Two different ideas. One post.

Over the last two days I’ve read two things that have really wowed me. Both take things I’ve thought a lot about over the last six months and really push and articulate them far better than I have.

Open Creative Communities

When Piers and I started likemind we didn’t know what it would become. We never explained what it meant to be of ‘likemind’, yet 15 wonderful people showed up. Since then it’s blossomed and spread around the world.

Over the last six months I’ve thought a lot about why we’ve gotten such an amazing response. I have a few theories, but reading “what is an Open Creative Community?” by Mark Kuznicki opened my eyes in some new ways. He defines these communities by “interest, practice, proximity and values,” going on to explain:

These communities live in a hybrid virtual- and place-based geography. They are hyper-creative and produce some phenomenal artifacts of human ingenuity and culture. They are open, in that the barrier to entry is not a membership fee or a geographic line in the sand or a common ethnicity. The barrier to entry is creative citizenship, and you are either a citizen and a participant or you are not, based on your individual relationship to that community’s interests, practices, proximity and values.

After I read that I was hooked. Especially the last bit, “you are either a citizen and a participant or you are not.” The beauty of likemind is that showing up makes you both an active participant and citizen. In the online world, the 1% rule applies: 99% of your users will not be highly active participants. In open creative communities, the opposite is true. By their very design it’s impossible not to participate. In some ways a community like likemind both lowers and raises the barriers to entry by forcing people to self select.

Anyhow, before I go on forever about the article, go read it and tell me what you think.

Death of Zero Sum

Since I went a little long on the first half of this I’ll try to get to the point on this one.

About four months ago I wrote about the relationship between binary code and the rise of ambiguity. Basically what I was getting at is that we live in a much more blurry world and I have trouble understanding how the binary code that sits at the bottom of all digital technology allows for that.

Grant McCracken has brought these idea back to the surface for me with his piece on “Beauty and the death of zero sum”. In it he uses the Dove Real Beauty campaign (which you can read all about in the comments of my latest entry) to show how “in every domain of taste, we are seeing a willingness to expand the tools of judgment and the size of the winner’s circle.” (Just for reference, zero sum means “a participant’s gain or loss is exactly balanced by the losses or gains of the other participant(s).”)

Grant writes:

Zero sum is dying in our culture. The notion that there is one single hierarchy of any kind is now in question. . . . The death of zero sum is especially evident on the internet where it turns out crowds matter more than elites. The new media emerge and they create a multiplication of value, a new superfluidity of admiration. This may be because people are prepared to “pay themselves” in admiration they do not deserve…but if it works, it works. There is nothing in the anthropological rule book that says that a culture may not make every individual an arbiter of his or her own value.

The internet and digital technology are driving a lot of these changes, but they are slowly seeping into the rest of culture. The web has redefined choice, offering us millions of results for each google search. The fascinating thing about those results, however, is that it’s often not the first that you find most useful. Rather, it’s some combination of many that gives you a final conclusion.

It was only a matter of time until that thinking began to invade the other parts of life.

This is probably no big deal for anyone else, but I squeaked with excitement when I looked out of my bedroom window this morning.

And also while I walked to the L train, even though most of what I had to walk through was gross.

I got nothing . . . it’s Monday morning. How ’bout some links?

Alright, it’s Monday morning and I’m not sure what to talk about (but have to get that birthday entry off the front page). I figured some links were in order.

First and foremost, however, is some exciting news for me. As of yesterday evening, if you search for ‘noah’ in Google I am the final result on the homepage. I’ve taken a screenshot to prove it in case it doesn’t last. Ever since the other noah made it I’ve been jealous of his noahness, but now I share a piece of the glory.

Okay, now onto the good stuff . . .

• At this point we all know my stance on this JetBlue thing (by the way, is it one word or two?). Well David Nottoli has been kind enough to break down the lessons of apology marketing from the airline’s fiasco.
• A fascinating take on religion today and what Jesus might have thought of the whole thing. (For the record I’m not really religious.)
• On President’s Day I was hanging out with some friends (the other’s don’t have blogs . . . yet) and we were discussing how funny a set of greeting cards that corrected stereotypes would be. This isn’t quite it, but McSweeney’s Mildly Disturbing Greeting-Card Messages is worth a read.
• Excercise equipment maker Life Fitness announced iPod integration on their new equipment. It’s getting kind of scary how everything has an iPod plug at this point. I can’t remember where I read it but some absurd amount of cars created today come with one (though it may just been an 1/8″ headphone plug . . . which is fine). Have we already hit a point where we can’t turn back from the iPod? Is there a business opportunity for Apple to sell it’s adapter to other companies to use with their products (including MP3 players). I bet that would be worth a boatload of cash.
• Possibly the most absurd of all the SNL music videos this year.
• Grant McCracken breaks down the seven branding lessons of the Dove campaign.
• Why expensive hotel mini-bars are good for you.
• And last, but not least, I highly recommend this great piece on blurriness from Russell Davies.

And that wraps it up . . . Have a great Monday and thanks to everyone who contributed to my birthday book, came out to party, sent me stuff in the mail and just said hello, I can’t thank you all enough for making me feel special.

a bike.
Originally uploaded by tokyohanna.

right outside of Taco Chulo, near Grand and Havemeyer. Williamsburg, Brooklyn.

Watch Out
Originally uploaded by chet gulland.

I’m going to point everyone to my friend Chet’s photo stream now. He has the best action shots I’ve seen on Flickr.

Harvard Business Review. Our annual survey of emerging ideas considers how nanotechnology will affect commerce, what role hope plays in leadership, and why, in an age that practically enshrines accountability, we need to beware of “accountabalism.”

Harvard Business Review. Our annual survey of emerging ideas considers how nanotechnology will affect commerce, what role hope plays in leadership, and why, in an age that practically enshrines accountability, we need to beware of “accountabalism.”

You read it right.

This is little more than comment bait, but screw it, it’s my blog and I’ll do with it what I wish.

First things first, credit for the title goes to swissmiss who apparently go it from bb. Secondly, hope many of you are planning on making the party in NYC Friday night (and don’t forget to bring the 8.5 x 11).

Thirdly, this delicious looking treat came from Bubo in Barclona.

Lastly, I wish you all as wonderful a year as my last one has been. As always, if I can do anything to help make it better, please let me know.

My roommate killed a roach.
Originally uploaded by tokyohanna.

Last night, Laura (my roommate) and I had a Time.

While I was in Richmond, our apartment had an unwelcome visitor in the form of a cockroach. It was the size of a thumb. an entire thumb. HUGE. I don’t know how Laura survived. I was almost in tears just looking at it. Anyway, the story was that she chased it all the way towards our front door with Fantastik, and poisoned it to death. Then she couldn’t bear to dispose of it without moral support, so she put an upside-down bodega candle on it. It stayed that way until I got home. Its antenna and leg were sticking out of the edges. After much prancing and scheming, we figured out a strategy involving several sheets of paper, a plastic bag, the bodega candle and a cardboard box.

At one point, there was a miscalculation and the candle rolled off, exposing Leif Garrett in all his deadness. We screamed and shrieked and each ran to our tortured Russians (our matching couches are named Tolstoy and Dostoevsky, respectively). We died.

Finally Laura got a surge of bravery. And so did I. We shuffled Leif into his tomb and Laura threw him onto our favorite neighbor’s roof. And he is still there. We will have to do something about it eventually. But for now, Leif lays there, and I made a tombstone for him.

Two words that have a huge impact on your business.

I don’t mean to be a JetBlue whore, but it’s time to talk about them again. Looks like my last post about them preceded a hurricane (or blizzard) of negative press.

Clearly passengers were right in their anger towards the company, especially those that were stuck on the runway in the plane for like eight hours. But the sign of a strong company (and person) is how the bounce back from adversity.

I think JetBlue’s Customer Bill of Rights and CEO David Neeleman’s apology are a step in the right direction.

What really amazes me about the video is the sincerity. Everyone says you need to be passionate about your customers and your business, but few people live it. You can tell when someone really cares: You can see it in their eyes. When I watch that video what I see is a man who is deeply disturbed by what happened and is making every effort to ensure that it’s never repeated. Maybe it’s an act, but if that’s the case I’d be pretty damn impressed. As James Hong put it:

[Customer Service is a good sign] of a good company. not just because it makes customers happy, but because it shows a company CARES about their customers. They understand who they are building for, and i’m sure sensitivity to customer’s feelings extends down to the engineers building the product. Often times, the things that make a product great are very low level details that arise as a result of the engineer giving a damn.

Neeleman is committed to making the changes necessary and that’s an honorable thing. It also is a good thing for business, as these were most likely changes that would eventually have needed to be made anyway.

Which plays nicely into one of the themes that’s been floating around in my head lately: Everyone says as a company you have to always be on your toes and evolving, but that’s easier said than done. How do you create a culture that’s not afraid to cannibalize itself?

Every system needs a disaster of sorts in order to regenerate life. Forest fires can actually be good for the environment. The problem is it’s easier said than done. Most companies get comfortable in a field or offering a specific set of services and don’t constantly strive to redefine themselves. For some reason the first thing that comes to mind is high-school dramas: Every one thinks it’s going to succeed when the kids go to college but none ever do. That’s because the same formula no longer applies, but they continue to try and shove it in there.

Sometimes you’ve just got to rethink your business from the ground up. James Hong from HOTorNOT (sorry to quote him again) wrote a great piece about staying hungry. After making a lot of money with HOTorNOT he is looking to completely revamp it. He’s changed the corporate structure, take a serious paycut (down to $24 a year) and set up a stock option program to keep employees hungry. All of this is new, so there’s no way to say how it’ll turn out, but you have to respect him for trying (especially with the cash cow that is HOTorNOT)

I guess the bottom line in all of this is that if you don’t cannibalize your business, someone else will.

An email conversation between me and JetBlue (in the form of me reading the email and talking back at my iBook):

As a result of system disruptions impacting flights to/from the Northeast, we are unable to complete your travel as scheduled. Your flight #1076 on Monday, February 19, 2007 for travel from Richmond, VA (RIC) has been canceled.

me: NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

You may receive a full refund* or travel credit on JetBlue which is good for one year. If you would like to rebook your itinerary without fee, please call 1-800-JETBLUE (1-800-538-2583) by May 22, 2007.

me: May 22nd?! I want to GO HOME!

I am not pleased. I was about to write that I wish I had more operations management knowledge, to be able to legitetmately say that I am angry with JetBlue. But then I read this and decided that yes, I am angry.

They handled my Tuesday night pretty well. They constantly kept us updated and set up a table full of snacks and drinks. My flight ended up landing at 3.00am instead of the scheduled 11.00pm, but that is much, much better than the 10 hours at JFK of people sitting in JetBlue airplanes on the runway. But I just wish they had known their limitations and had more of a contingency plan since this inclement weather was announced with several days’ warning.

Wanna know the best part?

Please be advised that we are currently experiencing extremely high call volumes and may be difficult to get through to a Reservation Agent. We’ll do our best to answer your call as soon as we can. If you can, we recommend you wait to until a later date to call and rebook.

I decided to take the risk of being on hold for hours. So I called. Because I see online that there is a flight on Tuesday leaving Richmond at 7.00am, “arriving” to JFK at 8.15am. If it was on time (ha, ha, ha), I would only be a teensy bit late to work. Well, guess what happened. There was a recording saying that due to extremely high call volume, my call could NOT be taken, and to call back later. “This is the end of this call” was even spoken by the recording. Now what. I wonder if I can just buy this ticket (flights were cancelled through tomorrow (Monday) only) and just sort out the money stuff later (of being reimbursed for the difference). I can see that as escalating into an eight month overcomplicated ordeal, like the stuff I read on Consumerist. I don’t know what to do. What is “later” to them? Later today? Tomorrow? May 22nd?

There are direct parallels between JetBlue and my biggest weakness. I have been told this a couple of times by different people: I get so excited about brands and what they can do, that I get lost in that bounciness and forget about the businessy stuff. One of the most resonating things said at my end-of-year review was “You have to remember that clients aren’t as excited about brands as you are.” Sounds similar to when the New York Times said “The cancellations raise new questions about whether JetBlue’s management is equal to its ambitions.”

I am angry. Very, very angry. So angry that I am about to walk almost a mile in the freezing cold just to go to the aforementioned World Cup. I expect that it will calm me down because the atmosphere will be comforting, reminding me of a nice summer 2006 in which none of my flights were delayed.

I had expected something cartoony. I am pleased. Not that cartoony is ever bad.

These were here over the weekend, and luckily this morning as well.

Bedford Avenue and North 8th Street, Williamsburg Brooklyn.

environmentally friendly clothes — web kiosk at front of store to reduce dependence on inventory

environmentally friendly clothes — web kiosk at front of store to reduce dependence on inventory