Art requires no explanation. Design is an explanation.
There is no contest in my opinion.
4.30.2008
INTERNET GROWTH/COMMUNICATIONS
Companies have already begun developing and securing specific portals/networks for their brands based on the social tendrils of their employees. Rich reputations for each employee will be key with a focus on validating knowledge and skill-sets of these brand stewards, from other networks. Eventually, everyone will have a web page or blog. Companies will then mine and seed participatory networks with brand stewards, developing rich reputations with users. There might even be networks with identities based on products themselves. Because of the very salient problem of contextual search, brands will begin to develop interactive store fronts where a one-on-one approach can be initiated with prospects. This might also include developing proprietary web applications and widgets, actually it is happening but I anticipate digital corporate stationary–sorta, a browser re-skinned when you visit a companies web site. Users really only need a few functions from within the browser itself. Menu options can remain within the computers respective OS with toggle options. We might even see the web browser traded out for widgets entirely. Simply because, a brand has more creative freedom with a widget. Skinning browsers and designing custom interface experiences will enhance brand equity. Currently, we're all stuck with a dual interface experience. Which can be easily overcome with widgets.
We've seen plenty of proprietary software and wed-based applications being developed by creative agencies too. Brands will need to start treating the internet as an operating system and develop websites like software companies develop programs. There is nothing more direct then a desktop widget that a prospect has downloaded and installed themselves. I'm not a huge fan of web based applications for a few reasons that I will address in another post–hopefully.
Following this, I think we might see a concentrated effort in bringing these experiences back to highly evolved brick and mortar environments. We'll probably see travel/tourism, clothing/apparell, and entertainment/gaming taking these first steps.
Retail environments can be greatly enhanced with technology and create a truly unique experience for the visiting prospect. Shopping online is very critical to the user but, so is basic social interaction. As newer generations emerge and grow with the tech-trends; smaller devices for connecting, etc., we might see entertainment travel full-circle back to a real tangible experience within these retail environments.
A thought on the global economy; This is occurring faster outside of the U.S market. Developing companies within new/smaller markets, aren't subject to the existing stigmas that lie within the US's existing/traditional agencies/companies–let alone their clients. And let's not forget about the rapidly developing countries that have changed economic and social practices within one generation. Implementation of more advanced communication is absorbed with less skepticism and restraint.
Web 3.0 isn't an adequate enough descriptor.
We've seen plenty of proprietary software and wed-based applications being developed by creative agencies too. Brands will need to start treating the internet as an operating system and develop websites like software companies develop programs. There is nothing more direct then a desktop widget that a prospect has downloaded and installed themselves. I'm not a huge fan of web based applications for a few reasons that I will address in another post–hopefully.
Following this, I think we might see a concentrated effort in bringing these experiences back to highly evolved brick and mortar environments. We'll probably see travel/tourism, clothing/apparell, and entertainment/gaming taking these first steps.
Retail environments can be greatly enhanced with technology and create a truly unique experience for the visiting prospect. Shopping online is very critical to the user but, so is basic social interaction. As newer generations emerge and grow with the tech-trends; smaller devices for connecting, etc., we might see entertainment travel full-circle back to a real tangible experience within these retail environments.
A thought on the global economy; This is occurring faster outside of the U.S market. Developing companies within new/smaller markets, aren't subject to the existing stigmas that lie within the US's existing/traditional agencies/companies–let alone their clients. And let's not forget about the rapidly developing countries that have changed economic and social practices within one generation. Implementation of more advanced communication is absorbed with less skepticism and restraint.
Web 3.0 isn't an adequate enough descriptor.
GRAPHIC DESIGN AUCTION SITES
Overall, these sites are still a merit-based system. Whether you are number one because of sales or creativity, you've earned it in some way. No one can fault you or your company for that. The only down-side that I've encountered, and confirmed with other users is; the language barriers that sometimes arise due to hiring outside your respective market/state/territory/country. It affects the work in some waya solely because the end-result is dependent on the initial client/creative interaction and communication.
I used a few of these sites years ago when they were fledgling beta startups. They were my first experience with a social network. They could be considered one of the first online-public social spaces. Some that come to mind; eLance ( beta orange ), bullhorn, smarterwork and guru.
Earning the work required the same tactics used by large companies, agencies, boutiques and freelancers.
The respective currencies of each user was the only true competition seen as 'harmful' to the industry. In fact, the long-term effect is far more valuable. Talent speaks many different languages.
I used a few of these sites years ago when they were fledgling beta startups. They were my first experience with a social network. They could be considered one of the first online-public social spaces. Some that come to mind; eLance ( beta orange ), bullhorn, smarterwork and guru.
Earning the work required the same tactics used by large companies, agencies, boutiques and freelancers.
The respective currencies of each user was the only true competition seen as 'harmful' to the industry. In fact, the long-term effect is far more valuable. Talent speaks many different languages.
4.28.2008
8 THOUGHTS ON A SUCCESSFUL CAMPAIGN
Please allow me to qualify my list with this statement first; Establish a clear single-minded message or do not bother with a penetration campaign.
1) Cross-pollinate the online market segment with information about the company. Post information about the company on sister-blogs and find market segments that parallel your company/objective and connect with them. The internet is the largest social network of them all. All other participant networks are equivalent to different street corners in the same city. Simplify key messages. They don't have to be simple-minded, just easy to relate to. Prospects will need to be able to reference any offer proposed to them. They will look to validate the communication and find supporting facts. Participant/Social networks are simply really fast email with music and my most recent birthday pictures. Creating a place to hangout is not as effective as most advertisers think. Using passive techniques for an aggressive medium is silly. And for the user who is seeker-first, the street corner won't sustain their interests very long.
2) Don't forget there is a real world. The internet is still an infant in many ways. And it's constantly reminded of this as tech company after tech company perform rapid prototyping of software and web-based applications. There is a lot of user-education needed to make internet-based markets work. The typical user does not have time to learn something new everyday. My point; look for brick and mortar segments worth penetrating with street teams and penetration campaigns too. Experiential marketing efforts will help facilitate WOM and establish more relevancy. Create something that is worth talking about with friends. Something the market can discover.
3) Think relevancy, not marketing.
4) All employees, both agency-side and client-side, should act in the capacity of a brand steward for the company and campaign. I'm sure we've all experienced the power of conversation that has been reinforced with a raw experience. Those that are positive. The trickle effect begins with you and them and who they interact with.
5) Don't lie.
6) X-Factor. It's gonna happen. Try to smile gracefully if it has negative results.
7) Don't get to caught up in technology and web-based apps just yet. The turnaround is fast for us intrawebbers but there is a much larger market segment that has no idea what's happened in last 5 months. Most won't care either.
8) First question we ask of the strategy is; Is it creative? ;)
1) Cross-pollinate the online market segment with information about the company. Post information about the company on sister-blogs and find market segments that parallel your company/objective and connect with them. The internet is the largest social network of them all. All other participant networks are equivalent to different street corners in the same city. Simplify key messages. They don't have to be simple-minded, just easy to relate to. Prospects will need to be able to reference any offer proposed to them. They will look to validate the communication and find supporting facts. Participant/Social networks are simply really fast email with music and my most recent birthday pictures. Creating a place to hangout is not as effective as most advertisers think. Using passive techniques for an aggressive medium is silly. And for the user who is seeker-first, the street corner won't sustain their interests very long.
2) Don't forget there is a real world. The internet is still an infant in many ways. And it's constantly reminded of this as tech company after tech company perform rapid prototyping of software and web-based applications. There is a lot of user-education needed to make internet-based markets work. The typical user does not have time to learn something new everyday. My point; look for brick and mortar segments worth penetrating with street teams and penetration campaigns too. Experiential marketing efforts will help facilitate WOM and establish more relevancy. Create something that is worth talking about with friends. Something the market can discover.
3) Think relevancy, not marketing.
4) All employees, both agency-side and client-side, should act in the capacity of a brand steward for the company and campaign. I'm sure we've all experienced the power of conversation that has been reinforced with a raw experience. Those that are positive. The trickle effect begins with you and them and who they interact with.
5) Don't lie.
6) X-Factor. It's gonna happen. Try to smile gracefully if it has negative results.
7) Don't get to caught up in technology and web-based apps just yet. The turnaround is fast for us intrawebbers but there is a much larger market segment that has no idea what's happened in last 5 months. Most won't care either.
8) First question we ask of the strategy is; Is it creative? ;)
4.13.2008
STAR WARS: SAUL BASS
"If Star Wars was filmed two decades earlier and Saul Bass did the opening title sequence, it "might" look like this...
This was part of a school project. The song is "Machine" by the Buddy Rich Band off the album Big Swing Face (1967)."
Via Creativity Machine
I'm getting that "Cowboy Beebop" love again after hearing this tune. :)
4.10.2008
4.07.2008
VIDEO COULD BE PROFITABLE IF:
1) Dynamic text that is selectable from within the movie despite being animated or affected by FX.
2) Dynamic roll-over and stop frame captions on products, services, clothes/apparel–like a pause button in a video game.
3) KeyFrame anchors within the content to allow bookmarking and instant recall from within our browsers ( soon to be replaced with widgets ). This also allows the user to send just that specific portion of the video via email or links.
4) Portability of the actual source files.
5) Commenting and annotation within the video-itself.
6) Top down-Top up conversations for other applications.
In essence, video becomes an application and not just a passive communication medium.
I know–I haven't even scratched the surface. :)
2) Dynamic roll-over and stop frame captions on products, services, clothes/apparel–like a pause button in a video game.
3) KeyFrame anchors within the content to allow bookmarking and instant recall from within our browsers ( soon to be replaced with widgets ). This also allows the user to send just that specific portion of the video via email or links.
4) Portability of the actual source files.
5) Commenting and annotation within the video-itself.
6) Top down-Top up conversations for other applications.
In essence, video becomes an application and not just a passive communication medium.
I know–I haven't even scratched the surface. :)
1$ GUERRILLA MARKETING
1) Exchange the dollar for one-hundred pennies.
2) Write the message on each penny.
3) Distribute the pennies personally.
2) Write the message on each penny.
3) Distribute the pennies personally.
SHOULD GRAPHIC DESIGNERS BE CERTIFIED?
( asked in the LinkedIn Q:A section )
Creativity, Art, Design–The Arts, are a blue collar sport. You get better by doing. And having the ability 'to do' means not allowing for more hierarchies to be developed. Technique is making the perfect mistake. Let me know when all clients are willing to accept 'effective' design as a respectable practice and profession with proven ROI and quantifiable metrics and I'll let you know what I think about certification. Unfortunately, there are two types of clients; Those that can see it, and those that need to hear it. As designers ( creatives in general ) we need to be able to design and create for both audiences. At that point, you've demonstrated your worth as a communicator first and foremost. All we can do as creatives, is offer other creatives what we've already done. Just my opinion.
Creativity, Art, Design–The Arts, are a blue collar sport. You get better by doing. And having the ability 'to do' means not allowing for more hierarchies to be developed. Technique is making the perfect mistake. Let me know when all clients are willing to accept 'effective' design as a respectable practice and profession with proven ROI and quantifiable metrics and I'll let you know what I think about certification. Unfortunately, there are two types of clients; Those that can see it, and those that need to hear it. As designers ( creatives in general ) we need to be able to design and create for both audiences. At that point, you've demonstrated your worth as a communicator first and foremost. All we can do as creatives, is offer other creatives what we've already done. Just my opinion.
NO WE'RE MADE FOR EACH OTHER
Take my brand–please. Formulate a process to effectively communicate benefits, solutions, products, lifestyles, or life-enhancing experiences to the prospects most likely to utilize them. Believe that strategy is driven by, and must be aligned with, the opportunities presented within the marketplace, existing competitive environment and the organization's unique competencies and benefits. The methods by which people absorb information, entertainment — perception, retention, engagement — has changed irrevocably. As should each brand respectively.
Insist on sound strategic planning. This process makes us smarter about our clients and establishes a more concise criteria for creative solutions. Believe that proper planning is the cornerstone to providing dynamic and more effective communications.
Insist on sound strategic planning. This process makes us smarter about our clients and establishes a more concise criteria for creative solutions. Believe that proper planning is the cornerstone to providing dynamic and more effective communications.
4.05.2008
4.01.2008
THE DECLINE OF HEROES
The Decline of Heroes
BY
Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr.
" For The Crisis of the Old Order, the first volume in his continuing study of the Rooseveltian era, Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., won the Society of American Historian's Francis Parkman Prize. His The Age of Jackson, published in 1945, won the Pulitzer Prize. Like his father, who has written fifteen important social and historical studies, Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., is professor of history at harvard University. He is married and has four children.
Ours is an age without heroes–and, when we say this, we suddenly realize how spectacularly the world has changed in a generation. Most of us grew up in a time of towering personalities. For better or for worse, great men seemed to dominate our lives and shape our destiny. In the United States we had Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, Franklin Roosevelt. In Great Britain, there were Lloyd George and Winston Churchill. In other lands, there were Lenin, Stalin, Hitler, Mussolini, Clemenceau, Ghandhi, Kemal, Sun Yatsen. Outside of politics there were Einstein, Freud, Keynes. Some of these great men influenced the world for good, others for evil; but, wether for good or for evil, the that each had not died at birth made a difference, one believed, to everyone who lived after them.
Today no one bestrides our narrow world like a colossus; we have no giants who play roles which one can imagine no one else playing in their stead. There are a few figures on the margin of uniqueness, perhaps: Adenauer, Nehru, Tito, De Gaulle, Chiang, Kai-Shek, Mao Tse-tung. But there seem to be none in the epic style of those mighty figures of our recent past who seized history with both hands and gave it an imprint, even a direction, which it otherwise might not have had. As De Gaulle himself once remarked on hearing of Stalin"s death, "The age of giants is over." Whatever one thought, wether one admired or detested Roosevelt or Churchill, Stalin or HItler, one nevertheless felt the sheer weight of such personalities on one's own existence. We feel no comparable perssures today. Our own President, with all his pleasant qualities, has more or less explicitly renounced any desire to impress his own views on history. The Macmillans, Khurshchevs and Gronchis have measurably less specific gravity than their predecessors. Other men could be in their places as leaders of America or Britain or Russia or Italy without any change in the course of history. Why ours should thus be an age without heroes, and whether this condition is good or bad for us and for civilization, are topics worthy of investigation.
Why have giants vanished from our midsts? One must never neglect the role of accident in history; and accident no doubt plays a part here. But too many accidents of the same sort cease to be wholly accidental. One must inquire further. Why should our age not only be without great men but even seem actively hostile to them? Surely one reason we have so few heroes now is precisely that we had so many a generation ago. Greatness is hard for common humanity to bear. As Emerson said, "Heroism means difficulty, postponement of praise, postponement of ease, introduction of the world into the private apartment, introduction of eternity into the hours measured by the sitting-room clock." A world of heroes keeps people from living their own private lives.
Moreover, great men live dangerously. They introduce extremes into existence–extremes of good, extremes of evil–and ordinary men after a time flinch from the ultimates and yearn for undemanding security. The Second World War was the climax of an epoch of living dangerously. It is no surprise that it precipitated a universal revulsion against greatness. "
BY
Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr.
" For The Crisis of the Old Order, the first volume in his continuing study of the Rooseveltian era, Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., won the Society of American Historian's Francis Parkman Prize. His The Age of Jackson, published in 1945, won the Pulitzer Prize. Like his father, who has written fifteen important social and historical studies, Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., is professor of history at harvard University. He is married and has four children.
Ours is an age without heroes–and, when we say this, we suddenly realize how spectacularly the world has changed in a generation. Most of us grew up in a time of towering personalities. For better or for worse, great men seemed to dominate our lives and shape our destiny. In the United States we had Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, Franklin Roosevelt. In Great Britain, there were Lloyd George and Winston Churchill. In other lands, there were Lenin, Stalin, Hitler, Mussolini, Clemenceau, Ghandhi, Kemal, Sun Yatsen. Outside of politics there were Einstein, Freud, Keynes. Some of these great men influenced the world for good, others for evil; but, wether for good or for evil, the that each had not died at birth made a difference, one believed, to everyone who lived after them.
Today no one bestrides our narrow world like a colossus; we have no giants who play roles which one can imagine no one else playing in their stead. There are a few figures on the margin of uniqueness, perhaps: Adenauer, Nehru, Tito, De Gaulle, Chiang, Kai-Shek, Mao Tse-tung. But there seem to be none in the epic style of those mighty figures of our recent past who seized history with both hands and gave it an imprint, even a direction, which it otherwise might not have had. As De Gaulle himself once remarked on hearing of Stalin"s death, "The age of giants is over." Whatever one thought, wether one admired or detested Roosevelt or Churchill, Stalin or HItler, one nevertheless felt the sheer weight of such personalities on one's own existence. We feel no comparable perssures today. Our own President, with all his pleasant qualities, has more or less explicitly renounced any desire to impress his own views on history. The Macmillans, Khurshchevs and Gronchis have measurably less specific gravity than their predecessors. Other men could be in their places as leaders of America or Britain or Russia or Italy without any change in the course of history. Why ours should thus be an age without heroes, and whether this condition is good or bad for us and for civilization, are topics worthy of investigation.
Why have giants vanished from our midsts? One must never neglect the role of accident in history; and accident no doubt plays a part here. But too many accidents of the same sort cease to be wholly accidental. One must inquire further. Why should our age not only be without great men but even seem actively hostile to them? Surely one reason we have so few heroes now is precisely that we had so many a generation ago. Greatness is hard for common humanity to bear. As Emerson said, "Heroism means difficulty, postponement of praise, postponement of ease, introduction of the world into the private apartment, introduction of eternity into the hours measured by the sitting-room clock." A world of heroes keeps people from living their own private lives.
Moreover, great men live dangerously. They introduce extremes into existence–extremes of good, extremes of evil–and ordinary men after a time flinch from the ultimates and yearn for undemanding security. The Second World War was the climax of an epoch of living dangerously. It is no surprise that it precipitated a universal revulsion against greatness. "
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Imagine a brand landscape defined by the individual; the consumer, the prospect, the common surveyor–a marketplace that evolves organically based on consumer interaction and feedback. A company and their agency-both accountable for their products, services and ideas. Knowledge is growing directly in relation to the amount of people contributing to it without regard for social or economical barriers. Language barriers don't exist. Knowledge is systematic growth based on interoperation without ration. Mass communications leveraged by the individual. Products and services rising and falling on their own merits. Someone googles "sucker born everyday," every minute. Advertising talks too much, art requires no explanation and we live in the middle. Create relevancy.
