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The Story
Creative destruction
I’ve noticed that many of the business folk I meet fall broadly into two distinct categories: those who are trying to do something and those who are trying to be something. Truth be told, I don’t have much time for the latter. The former, on the other hand – those who are trying to do something – don’t need to try to be anything… they just are. And I love them.
There’s something sparkly about people who are trying to do something – instigating change – like entrepreneurs who are the masters of ‘creative destruction’… a term Joseph Schumpeter popularised when he outlined his vision of capitalism, around innovative entry by entrepreneurs as the force that sustains long-term economic growth, even as it destroys the value of established monopoly companies.
The difference between those trying to do something and those trying to be something is more stark than ever in our current social media frenzy. If you’re trying to do something, media isn’t the point, technology isn’t the point – the objectives are what’s important… and the ability to question… why are we spending time and money on this? Is it in line with what we’re trying to do? Is it what our customers want? Are they getting value from it?
Meanwhile those who are trying to be something are focused on being… cool. And everyone knows there’s nothing less cool than trying to be cool 
If you’ve ever been in a meeting and had the same feeling in your guts as when you’ve watched your dad dancing, it’s time to refocus on what you want to DO. All else will follow.
Those who are trying to be something can keep their shuffling boardroom butlers, loud bar talk and tie-tweaking long-winded background intros… but we’ll take the tea and biscuits. Just don’t expect us not to roll our eyes.
‘Future of TV Advertising’ on slideshare
My presentation on The Future of TV Advertising is featured on the Slideshare home page. Thanks Slideshare!
“Hey ResonanceBlog!
Your presentation is currently being featured on the SlideShare homepage by our editorial team.
We thank you for this terrific presentation, that has been chosen from amongst the thousands that are uploaded to SlideShare everday.
Congratulations! Have a Great Day!
- the SlideShare team”
Quote of the day
Every organism needs to eliminate its waste products, or else it poisons itself.
[Drucker]
Go see Alan speak at MIT
Alan Moore is giving a talk on 17th November at this MIT event.
Here is a brief synopsis:
We are witnesses to a structural and transformational change in society, what many describe as the toxic tail end of our industrial, mass consumer, mass media era. The tragic legacy of the last 150 years is that humanity has been thin sliced and deconstructed almost to the point of destruction. Human beings have become little more than individual units of capitalism – pawns of economists and unfettered capitalism.
But the fact is, “I needs we, to truly be I,” wrote Carl Jung, and this is why we as a species are at the barricades of a communications revolution, in which humanity is renegotiating the power relationships between; people, organisations, and even governments. As social philosopher Richard Sennett argues, we want to, “recover something of the spirit of the Enlightenment on terms appropriate to our time”.
The tools of the revolution are digital communication technologies, but the drivers are about human connection and human identity. Technology does not come out of nowhere, it is indeed a human invention in the first place, and these technologies succeed to the extent they meet fundamental human needs. The rise of the networked society is no accident, and a new philosophy is needed now to enable individuals and organisations adapt to a new way of doing, trading, educating, living.
Therefore, our imperative is to de-school ourselves in a philosophy and a way of thinking and acting that has delivered us into a cultural, ideological and economic cul-de-sac. We need to liberate ourselves from how we were once taught to think and live our lives, stemming from the ethos of industrialisation and the mass consumer society.
—
Alan is a rare breed – genuine, in it for the right reasons and knows what’s important. I’d highly recommend you grab the chance to be there.
Saturday morning blog post
Putting the Fun in Functional
Useful stuff from Amy Jo Kim…
Surfing waves of change
The fantabulous Alan Moore asked me to write an article for his blog the other day…
“As cumbersome institutions creak in the wake of recent economic and political shake-ups, we’re left with a choice: whether to deem the wave of change a lethal tsunami come to wipe us out, or surf it like the greatest wave of our lives.
Disorientation is an unavoidable symptom of the status quo being disrupted; and disruption is both inevitable and necessary.
In camp tsunami lie flailing agencies, publishers, record companies, governments, educational establishments and other intermediaries struggling to stay relevant and guard the floodgates, as networked surfers form tribes and leverage their power to organise without organisations.
We’re square pegs in round holes, operating within industrial revolution legacy systems. Mass production, mass marketing, mass broadcasting; co-existing with ultra-connectedness. The truth is out there. Google it. Then apply your newly honed bullshit filter to weed out the facts from the crap…”
You can read the full thing here.
The revolution will not be televised
You will not be able to stay home, brother.
You will not be able to plug in, turn on and cop out.
You will not be able to lose yourself on skag and skip,
Skip out for beer during commercials,
Because the revolution will not be televised.
The revolution will not be televised.
The revolution will not be brought to you by Xerox
In 4 parts without commercial interruptions.
The revolution will not show you pictures of Nixon
blowing a bugle and leading a charge by John
Mitchell, General Abrams and Spiro Agnew to eat
hog maws confiscated from a Harlem sanctuary.
The revolution will not be televised.
The revolution will not be brought to you by the
Schaefer Award Theatre and will not star Natalie
Woods and Steve McQueen or Bullwinkle and Julia.
The revolution will not give your mouth sex appeal.
The revolution will not get rid of the nubs.
The revolution will not make you look five pounds
thinner, because the revolution will not be televised, Brother.
There will be no pictures of you and Willie May
pushing that shopping cart down the block on the dead run,
or trying to slide that color television into a stolen ambulance.
NBC will not be able predict the winner at 8:32
or report from 29 districts.
The revolution will not be televised.
There will be no pictures of pigs shooting down
brothers in the instant replay.
There will be no pictures of pigs shooting down
brothers in the instant replay.
There will be no pictures of Whitney Young being
run out of Harlem on a rail with a brand new process.
There will be no slow motion or still life of Roy
Wilkens strolling through Watts in a Red, Black and
Green liberation jumpsuit that he had been saving
For just the proper occasion.
Green Acres, The Beverly Hillbillies, and Hooterville
Junction will no longer be so damned relevant, and
women will not care if Dick finally gets down with
Jane on Search for Tomorrow because Black people
will be in the street looking for a brighter day.
The revolution will not be televised.
There will be no highlights on the eleven o’clock
news and no pictures of hairy armed women
liberationists and Jackie Onassis blowing her nose.
The theme song will not be written by Jim Webb,
Francis Scott Key, nor sung by Glen Campbell, Tom
Jones, Johnny Cash, Englebert Humperdink, or the Rare Earth.
The revolution will not be televised.
The revolution will not be right back after a message
bbout a white tornado, white lightning, or white people.
You will not have to worry about a dove in your
bedroom, a tiger in your tank, or the giant in your toilet bowl.
The revolution will not go better with Coke.
The revolution will not fight the germs that may cause bad breath.
The revolution will put you in the driver’s seat.
The revolution will not be televised, will not be televised,
will not be televised, will not be televised.
The revolution will be no re-run brothers;
The revolution will be live.
by Gil Scott-Heron
Landmark victory for Adbusters
Adbusters Media Foundation, the publisher of Adbusters magazine, has won an important appeal in its case against the CBC and Global Television Network. Adbusters initiated a landmark legal action against the media companies for refusing to sell airtime to Adbusters for its social marketing television campaigns. Read in full on the Adbusters site here.
The vast majority of media companies decided not to report the victory. Hmmmm.
Copyright ResonanceBlog 2009
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