​This could be more appropriately called the “torn from the headlines” strategy, but calling “CSI” is a great reminder that, sometimes, facts make great fiction.

With this approach, scroll through the headlines of a news website and see what the headlines trigger in your imagination. There are a few ways to do this:

• Apply the Netflix strategy to multiple headlines
  • Combine the elements of two or more headlines
• Write the story
  • Write a "big" story that fits the headline
• Intentionally misunderstand the headline
  • As I’m writing, one headline reads “Original ‘Sesame Street’ Character Dies.” I know they’re talking about one of the humans (Bob McGrath), but my writer brain immediately goes “Oh, no! What happened to Kermit?” And that joke can lead to all sorts of story ideas.
• Visit the other side of the argument
  • It used to be that news was merely facts with an editorial sprinkled here and there. Nowadays, most news outlets seem to be all editorial disguised as fact. Even when there is true news being reported, an outlet may have a bias—they only report news in such a way that promotes a certain view. They can’t even be registered as a news outlet, but as entertainment. This is a shame in the bigger scheme of things, but for this exercise, it can be quite helpful.
  • If you lean left/liberal, scan the headlines on some outlet that leans right/conservative, and vice versa.
  • Why is this helpful? Because reading an alternative bias against what you typically resonate with is likely to spark something unsettling within you, and that angst can drive creativity.

Remember, the vast majority of the concepts you generate will suck. And that is okay. You need to give yourself permission to be crazy, stupid, out there, and messy when you’re trying to figure out what to write. Don’t edit yourself. The goal is to just have fun with this and generate as many ideas as you can. You’ll then review the concepts and see which ones get your attention, which ones can be tweaked into a better concept, and hone in on the marketable ones.

Always remember, “Sharknado” is a thing. It’s not only ridiculously dumb, but was ridiculously successful. Just have fun with this.

​This first “Netflix” strategy was once my favorite, but the Netflix interface is no longer compatible—especially the way it auto-plays previews. It used to show a grid of movies, where each row more or less contained a different genre…and scrolling through that grid was what helped me generate ideas.
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Luckily, Google offers a great alternative. Search “movies on Netflix,” and results show up in a grid as shown here.

​And here comes the fun. Pick two movies in the same genre, and a third from a different genre or category and try to get yourself to see something by combining the three.