Welcome to Luton

A sign reading ‘welcome to Luton’ greeted passengers flying into Gatwick Airport (London). For context, Luton airport is 60 miles south of Gatwick. Basically, no one going to Gatwick would want to be surprised by ending up in Luton.

The sign, as was its intention caused panic and confusion in the passengers. The prankster and wizard behind the curtain who brought this into being is YouTuber and comedian Max Fosh.

The joke was silly but effective enough to catch the attention of not only the passengers but netizens online. Subsequently news agencies worldwide also caught hold of it.

Max Fosh, is not a novice to such antics. His approach is to do these activities while ensuring they do not cause inconveniences to anyone. Let me tell you about some of his other videos- He was technically the richest man in the world for 7 minutes, he ran for mayor of London, and he has made his parents sign a binding legal document declaring him their favorite offspring.

Now, these ideas might seem foolish. But the lengths he goes to in bringing it to fruition has 9,54,000 people on YouTube chuckling with him.

His videos brought three words to my mind; motivation, creativity, and hard work.

Take the ‘welcome to Luton’ prank.

His goal was – a viral news story. Inspired by someone who had painted a ‘welcome to Cleveland’ sign on the roof of his house in Milwaukee, Max wanted to do the same thing in London.

This being a prank, he also wanted to place a sign in a location where people would notice and worry about it. His goal, the target, and his intention were clear.

While planning the operation – He looked at the logistics and decided on Gatwick airport. Googling flight paths helped him figure out exactly which area to focus on. Next, he called every house, business, and space owner around that area. At first, he got resounding rejections. Not giving up he spent weeks on the phone and finally got somebody to agree to let him use their land for his idea.

The work was not over yet, someone had to make the sign and it had to be big and believable enough to convince and confuse. He hired an artist because sometimes we must delegate work that is not our expertise. After two weeks Angus (the artist) had constructed each letter of the words out of tarpaulin. With the letters in tow, they drove to the site to drill in the giant 3 by 8-meter letters of the sign.

After all this painstaking effort, to achieve his goal of becoming a viral news story, there was realistically no guarantee of that result. It was likely that people will not notice, or dismiss the sign, and he might even get into trouble with the authorities. All he could do in the end was let go and hope for the best results.

My two bits

Looking at the entire situation, I have to commend the hard work he put in for such an uncertain outcome. I will use the lens of the two types of motivations, intrinsic and extrinsic for examination. Intrinsic motivation is when someone does an activity for the satisfaction of doing it, without any promise of external rewards. While extrinsic motivation is when someone does an activity for a separate outcome that is a reward or to avoid punishment. You can keep your room neat because you like cleaning up (intrinsic motivation) or you clean it because your parents/partner will get angry if you don’t (extrinsic motivation)

Coming back to Max Fosh, what motivated this man to do this amount of hard work? According to his previous videos, he likes to do silly things. So, there is intrinsic motivation. This tracks as research tells us, if one is intrinsically motivated, they will start activities themselves. They will also focus and sustain their effort for longer periods almost without realizing it. He certainly displays these characteristics. You can see several examples of this on his YouTube channel.

Now we don’t know what happens off camera. It is likely he has started and stopped many other ideas for not being viable. The ones he does carry out, however, are enough in number for the conclusion he does not give up without a fight.

But he also gets a certain amount of accolade, views, praise, and monetary benefits for his videos. So, I would say his motivation is also extrinsic. I would draw the comparison to a passionate Cricket player, being offered money to play the sport. The difference between a hobby and doing it as a job is the discipline.

The basic thing most YouTubers will tell you they have to do for their work is – Have a plan. Most will advise making a list of ideas, and having a calendar for videos and social media posts. Also important is getting sponsors so they can deliver quality in their content. Seeing that Max Fosh releases 1- 2 videos every month, plus there are sponsors that support his channel. We can reasonably assume he does take his job seriously.

People like him inspire me in many ways: –

1. He does not dismiss the absurd, out-of-the-box ideas he gets. Unlike us who get bogged down in the details, worry about failure, or don’t think beyond the idea to its execution.
2. The careful planning and thought he put in to bring the idea to its execution. Enjoying the process of research and making a note of the obstacles he is likely to face
3. Persevering for weeks in the face of many rejections. He continued to put in efforts with the same energy with which he started. Even making jokes, as if amused by the road bumps.
4. Convincing people to help him execute his crazy plans. Especially the many who did not like the idea in the first place.
5. After its execution the patience to let go and hope for good results.
6. Finding a way to do things that you enjoy into a job that gives you decent benefits – now that takes the cake.

As a disclaimer (this seems to be becoming a trend in my posts) I must vehemently stress I do not support pranking airports or indeed pranks in general. I am using Max Fosh and his videos to make a case for silliness. We were our most creative selves as children. Children are silly; they invent new games, color outside the lines, declare themselves the king/queen, and make up their own rules. We, can try and bring some of that into our lives today. We can worry less about others’ opinions, or the perfect solutions and try executing those ideas that do not fit inside pre-decided boxes.

The more we practice the art of thinking differently, we will push our minds to spark new ideas. Our brain makes new neural connections when we practice and learn something new. With time we will get, more practical and efficient at doing them.

If you are going to try to do something silly, I encourage you to go for it. All the best!

To anyone wanting to see Max Fosh’s version of events please see the video

Picture source- Creator – Abbey Desmond, May 2022