one part truth, two parts mixer

Reptilian cores and consumerism

2011-10-20T09:28:28+01:00

Good article in Vanity Fair (California and Bust, Michael Lewis, November 2011) about the strain that local economies are under. Interesting theory about human hardwiring and how it copes with abundance (helpfully not the highlighted bit):

Resolutions kept

2011-10-09T16:41:51+01:00

I don't think I shared 2011's new years resolution, and maybe that's why I've kept it. The resolution was 'Less smartphone, more books' (very much a variation on 2009's resolution). So I didn't renew the contract on my smartphone and devoted my time to reading more (I do still have a phone, but it's super retro). I realise that I didn't need to make any sacrifice to acheive my goal, but I have very litle self control.

Anyway, what I've read this year (plus Made to Stick and The White Woman on the Green Bicycle, which I've lent out):

I'm super proud of this effort, because it's the most I've read in a year since I was at university. I got to reread books that I'd been missing (Lord of the Flies, The Leopard, Confederacy of Dunces) and make a dent in my 'to read' pile that's been building up since 2009. My topline highlights and disappointments:

You may have noticed a selection of Trinidad and Tobago themed books in that pile, which I devoured in and around the two weeks I spend out there in March. I probably loved the Dragon Can't Dance more because I read it over carnival, but I would thoroughly recommend. Probably my favourite new read of the year.
I'd never read Margaret Atwood before (thanks to Ngaio for recommending), but really enjoyed the Blind Assassin, and will probably read more.
Freedom - Good, but I'm with Lynz on this one, not as good as The Corrections. The politicism was too overt, and what happens in the end in neon lights from about midway (but without really caring about the how)
Both Santa Evita and The Way to Paradise are fictional accounts of real people, Evita and Paul Gaugin respectively, and interestingly both had the same pace. Most great books have you racing towards the end with a desperate need to know the resolution/ending, but these were books that you could probably give up on (Santa Evita more).
Hegarty on Advertising was alright - I don't know if it's because I've heard most of the stories because I work at BBH, but it didn't have the reveals and stories of Ogilvy's book (loved the layout though and also spotted a couple of typos). Also, in true BBH style it's all about success, whereas I would love to know how Hegarty learned from his mistakes - there is obviously the possibility that he never made any ;)
While I respect the way that Mark Haddon tells the story, I just couldn't get into the writing style of the Curious Incident of Dog in the Night-Time.
As was the case with Sea Otters Gambolling in the Wild, Wild Surf, just not my sort of book (sorry Mark, I didn't enjoy it very much). Actually if despite my opinion you would like to read it then please shout and I'll send it over to you. Actually that goes for Black Rock too, as although it was an enjoyable enough read (quite harrowing actually), it's also never going to get a second reading.

Grossman's Life and Fate in the post. Vanity Fair on the bedside table. Rejoicing in wonderful, wonderful words.

Urban legend

2011-09-19T14:39:37+01:00

This has been doing the rounds on Facebook recently:

Wouldn’t it be great if that was true? Although I guess the thieves would also be aware of this, so any holdup would be a dangerous game of bluffing.

Erm...

2011-09-15T16:04:19+01:00

Why is it more expensive to print out your own tickets than to collect them in the box office? Ticketweb FAIL.

Greed

2011-09-05T14:04:00+01:00

So, for the first time in a long time I got hit with a direct debit and overdraft charge because sneaky T-mobile took my cash out before the 1st of the month. I probably shouldn't have been living so close to the edge but since I reduced my overdraft to £200 I flirt with danger all the time. I got charged £25, which we know isn't representative of the cost to the bank. It seems that despite the ruling and banks having to repay unfair charges, nothing much has changed.

I know that Ryanair don't pride themselves on customer anything but I paid £48 for web check in and card charges for some flights (I had to fly Ryanair as they are the only people that went to the destination). Now the Office of Fair Trading are on their tails. And rightfully so. I hope you can claim retrospective charges back as in the case of the banks.

I'm guessing that this has come about following a huge volume of customer complaints. I myself wrote to the OFT about my Ryanair charge because it was so unbelievable (I also wrote to them about BT charging to not make calls but apparently that's legal).

Anyway, I digress. If that charge had more closely represented the cost to the company I probably would have paid it, never complained, and paid it again next time I used the company (I havent even taken the Ryanair flight yet, but i'm already hoping that this is never). The same with the banks. if you got charged a fiver, you probably wouldn't even notice, let alone complain.

So the moral of the story? Only be a little bit greedy? Shock horror, charge fairly?

Action man

2011-09-03T16:55:00+01:00

The idea that we need to consider a "return on action" defined by quality of action was something that really stuck with me from Cindy's talk.

It's an interesting way of considering the value of engagement. We use the digital/social equivalents of mass awareness figures from the old world of advertising to measure success of campaigns in this space, i.e. likes, hits, fans. But always volume. The main problem with this is that apart from average time on site there arent' many metrics that meaningfully measure engagement unless an action is required.

Going to start thinking about building actions into the work I do. I feel like we've made a move in this direction with the work we've done on Parents for Playgrounds, but we could do so much more!

Gallop quotes

2011-09-02T16:24:00+01:00

So, saw Cindy Gallop speak on the Future of Advertising courtesy of Girls Club and Made by Many on Wednesday night. The precis is that the agency model is dead and needs a kick up the bum. Some random quotes and thoughts from the night (a lot of paraphrasing):

On her project If We Ran The World:

The greatest untapped pool of resource is human good intentions that never translate into actions, and also the intention of brands and corporates
Rather than look at micro actions such as tweets (which are so easy, you might as well) look at actions which actually make a difference.
All current social networks are based on dating. If current attractiveness is about how much you post/upload/etc can IWRTW change the model to make how much you do the measure of attractiveness.

On working with brands to do good:

Looking at a return on action that is defined by quality of action, i.e. donating an item to Braddock versus donating a Like.
Brands are currently at Level 1, which is co-creation. What they need to be moving to is co-action, i.e. helping customers to do meaningful things which in turn makes their brand interactions more meaningful.

Agency models

"The future belongs to people who make stuff". I.e. the death of the big idea and the future of production. After all it's the execution that makes an idea fly.
Trying to get the magic back into advertising. In the Mad Men era clients didn't believe that they could do the job that agencies did but now its the reverse. Apparently in India the Unilever client has suggested that agencies should be on the roster without fee as the prestige of being on that roster will get them more work. Just had a chat to Anika at BBH Labs, and we discussed the fact that the creative brief is now always approved by the client. Would a small step by the agency be to stop this process. They buy the strategy and define the commercial problem, why get involved (limit?) the initial creative process?
Being overly attached to business/an idea/etc generates fear, which leads to taking the safe path
Remember the power of mystery and intrigue
"Institutions perpetuate the problems for which the provide solutions" Clay Shirky
"People hate advertising in general, but love advertising in particular" Mark Bernstein

Thanks Sara et al for putting on the show, and Cindy for erm, performing.

Tech talks

2011-09-01T10:35:53+01:00

Where you're a know-it-all when you're asked to show hands if you've heard of something.

But a modest mouse when it comes to asking questions.

Value of a scent

2011-07-17T12:18:00+01:00

“If you throw so much stuff at people they have to no time to become attached to anything, to love anything and you're not making anything good enough for them to become attached to”. Chandler Burr, talking about the effects of exponential growth of fragrance lauches in the Perfume documentary on BBC4.

Heart elephants

2011-07-05T10:56:48+01:00

This sentence almost made me cry.

From this month’s issue of Vanity Fair. The whole article is pretty harrowing. It’s kinda made me want to get all Dian Fossey on it.