a hundred avatars

Planning killed the connections star

Maybe or maybe not. No time to respond really (and i've been meaning to read this for weeks anyway) but I quite liked this presentation from Gareth and Jason. Apparently connections planning needs some fixing. Hear hear. What doesn't? ;-)

Connections Planningness

View more documents from Jason Oke.

Tribes and Members, by a Member of the Tribe

Two TED talks I recently came across and an interesting article from Ad Age.

The first, of Dave Logan on Tribal Leadership 

 

 And the second, the inimitable Seth Godin 

 

And the article:  No More Joe Consumer

All are interesting (and flawed, in their own way, but who cares, they're interesting), with the main point being the importance of tribes (and individuals with unique backgrounds) in the spreading of ideas over the 20th Century model driven by mass production, mechanization and advertising

Good stuff. Guess I picked a good time to go back to the fringes, since that's where it all is happening.

Although the whole 'Tribes' motif could be negative (you aren't you, you're your group) the most interesting interpretations are humanistic and empowering. 

1. Tribes are self selected, not just inherited. Great point that Godin makes: you don't need everyone, you just need 1000 people who will spread your message.
2. Tribes aren't really as much about their leaders as they are about the group. If the point he makes is true (leaders have charisma because they lead, they don't lead because they have charisma), tribes are a matter of will?
3.  Godin: You don’t need everyone, you just need 1000 people who will spread your message 
4. Good questions Godin ends his talk to move us forward that every 'tribal leader' should ask: Who are you upsetting? Who are you connecting? Who are you leading? 

What's great about this? Well in Adland all of it begins to upends the  notion of the USP and the WHO. Less single minded ness, less always trying to answer the question "do we have their permission to do X' from people who are worried that the answer is no.  All of this means that you don’t need people’s permission to lead them, just a good idea that you can convince people to coalesce around.

America's Most Wanted

Nada, nothing new, but I really enjoyed this bit with the guys from Nortec Collective during this episode of Kurt Anderson's Studio 360. 

Never ceases to amaze what openness happens when people ignore borders and follow hearts and instincts.

There's also a great interview with Toumani Diabate, who is the 73rd generation of his family in Mali to play the kora. 

In this case following the borders follows the heart. It would be cool if Nortec started to work with him, since both interviews mention Bjork. But the Nortec guys didn't work with her, they just had a taco together.

The practice of social

Put the practice into social media best practice...

After being pinged by Dino to respond to a meme on here on "Social Media Best Practice" I came across this podcast on various views of the notion of practice from Buddhist perspectives

Dino's point was that the lesson from social media is that focus should shift more to how we think about brand values than focusing solely on marketing tactics. I'm going to talk even less than he did about social media and more on thoughts on the word 'practice.'

I'm going to finally summarize that Dharma talk in an effort to add a different perspective to the notion of practice.

Although all Buddhist traditions focus on the cessation of suffering and the interdependency of all things (!), each tradition has a different take on the 'how to', or 'practice'. Perhaps these various perspectives will be of some use in our own increasingly interdependent vehicles of values and communication.

What is interesting is that Buddhist practice (meditation, mindfulness training, etc) is by definition a neutral tool. By itself it has no impact on behavior, but the notion of calling it 'practice' as a part of (or opposed to?) ritual by definition means that we are moving beyond passivity, actively seeking to diminish our suffering or that of someone else. It means an engagement with our selves and a take on how what we do impacts others.

Analogously, older forms of advertising are built on passive mechanisms. Sure spending $100MM on TV advertising feels like an action, but because it wasn't constructed with feedback and interdependence in mind, just how valuable is it? Blind ritual, lacking in introspection, right?

By using tools that help cultivate our potential, we must rely on instinct and individual judgement. We question the input of our senses, but external tools (quant studies, etc) will only be of so much use as technology accelerates our feeling that we are a part of a larger whole, connected. Is it any surprise that sustainability thinking has arisen around the same time as digital social networks?

At the same time, another lesson is learned from Buddhist traditions. Some traditions say, our inherent Buddha nature that aids us in perfecting ourselves, that cultivation alone is insufficient.

In this case one wonders if these are the intellectual forbears of those who claim that strategy alone guides the way. Does a brand have an inherent value in and of itself outside of its behavior? Digital social media brings practice and theory together in a way that was previously difficult to understand.

Or is who we are defined by what we do? Is, ultimately, the value of a practice in just that: the practice.

Looking at the word "practice" through various definitions, one finds three main uses of the word that are remotely relevant to this now longwinded analysis (blog posts are supposed to be short?!): practice as repetition; practice as taking an idea into action; internalizing a concept and bringing it to true realization and integration into one's being.

Now that I've completely overanalyzed 'social media best practice', it's the last of the three that I think is relevant to us.

Social media is about a preparation that is, to paraphrase Dogen, at best a continuous mistake. To do it well, we must use our judgement (that's the 'best' part) but be flexible and open-minded. Best practice here is about not fixating on the tool, but rather on relishing their lack of relevance. Best practice here is an internalization of the challenge that no fixed center brings to our work. Rather than generate illusions of effect (400 GRPs X MB copytesting score of Y=Excel Lies) we can look at the role of interdependent relationships between people and seek to understand and encourage those.

Despite the chaos of the last few weeks (and it has always been thus) the future is bright, but challenging. Paradoxically, technology fades as it improves and it will just bring us all closer together as humans, not avatars. Those of us who make a living at creating those networks should be well disposed to, well, practice.

Spinoza's Clarity of Scope

Planners are fond of saying that the right (and clever) definition of a problem is often the first, best step towards the best (and most clever) solution.

To wit: I'm catching up on some reading and am enjoying The Courtier + The Heretic , which has been hanging out on my bookshelf waiting to be read since last year when I name checked Spinoza a few times at a few lectures I gave at NYU and FIU last fall on identifying and using consumer insights.

The book is enjoyable so far (even compared to the highly enjoyable Betraying Spinoza), and in it the author quotes a letter Spinoza wrote to Henry Oldenburg in 1665 where he laid out his his motivations to finally publish "a treatise on my views regarding scripture:"

1. The prejudices of the theologians. For I know that these are the main obstacles which prevent men from giving their minds to philosophy...
2. The opinion of me held by the common people, who constantly accuse me of atheism. I am driven to avert this accusation, too, as far as I can.
3. The freedom to philosophize and to say what we think. This I want to vindicate completely, for here it is in every way suppressed by the excessive authority and egotism of the preachers.

Prejudice,  reputation and freedom. Crystal clear...

Why is this relevant? Because a clear definition of what you want to resolve and how is the answer from the very beginning, and that's forgotten far too often.

Great creative and incisive minds perhaps have an aptitude for clear vision from the very beginning. The rest of us have to learn how to approximate that clarity. But we can learn how to set that powerful a foundation for ourselves.

Genius is too important to be left to the genius.

iPhone Killer or Spec for 4G?

Apropos the iPhone buzz following Jobs most recent impersonation of a burning bush, i though this post on How to Create an iPhone killer was particularly well done. (via things magazine)

Check out the post, but ideas like 'digital buttons should not be like real ones' remind us that as technology changes, the cues we can use to persuade people to act differently should change accordingly.  New technology creates the potential for new experiences.  Let's make them, instead of copying the old.

Make it new.