How to kill a cultural icon…

January 22, 2012 By Leave a Comment

There’s a classic Bill Hicks routine which states that as soon as you appear in a commercial for a product, you are removed from the artistic cannon forever. And I struggle to think of a time when applying that role would have caused me to miss out on something particularly great – although the age-old tradition of celebrities popping up in seemingly random adverts in countries like Japan mean they may be some examples.

But what happens when the stars aren’t human, but characters in a story which has become immensely popular and adopted by millions around the world with their own passionate interpretations and fandom? OK, so we should probably be used to this by now, judging by the way this particular story has been used, exploited and hollowed-out for every possible revenue stream, but still…

So the character whose entrance into a rebel ship inspired fear and nightmares in generations of people is now a middle-management consultant to a chain of average computer retailers.

And then this happens…

If you remember all those strange people around the world who declare themselves as a Jedi whenever a census appears, a reasonable percentage of them aren’t doing it entirely as a joke – there’s enough evidence online of the Jedi mindset being compared to a more recognised religion. Without debating the merits of each religion, this is essentially like seeing the head of whichever version you follow decide to start pimping themselves out for commercials.

I’m done with Star Wars…

I don’t remember the first time I watched Star Wars, but I do remember a friend actually having a film projector at an early  birthday party to screen The Empire Strikes Back. And whilst my collection of toys was sold by my father without my knowledge when I was a teenager, thus destroying a potential retirement fund, I’ve since discovered that my Star Wars lunchbox still survives in a dusty corner of the garage. And I do have the original trilogy on VHS just so I could show my son that Han fired first, just as it should be.

But that’s balanced with the fact I don’t expect every piece of entertainment to be an artistic statement, the history of merchandising and utilising the Star Wars world to extract every last penny from it, and the fact various adverts have appeared in the past with some of the characters – I’ve discovered Yoda apparently also picked up a cheque for a Japanese advert a while ago, like so many other stars.

I’m in my 30s, I’ve worked in the publishing and entertainment industries for 10+ years, and I know how all this works – and yet I feel a sense of loss with the resignation. One of the guiding stories of my childhood, which I wanted to share with my son as he grows older, has now lost any magic it had. It’s no more meaningful than whichever animated feature will be on the side of Happy Meals next month.

Marketing with listening and meaning:

If you’re one of the growing number of companies embracing the approach of standing clearly for a defined purpose, then you might believe you’re above this risk.

And if you’re just in the business of churning out a product, perhaps an unexciting one, then you might believe it doesn’t matter.

But the important thing is that I don’t think George Lucas and everyone else involved had set out to make a serious artistic statement which could spring into a belief and support which has last 30+ years. He made some films, and realised that there was more money to be made around them than directly from them – particularly pre-VHS, DVD and Streaming.

The meaning and experiences came from the people who watched,shared, discussed, and believed – would you know if the same thing was growing around your brand? Are you not only monitoring but paying attention, analysing, listening and shaping your future in that context?

Filed Under: Branding, Business, marketing, social media marketing, Social Media Monitoring Tagged With: , , , ,

Media companies and losing talent

January 2, 2012 By 6 Comments

A couple of very interesting posts regarding the ever-changing media world popped up last week. Jeremiah Owyang catalysed some interesting discussion when he posed the idea that the Golden Age of Tech Blogging is over (A theme I’d covered earlier with a less provocative headline – curses!) We both broadly agree on the topic, although I think we’re probably both being slightly biased towards anecdotal evidence and especially an understandable English-language bias.

One thing we both mentioned was the move for senior writers and contributors from notable blogs to be starting out on their own – whether as a group or individuals – e.g. The Verge, The Kernel, Uncrunched, The New Gambit, etc).

And related to that was Neil Perkin, with a typically insightful post asking ‘Why big companies get rid of talented people?’. Considering AOL looms large in the stories of TheVerge and Techcrunch,  it’s a pertinent question to the state of tech blogging, along with all large media businesses at the moment. To quote:

Despite talking a good game, many large organisations remain relatively poor at moving talent around the company. The silo culture that still characterises many businesses doesn’t help. Requirements and expectations become optimised to local needs rather than those of the organisation as a whole. Strangely, the people who can really see the bigger picture and are often the ones to challenge existing assumptions are the ones that begin to not fit so easily into those silos. So companies take the easy option.

In my view, it’s their loss.

I’ve certainly suffered from those elements of traditional business culture, and also been lucky enough to benefit from senior individuals who looked beyond it and saw reasons to do things differently. I also commented on Neil’s post that there’s an element of a culture clash – anecdotally, the most talented digital and non-digital people I’ve worked with have all been more concerned with solving problems across the business than staying within their assigned role or concentrating on office politics and have often suffered for it, even within firms which are supposedly extremely tech focused.

The major difference is that digital tools mean those people have less reason to accept their given role – there’s greater access to other opportunities whether with another company or via self-employment. I haven’t timed it for a while, but a new site via Blogger, Tumblr etc is about 1 minute to set up, and however long it takes to get your first post written – all for no financial outlay.

exit.

 

How big media companies can keep talented people

1. Hire and fire the right people:

First up, there’s an oft-quoted rule about A players hiring A players. You need to be hiring people who you can trust with the freedom I’ll mention in tip 2, and who can work with a high degree of autonomy. Those people who will identify a problem, come up with a solution, and then get it done, rather than just sitting there.

You also need management at all levels who can accept constructive criticism, work with it, and are able to change things. And you need a level of honesty throughout about whether or not it’s working, because even if you can convince yourself within your business that everything is fine, it’ll still be apparent outside of the office by the output.

2. Freedom

Everyone knows about Google and their 20% time. Barely any companies ever actually do anything similar. Lots of people can provide empirical evidence about how small changes and innovations lead to big results, and yet very few companies ever put that type of approach into practice. Every company would love the next big thing, but hardly any would let someone build something and get it straight out the door to see whether it works or not, without months of watering it down into something non-offensive, and uninteresting. I have to mention my former employers at Absolute Radio as one example of a business which puts an above average level of mutual trust and respect in the talented people they employ, and as a result continue to constantly churn out a variety of interesting projects and innovations, some of which are highly successful.

And when it comes to freedom, common sense goes a long way in revising employee contracts and guidelines for areas such as social media. In a litigious area, it’s easy to forget the effect that what may have seemed a legal safeguard will actually have on a normal employee, especially when it comes to legal attempts to own innovation rather than encourage and reward it.

3. Support and reward

Psychologically, money is not the biggest lever to increase productivity and success, provided it’s at a decent level. Crucially in the media industry, the attraction of a career leads to a high amount of applicants for roles, and a correspondingly low level of pay for many. If you want employees to focus on the best way to make your business more money, then you need to understand they can’t do that if they’re constantly worrying and stressed about making the next mortgage payment and their increasing overdraft.

I’m not suggesting you pay huge amounts over-the-odds for people who aren’t going to be productive, but that you adequately reward people that are. And that doesn’t necessarily mean in basic wages – give people a chance to share in success, and make it meaningful.

Whatever your opinion of Richard Branson, there are examples in Business Stripped Bare of cleaners and watersports instructors rising to management positions. At the same time, cabin crews on their airlines earn slightly less than competitor employees but receive other rewards for their contributions to improving the business.

 

Culture Jamming by Hugh McLeod (cc Licence, ref gapingvoid.com)

It’s worth reading this Hugh McLeod post that accompanies the above cartoon on Culture Jamming. The money quote is:

‘chan­ging your company’s for­tu­nes NOT by trying to directly change what the gene­ral public thinks of you, but by trying to change what YOU think of you.‘

And that’s the massive, massive problem with most media companies up until now. Along with marketing and advertising, they’re the companies most used to talking at audiences, and have spent decades, or even hundreds of years perfecting that art. And when you’re used to playing a part to an external audience, it’s hard to even start to acknowledge what’s going on internally.

Filed Under: Business, Digital Culture, Digital Publishing, Digital Television, Entrenpreneurship, Magazine Publishing, Media, traditional media Tagged With: , , , , , ,

My New Years Obsessions for 2012

December 31, 2011 By 4 Comments

The most positive way to describe my life in 2011 would probably be ‘interesting’. Along with every high, such as celebrating my first year in business, there have been a number of lows, particularly when it has come to family life. So the coming of a new year is a welcome fresh start, and rather than partying to celebrate midnight, I’m choosing to focus on how I start 2012 tomorrow morning when I wake up.

And rather than setting out a list of resolutions, a term which seems almost invented to accommodate them being broken, I’m thinking about my obsessions for the next year – things which will continue to drive me forwards no matter what happens.

The Business obsession: Building businesses which enable others to gain control of their employment.

I’ve been thinking a lot about what I want to achieve work-wise. Obviously I’ll always be working towards greater financial security, as I suspect you will, too. And within my portfolio career in marketing, writing, teaching and other stuff, there are areas that I feel driven to concentrate on and expand.

But when I imagine success, I’ve realised a key motivation is that I know many, many people who are incredibly talented and skilled, and feel disillusioned with their current employment. So if I’m able to grow my business and can help other people become empowered to choose their own destiny in their professional life, that appeals far more to me than managing people in an office who are just paid to turn up every day.

So the plan for 2012 is to increase the turnover for my career, and get to the stage where I’m able to employ and empower at least a couple of those people on a regular basis by the end of the year, whether that’s in an existing project or something new.

The best way to achieve any plan is to break it down into smaller steps, which include improving what I produce for my own websites and the way I work, continuing to always do the best possible work for clients, and also making more of opportunities elsewhere.

The personal obsession: Building better connections with family, friends and strangers

Despite doing a reasonable job of keeping in touch with my friends and family via social networks, I’ve been a bit rubbish at actually catching up in the real world, and I’m obsessed with changing that in 2012. Not only do I need to keep working on being the best dad I can, I also intend to try to be a better son/grandson and friend to all the people who have supported and helped me over the years. It’s incredibly important that all of us make time for the people we care about, and it always benefits us as much, if not more, than it does the people we’re visiting/helping/supporting.

And by the same token, since being based more at home and outside of London, I’ve been rubbish at catching up with people I know well electronically, but failed to connect with in the real world. There are several people I haven’t seen in ages, and several more that I keep aiming to meet but fail to arrange it. And each one of them is inspirational in some way.

I have a sneaky suspicion that actually getting my social life together offline will also drastically help my creativity and business – I’ve already benefitted immensely from the clients with whom I regularly work in the office as well as virtually, from Digital People in Peterborough meets, and from the chats and conversations I’ve managed to make time for in 2011.

Again, I’m breaking it into smaller steps, by making lists of the people who I want to make time for, and sorting out my calendar in a more organised fashion.

 

How you can help…

No one achieves all their obsessions completely alone, and I’m going to take this opportunity to ask you for a tiny bit of help. Whether or not we’ve met before or chatted online, if you’d like to meet up for a drink or a chat, let me know. And if I don’t come back straight away with a date or time, then keep reminding me. Because I definitely want to meet up with you (if you’re not going to be in the UK at some point, then Skype works!) And this isn’t about me trying to sell your my services as a prospective client – it’s purely because there’s nothing more interesting to me than finding out about what you’re doing and what your passions are. And the fact you’re reading this means that you’re part of a self-selecting group that are guaranteed to be interesting – after all, you’re reading my blog aren’t you?

The only thing to know to save some confusion are that even if we’re meeting for ‘coffee’, I don’t actually drink the stuff, but mainline caffeine from soft drinks (I do, however, drink beer).

Here’s to a great 2012 for everyone, and I can’t wait to meet up with more of you this year.

Filed Under: Blogging, Business, Dan Thornton, TheWayoftheWeb Tagged With: , , , , , ,

Key trends for 2012: Digital Disruption gets Physical

December 16, 2011 By Leave a Comment

It’s the trend and prediction season, and there’s one overarching theme which ties together the main three technology trends I believe will break into the mainstream in 2012. Over the past decade we’ve seen a huge amount of disruption triggered by increased internet access – both in terms of speed and availability. The access to information and entertainment has had a massive effect on media and entertainment industries, whether through legitimate ways to access content or piracy. And we’ve also seen new tools and changes in collaboration, business practices, marketing, freelancing, crowdsourcing and much more.

But the majority of these changes have all been concerned with the fact you can transmit information and content effortlessly around the world. The key change for 2012 is that three major trends and breakthroughs will have a far bigger impact than ever before on the physical world. All three have been discussed and reported in technology circles for months, years, and in one case, decades, but all of them are reaching that tipping point where ‘normal’ non-geeks are interested and getting to the stage where they will start to invest with their cash.

Trends for 2012 #1: 3D Printing:

Having previously predicted that 2012 will be the year of 3D printing, I have to lead with it. Since writing that post in August (which was one of my most popular), the profile and interest in 3D Printing has only risen. We’re still at the stage where people can find new ways to utilise it every week, whether that’s criminals using it to produce credit card skimmers, the highly debatable use of creating gun parts, or the potentially life enhancing application of 3D printing to create new bones. One of the reasons I love 3D printing so much is that it’s still at the stage where it’s advanced enough to be indistinguishable from magic, but sadly I suspect that era will be over soon, and we’ll see more companies probably publicly demonstrating how they’ve been using it in-house for rapid prototyping etc.

  • In addition to the BBC link above, it’s being featured by the likes of The Economist, highlighting celebrity 3D printer Jay Leno. We’re already entering the cool celebrity endorsement stage.
  • DIY 3D Printers are coming down in price – e.g. $500. OK, so we’re still at the stage where you need to assemble your own kit, but when the existing companies build enough demand and scale, or when you get someone like Samsung or Toshiba in the market, the ability to source parts in massive bulk and package them in something that’s consumer friendly will rapidly change. How long before a bright pink or blue 3D printer covered in cartoon characters is on the shelves of Toys R Us for example?
  • Having seen Makerbot gain funding and more media attention, now Shapeways has raised $5.1 million for the alternative approach of remotely producing whatever designs are sent to them.
  • The tech, the stories and applications are a dream for anyone in marketing – if any 3D Printing company wants to chat to me about the possibilities, I’d definitely be interested. I can’t think of many technologies that have so many simple yet magical ways to entice consumers
  • And there are a number of startups now building their businesses on the platform of 3D printing, for instance, building personalised robot figurines to order, which leads me nicely onto the second trend…

 

Trends for 2012 #2: Robots in the workplace and your home:

Robots have been around for a long time in both science fiction, and in the workplace. As ideas and mechanical automatons, they’ve been around for hundreds of years, and in an industrial setting, they began work in the 1960s. More recently, their military use has skyrocketed – for a detailed look I highly recommend Wired for War by PW Singer, and their use in warehousing and distribution has been documented in various places. So why am I tipping something so old and obvious as a trend for 2012?

  • For one thing – use in the home, and the drop in prices. A basic Roomba robot vacuum cleaner costs £239.99 on Amazon, comparitive to a number of Dysons, for example. Sadly robot lawnmowers are still equivalent to the highest end of the human directed version, but I’d put money on that changing in the near future. And when that happens and you send one out, all your neighbours will suddenly get a prime view of it.
  • And the other is the increased sophistication of their role in the workplace. Korea is trialling robot prison guards, Toyota has unveiled 4 robot health assistants due on the market around 2013, and they’ve already got competition from the Riba healthcare robot due to 2015, amongst others. President Obama has already announced the U.S will fund the Advanced Manufacturing Partnership, which is part of the many efforts to enable robots to interact with humans in their work, rather than simply isolated on a production line doing a very simple task.
  • Again, cost is an issue with a current personal robot costing $400,00. A bit much for personal use, but costs will decrease rapidly – in 1973 the first personal computer cost around $200,000. And in the workplace, more specific requirements and designs lower the cost to the point where investing is a case of direct comparison with a human equivalent. Whether or not you support or use immigration or cheap labour for repetitive tasks, there are still costs involved and potential problems which robots could answer. And given we’re on the cusp of self-replicating robots and machines, 2012 probably won’t see a personal robot butler in every home, but will see more businesses investing in them, and more widespread use of the single-task robot in your personal life.
  • And one element which might help that spread and help the adjustment is the rise of home working and telecommuting, as there has been work and research which leads to the use of robot ‘stand-ins’ for workers away from the office for meetings etc (The same thing still continues in virtual worlds, despite the perception of business ‘failure’ in places such as Second Life – and the use of more traditionally framed virtual collaboration tools could well lead to a resurgence in the future, particularly with more senior executives of an age where virtual worlds in video games are second nature)

 

Trends for 2012 #3: ‘The Internet of Things’

Possibly the clunkiest name for any trend, but fairly self-explanatory when you realise this refers to connected devices. Again, this isn’t a radically new idea, and comes accompanied with references to the internet fridges we all failed to rush out and buy. But that was before the iPad started to replace a recipe book on the kitchen counter, next to the internet-connected radio and the smart phone.

And the key development is that the infrastructure is now available in ever-growing areas – ever-faster broadband, wifi, power lines etc.

  • Consider that the EU has already seen fit to sign a framework for privacy for RFID applications, which power the connectivity.
  • Businesses are already there – remember the warehouse robots from our last trend? RFID. Want to be able to connect all your vehicle assets? RFID. Want to be able to track all your inventory, no matter where it is in the supply chain, down to a single box? RFID.
  • Increasingly we’re controlling more of our lives from a small group of devices – smartphone, tablet, laptop, Kinect etc.
  • There are already a huge number of applications and businesses utilising existing technology, such as Arduino, to allow your plants to message you when they need more water, or your doorbell to text you when someone rings it.
  • And remember the Internet Fridge back in 1999? Well, it’s back and wifi enabled. And given that the likes of Tesco have started using augmented reality to allow you to snap a picture of your groceries on the wall of the underground station while you are waiting to come home, suddenly being able to access what’s in your fridge and what you need to buy when you’re out and about suddenly doesn’t seem quite so daft…
  • If that all seems a bit too far – consider the amount of self-diagnosis being utilised in cars. And imagine the time and frustration saving when your rubbish washing machine is internet connected? This isn’t about using your tumbledryer to surf the web – it’s about saving time and effort when it breaks by contacting the engineers directly to let them order a part and come and fix it, rather than trying to arrange an appointment via a call centre for someone to come and look at it, go away again, and then come back with the right bit to fix it.

 

The implications of 2012′s Physical Disruption

The one outside element which might have an effect on the timescales is the perception of the global economy. I don’t think that will slow 3D printing particularly, as tough economic times tend to see a rise in DIY and self-repair, plus investments in items which are very much about longterm quality and value.

It may be harder for robots to be accepted into the family – they inherently seem more frivolous, even with the argument that the time-saving means more productive work can be done to show a decent return. In the workplace the cost savings are more immediately apparent and the future looks less accessible for anyone in an unskilled manual labour role. Much as the longterm prospects for call centres might start to decline this year, which I don’t think anyone except employees will mourn (Sorry for the few good call centre people I’ve dealt with).

Put simply, 2012 is the tipping point, I believe, for small business of crafted products. I remember watching a presentation video, which I believe was JP Rangaswami (Annoyingly absent in every history and bookmarking tool I use, so I’ll continue to try to locate it), in which he talked about a return to a pre-Industrial Revolution business world, and 2012 seems to be the point where that becomes an increasing reality. Big brands will continue to exist, but already they’re moving to a world in which they retain their size by the interests they own and the backroom elements they can provide more than leading the storefronts and businesses with their brands.

That has positives – at the point were you can save money by printing your own products rather than paying to import them from outsourced manufacturer in Asia. Optimistically, saving on the more menial healthcare tasks may allow for more training and specialisation in more complexity, assuming the NHS isn’t completely destroyed. And a connected house should mean more time to be productive or relaxed.

But it also has scary implications for employment – the easy reassurance is that when the economy improves, everyone will be back in work and everything will be OK. But the effect of digital disruption has been that it creates money, and employment, but in sheer numbers the workforce will always be much smaller than what was replaced, as we increasingly use algorithms instead of humans. Extend that further out into unskilled and semi-skilled professions and we need to rapidly reconsider the education system and the industries which the UK and the world will be pursuing in the future, and how that maps out against the world’s population.

So that’s something to look forward to next year.

Filed Under: 3D Printing, Business, Disruptive Technology, innovation, Robotics, technology, The Internet of Things Tagged With: , , , , , ,
« Older Posts
Newer Posts »