Stretch catapult, take aim and release. Observe ensuing destruction.
It's a tried and tested formula that has kept young miscreants amused since humanity learned to pile three stones on top of each other. Applying it to the virtual world has made a small Finnish company's fortune - and no doubt cost countless other firms 10 times as much in lost productivity.
The compelling temporal sump that is Angry Birds has swept across the globe, swooping out from that Nordic country to lay waste to any idle moments that stood in its way.
A Google search brings up 222 million hits. That's just over 41 hits for every child, woman or man in the platform's home nation. It's even one hit for every other mobile phone on the planet - most of which aren't compatible with the slick touch-screen playability of the quirky puzzles.
Those feathery fiends have now completed the circle, leaping from the pixellated world into the physical in the form of gaudy merchandising.
Shanghai is by no means immune to this invasion - commuters scratching at their screens wearing officially branded trainers are a regular sight and stuffed toys are even sold in convenience stores. But it seems things may soon go a step further. Rovio - the company behind this digital craze - set up its regional base in Shanghai last year with an office to tailor marketing and new content for the mainland market.
A delegation of T-shirted executives in town late last month let slip the next step in their ploy for world domination. If things go their way, they could be breaking ground on an amusement park on the fringes of the mainland's most populous and affluent metropolis.
