Archives for April, 2008
Leverage What They’re Already Talking About
The other day I check my mail (snail mail that is), and find a postcard from Expedia.com. The postcard shows the Golden Gate Bridge in San Fran and reveals the statement “They say “economic stimulus”, we say “free vacation.”" Genius! Take something we’re all talking about and leverage it for your product or service. Okay, obviously, [...]
Authentic Leadership
I recently helped put on a talk for the AeA Emerging Business Committee. It was entitled Authentic Leadership and it was presented by the leadership consultant Gordon Whitehead. His practice is Captus5 and he writes extensively on the subject of leadership. Good leadership is what drives organizations. Leadership is first and foremost about people. More specifically, it’s about influencing people to [...]
The Door-Close Buttons in Most Elevators Don’t Do Anything
When we first moved into our new building, Dave wrote “Door-Close button in elevator does nothing” on the maintenance list, and the handyman replied “Button functions as intended” or something along those lines. Well, turns out they’re BOTH right. I was reading an article that Kottke linked to about elevators, and there was a little bit in [...]
InnoTech Presentation Notes: Understanding LINQ
Since I’m posting this in advance, I hope my session titled Understanding LINQ was a huge hit and everyone loved it. I’ve been working on the content for a while and its tough whittling it down to fit inside the specified time slots; there’s just so much cool stuff. I probably phat-fingered some keys once [...]
How Trade Associations Facilitate Innovation
There was a great article called “Innovating Through Design” in the Dec. 2006 issue of Harvard Business Review. The article explored how informal collaboration amongst design professionals in Lombardy, Italy, produces incredible innovation in product design. The Lombardy firms’ R&D operation, for the most part, can be found neither inside the companies nor in interactions [...]
WebVisions and WebVisionary Awards
If you haven’t signed up to attend WebVisions, you should do it now. If you are not familiar with WebVisions, it is a creative web conference that takes place here in Portland. Many of us from Pop Art are going and if you are there, be sure to say hi. This year, [...]
Corporate Lifecycle Symbiosis
One attribute of the Pop Art culture that I enjoy is the tireless pursuit of making ourselves better. We take time out to enjoy successes, but we are looking for the next way we can improve internally and how we can help clients in new ways. In that spirit, the book Corporate Lifecycles by Ichak [...]
Generation Y and Scion’s Coolness Factor
Last month, I heard something that made me gasp: “Scion isn’t cool anymore”. Granted, some of you may wonder whether it was ever cool. If you don’t appreciate the design personality and in-your-face attitude of the 2005, boxy xB, you are likely to say that Scion’s lack of cool factor is not news. To me, [...]
An Orwellian Lesson on the Power of a Question
In the book 1984, George Orwell illustrates for us the impact of a society that is no longer able to question the world they live in. It is groupthink at its worst. A world that is vacant of critical thinking and learning beyond the basic skills needed for survival. Any individual that attempts to question [...]
I Work with a Bunch of Smartasses Part IV
“I print out all my e-mails and tape them to the inside of my clothes. I know Levi and Justin use their iPhones to access e-mail outside work, but my clothes come with me everywhere, and they don’t set off airport alarms. I have a DD hat, a Freightliner jacket, a Leatherman belt, and a [...]
Waiting for the Mobile Bandwagon?
Ad Age’s Alice Z. Cuneo writes this week about “Why ‘08 Isn’t Mobile’s Year — Again” identifying five key challenges to mobile really taking off: Reach, Measurement, Complexity, Misnomer of mobile as ad medium, and No hallelujah moment. The latter being the culmination of success on the previous four resulting [...]
