Right. That’s it. Back to school. Great though, wasn’t it? Different feeling. Freedom. Sunshine. All good things though. No biggie. Autumn’s great 🍂 too. Ok, let’s go.
“Life has no meaning. Each of us has meaning and we bring it to life. It is a waste to be asking the question when you are the answer.”
Joseph Campbell
culture // biggie small
Even though the web is owned by giants, it's occupied by small brands and people making cash too. So small, is big. Why, I hear you say? Well firstly, Kevin Kelly’s seminal essay 1,000 true fans has come true. The internet birthed a new creative middle class, happily making a living on the long tail of the web (see Patreon, Shopify, Youtube etc). Secondly, the web has given rise to niche culture. Communities of like minded people connecting over niche interests and brands like Corteiz ( e-commerce), Slawn (art stuff) and Steelo (lifestyle, culture, e-commerce) feed off this. And, thirdly, new tools and platforms give people increasing influence over entertainment, allowing fans to become the new creators. From contributing to storylines, to fan generated content, fan-fluence is now blurring the line between audience and creator. On the long tail of the web, small is big, and big is small.
brands // transform
It’s a big word, transformation. Mostly over (and mis) used. The butterfly story sounds good, the reality of the caterpillar putrefying and eating itself, less so. Transformation is tough. Loved this story from Andrew Geoghegan, who moved to PZ Cussons with a transformational brand challenge. He found that a transformational journey, is about transforming yourself, and hopefully those around you in the process. Transformation could begin by asking a question like, what business are you really in? This kind of question pulls you out of marketing myopia, and the obsession with the brand today, vs what it could be tomorrow. Brands need to continuously orientate themselves around customers needs, not the products they make. Like Starbucks, who want to become the gas station of the future for EVs. Makes sense, right? So, what business are you really in, and are you getting a fair share of it?
technology // art-ificial
You’ve probably seen a tonne of AI generated images recently. AI is getting pretty good and it’s mainstreaming quickly. The latest tools like DALL-E 2 are improving and generating extraordinary images. Like this guy, who’s new hobby is prototyping video games in 60 seconds with GPT-3 (ai text producer) and DALL-E. Or Robomojo, which uses AI to reinterpret the posters of classic movies. Or this guy, who used Midjourney (like DALL-E) to create a whole new line of Marvel supervillains. Crazy. It all works by inputting prompts into the AI tools. Prompts like: man, standing, dreaming, future etc. Then the AI does the rest. It’s even created a new marketplace for prompts for DALLE. Just telling people the prompts that get interesting results. Which feels soooo weird. So artificial. Begs the question, what art is and what we should actually value?
creativity // improv and doorknobs
Loved this piece on good conversations, and how conversations have givers and takers. Givers, who think that conversations unfold as a series of invitations and takers, who think they unfold as a series of declarations. Takers keep things moving, givers wait to be moved. And good conversations they say, have lots of doorknobs (or ways in) to be opened by givers or takers. This came to the author while doing improv with a “take and take” rule, where the person talking had to keep going until someone jumped in and took over (takers). Improv is tough, but great for creative thinking. There’s actually a great parallel with improvisation and good strategy. Good strategy, just like good improvised music, or theatre, works in the moment with whatever’s at hand, along with experience and talent. There’s no frameworks in improv and there’s nowhere to hide. Strategy needs to be honest like that.
five random (ish) things:
THIS is how you end a speech 🎤.
A very cute Stanford Marshmallow Challenge 🍬.
Nike do amazing ads 🎥.
The best thing you’ll see today 📝.
Japandi design = Japan + scandi 🏯🌲.
watching // storytelling:
Better Call Saul was amazing. From start to finish. This gives some insight into why. A visual storytelling masterclass, carefully and considerately constructed. Lots to learn about details and why they matter.