[westcoast49]

Scott Adams has tried to describe it. He says that a good recipe for a joke is something that almost makes sense, but not quite. In other words, it has to be slightly absurd, but also slightly sensible, at the same time. A lot of Seinfeld jokes are along those lines.

[sumtechguy]

There is a decent series by Rowan Atkinson on how to build something humorous. For many standup's they basically slowly show after show 'write' their stories. By testing what is good or bad in them and discarding what does not work and keeping what does. I have been watching Josh Wolf on youtube. Not sure he meant to do it. But he tells one joke a few times in successive videos. But each time the story is more funny the newer the video it is. You can tell he is revising the joke and finding where to spice it up.

Do not remember which stand up I heard it from. Many usually try their new material at 2am. If you can not get the people who are decently drunk to laugh it probably is not a good joke.

[suzzer99]

Yeah Seinfeld talks about this too. Jokes have to be worked and worked. Sometimes he said the best wording only comes to him on stage.

[suzzer99]

A perfect example of this absurdity is expressing mock excitement: "ZOMG!1!!one1!"

Spelling out the one kills me every time.