The physicist checked his value ranking before he went to the lab, and stopped, astounded. He had never ranked higher than the bottom hundred that cleared the recognize threshold, but today he was up to number 3! Not just on the physics boards, either, but on the widenet. He clicked through, trying desperately to figure out what was going on. Happy birthday wishes, lots of them. Ah. But a birthday alone was not enough--somebody had chosen him as the random celebrate his birthday because he gave us something nominee. He clicked through--and laughed. It had been a physics project when he was just a college student, when he wanted to try and get in good with the frats and so he came up with a beer-cooler that--


Inspiration: Google's doodle today is in honor of the physicist Heinrich Rudolf Hertz. I did my little bit of logomancy and ended up on a site that tracks trending topics on Twitter.
Story Potential: High.
Notes: So you're going to be famous for a day. One day only. What do you do to capitalize on it? And if you're a geeky sort of person, do you already have a plan for what to do, just in case? Like if I suddenly started making serious money from writing, I know who I'd hire to be my accountants. This could be a really fun brain exercise.

Her last update was six hours ago, and she was beginning to sweat. She was trapped at Christmas, surrounded by the gems and gewgaws that her mother dragged out every year, a shining winking blinking array of lights. She'd managed to sneak out for breakfast and stop by a cafe that had fresh crepes and a full-band upload booth, so she'd gotten that taken care of. She might have relaxed--it was Christmas, after all--but she knew some of her fans and she knew how alone they were. She felt genuine sympathy for them, and wanted to keep them company, help them to feel connected to another human being, liked, as if they could be her friends if they only lived close enough. She did. She also knew well enough that they didn't have the perspective to understand why she--

Inspiration: Mephisto Walz - Hangin' on the Telephone
Story Potential: Low
Notes: Like the various "nudge a friend" features, but now with electric shock and paycheck docking.