: Ring, ring. I think they should turn the Jericho military base into a giant urban farm, with some affordable housing thrown in. Ding! Ding! Ding!

Or: Ring, ring. I’d like to write a book about aliens who come to earth and they eat all the oil rigs and the humans fight the invaders but they should really be happy because the aliens have actually saved the Earth from climate change… Bzzzzzzz.

Or: Ring, ring. Musicians get to make all these cool recordings of political songs. So, for the duration of the election campaign, all writers should put down their pens and learn to play guitars… Bzzzzzzz.

Or maybe that’s actually a Ding! Ding! Ding!? See, I can’t tell. Thus the need for a hotline.