a hundred avatars

From Those Wonderful People Who Brought You Pearl Harbor

 Great review of Jerry della Femina's book in the Design Observer, given the reissue of the book thanks to Season 4 of Mad Men tonight.  I've been meaning to read this for years, never got around to it, despite running into Jerry a few times at cocktail parties through the years and comparing head shaving technique.

Anyway, here's my favorite bit from the review:

In that light, the end of the New York Times article that started it all ends with an especially arresting prediction. "The WASP's blew it," declares Della Femina. "They sat around and said, 'This is it, and we don't have to work for it.' My group will eventually blow it, too. We'll sit around in our funny clothes, and we'll get old and fat and start sliding. And then the next revolution is going to take place. The hot writer is going to be Pedro Jimenez, and the hot art director is going to be George Washington Smith. What a crazy scene that's going to be!" Reading this today, it took me a second to realize he was talking about agency creative departments dominated by Hispanics and African-Americans.

Not sure if agencies have too many Pedro Jimenez or George Washington Smiths, but as a Juan Epstein (?!?) at a digital shop, I do appreciate the spirit of creative destruction Jerry's always represented.

(btw, I'm not sure how my new colleagues at Dentsu feel about the title of Jerry's book.)

Does brainstorming work?

 This article suggests that brainstorming is detrimental to creativity. i think that brainstorming done well is additive to the power of a single creative author.

In the spirit of proving the article WRONG (and proving IDEO right) I'd like to open this up for debate. what do you say?

Humans + Objects

 A few years ago, MOMA had a show called Design and the Elastic Mind. (I blogged about it here.) I think we’ll look back at that show years from now as having marked a seminal shift in the boundaries (or lack thereof) between technology, design and creative thinking.  The show celebrated the rise of ‘elasticity’ in thinking, which was defined as ‘the product of adaptability and acceleration’

In other words, most of the people on the receiving end of this post.

I just discovered that a year from now, they’re slated to have another exhibition, called “Talk to me” which will focus on the interaction between people and objects.  

@marcelbotha had a nice chat with Paola Antonelli here

Other content here: http://www.fastcompany.com/1614132/momas-new-exhibition-talk-to-me
Or of course: http://is.gd/dpzaA

Check it out and follow it over the coming months. It’s also interesting to keep in mind as we come up with interesting digital ideas for clients. I know it sounds crazy, but the space between people and machines is getting slimmer all the time  and will be popping up increasingly in the zeitgeist over the next few years. 

Planner Tools (aka, Empathy for the Human Condition)

The interview I did a few weeks ago for PSFK on planning continues. Here I was included talking about people and how technology has paradoxically brought focus back on the individual and perhaps a return to people as analog creatures vs. the masses of the previous 50 or so years.

I discuss this with referencing neither Joseph Campbell, causality, steampunk nor The Baroque Cycle.

Dammit, I did it again.

Intuiting how to be a planner

Piers Fawkes and PSFK were kind enough to have a few planners and me over for some snacks, wine and the chance to talk about great planners' skill sets. If I don't embed it on my own blog, who will? 

The PSFK link is here . Frankly I'm proud of myself that I managed to talk about intuition without namechecking Baruch Spinoza and his levels of knowledge.  Oops, I just did.

Since you brought up Spinoza (you did, didn't you?), please go read Rebecca Goldstein's wonderful Betraying Spinoza

Why Networks Matter + How They Propagate

Nicholas Christakis again, this time at the RSA in the UK.

Really good stuff on how networks work. It comes down to the fundamental human need to not only experience (emotion, events, habits, etc) but to share. By expanding our network, we expand ourselves. Particularly interesting is the bit towards the end, where he talks about the correlation between successful Broadway plays and the type of network the people working on it came from.

Shows that either threw together a bunch of people who had never worked together or people who had only worked together tend to fail.  Shows that balance the relationships between people tended to succeed. Unsurprisingly, it's not only about happiness spreading (or obesity or altruism) but also that the types of networks we form create different sorts of lives for ourselves.

JJ Abrams + The Mystery Box

JJ Abrams on the importance of revealing less than...

Briefing is the soul of wit

via farisyakob.typepad.com

did i post this yet? i'm reminded by what good thinking this was from Gareth on digital briefing after seeing it over on Faris' blog.

Worth a look, and worth realizing just how much our craft and work have changed in an incredibly short period of time.

it's why i've gone and taken a new job in a place which has done an exceptionally good job changing with the times.

Packaging/Information/Content

two things in the last few days:

this packaging is cool because of what it shows:

 via PSFK

And this other stuff is interesting for how it creates community around packaging. Meta-meta tagging reality.

The line between the reality online and the reality in 3D is quickly blurring. Or maybe it's already gone. With total transparency, what's inside the packaging really has no where to hide. Packaging is a gateway to experience design, experience that differentiates far more than superficial advertising. 

Sure beats sticking a cow on the package.

How to be a culture hacker

via @timstock