An unemployed man goes to apply for a job with Microsoft
as a janitor. The manager there arranges for him to take
an aptitude test (Section: Floors, sweeping and cleaning).
After the test, the manager says, "You will be employed
at minimum wage, $5.15 an hour. Let me have your e-mail
address, so that I can send you a form to complete and
tell you where to report for work on your first day."
Taken aback, the man protests that he has neither a
computer nor an e-mail address. To this the Microsoft
manager replies, "Well then, that means that you
virtually don't exist and can therefore hardly expect
to be employed."
Stunned, the man leaves. Not knowing where to turn and
having only $10 in his wallet, he decides to buy a 25
LB flat of tomatoes at the supermarket.
Within less than 2 hours, he sells all the tomatoes
individually at 100% profit. Repeating the process
several times more that day,he ends up with almost
$100 before going to sleep that night.
And thus it dawns on him that he could quite easily
make a living selling tomatoes. Getting up early every
day and going to bed late, he multiplies his profits
quickly.
After a short time he acquires a cart to transport
several dozen boxes of tomatoes, only to have to trade
it in again so that he can buy a pickup truck to support
his expanding business. By the end of the second year,
he is the owner of a fleet of pickup trucks and manages
a staff of a hundred former unemployed people, all
selling tomatoes.
Planning for the future of his wife and children, he
decides to buy some life insurance. Consulting with
an insurance adviser, he picks an insurance plan to
fit his new circumstances. At the end of the telephone
conversation, the adviser asks him for his e-mail
address in order to send the final documents electronically.
When the man replies that he has no e-mail, the adviser
is stunned, "What! You don't have e-mail? How on earth
have you managed to amass such wealth without the Internet,
e-mail and e-commerce? Just imagine where you would be now,
if only you had been connected to the Internet from the
very start!"
After a moment of thought, the tomato millionaire replied,
"Why, of course! I would be a floor cleaner at Microsoft!"
