My /wish list

Last year I heard this episode of Hidden Brain that talked about the science of gift giving. Jeff Galak (the expert guest) made some really interesting points:

• Giving a bad gift is not only disappointing to the recipient, but it also places a burden on them to reciprocate giving a gift to you!
• Be very careful around the hobbies that people have. Often times, they’ve put in a lot of thought and done a lot of research on the topic. They likely have a pretty specific set of requirements for the thing they want. If you buy them the wrong thing now they are stuck with a thing they don’t really want, but also might feel like they can’t justify getting the actual thing they want.
• If you know with certainty someone is going to use the gift you got them, that can be a decent gift. Maybe a Starbucks gift card if the person goes to Starbucks every day. That sort of thing.
• If all else fails, giving money is NOT a bad option. At least they can buy something they want guilt-free!

At the end, the interviewer asked Jeff how he approaches gifts with his wife. This was his answer:

We literally just keep a Google Doc with links to things we want.

Then I came across the wish manifesto and thought, I should do this! For a little while now I’ve been maintaining a wishlist on Amazon, but I don’t want it to be limited to only things that can be bought there!

So here it is. My /wish page!