tonygoodson

Drambuie is for Poofs and Lawyers

A fantastic viral ad for Drambuie.  Bogans speak out!

A few of my thoughts;

- My enemies enemy is my friend

- Crocodile Dundee IV

- The only drink ad that makes me want to try the drink

- Any publicity it good publicity

- Class sells! (Damn, can't get the video version now)

"Drambuie made for a Prince, not a Bogan"

Anger at Prince free CD giveaway

This is funny, listening to the squealing of the old music industry grab on for every penny to an old model that doesn't serve the consumers anymore.

 Anger at Prince free CD giveaway

It is yet another example of the damaging covermount culture which is destroying any perception of value around recorded music

They seem to be saying that if they make music a difficult rare commodity they can make money!!  A bit like the diamond trade dealing with gem quality synthetic diamonds!!

Funny, but the first album I ever bought was Mike Oldfield's Tubular Bells, which was a recent giveaway at The Mail on Sunday, as well.  Under what circumstances does the record industry think I will pay full whack for yet another copy of a long lost album I bought over 30 years ago?  Or are they relying on a new generation of Tubular Bells listeners, and stuff me.  Either way, the message is Stuff Me!

I feel sorry for the record store holders, if their industry is dying, but isn't that because consumer demand is changing?  Shouldn't record stores and recording companies be offering something to me that I want!!

London 2012 and Good Design

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.  And then check these comments out on Digg.  Can so many people hate the new London 2012 Olympics logo, and be wrong.  Occasionally a radical new design comes along which questions and changes our perception, but I don't think it's the London 2012 Olympics logo.  And the trouble with design by committee is that they all start to justify what they've done, and lose sight of it being horrible.  It's sharp, ugly, badly coloured in, and confusing.

And talking of colouring in, a few months back there was discussion of developing an icon for Melbourne.  The best comment I read was the suggestion that an icon should be something that can quickly be drawn by an eight year old.  Think Eiffel Tower, think Sydney Opera House, think Empire State Building.  In fact, think Apple iPod.  So my first reaction was to ask my 5 year old to design something for the London 2012 Olympics.  Funny that the BBC website featured the picture above on the front website.

And then with more thinking (but not much), what do you associate with London, and design round that.  And blow me down if other people haven't done the same thing.  Why does new design have to be radical, why can't it be beautiful and err iconic!  The London Olympics are in London because of London, otherwise they'd be in Manchester!!

Finally, in discussion with Johnnie Moore, we might come up with some "Fruit Salad" design using the Frutiger Linotype font to enhance the Fruit Salad look of the new London logo. And I spotted the Donut Logo as well.   And of course there's radical and there's RADICAL!

Listening to Users considered harmful?

Kathy Sierra has (yet another!) great post, about (not) listening to users.

It turned out that most of the major changes they made to their program came not from user requests and suggestions, but from the Parelli team's own innovations. He went on to explain that their members/students/users had no idea what was needed to make better, faster, deeper breakthroughs. In fact, many of the changes went against what their user feedback seemed to suggest. In other words, in many ways the Parelli team deliberately did   not listen to users.

If I listened to every user, then I wouldn't have a voice or weblog, and it would be pretty bland so as to cause offence to no-one.  So if you want to incrementally improve your product or service, just listen to your users.
If you want to radically take a leap and make the big change, listen to yourself.

I was just looking at the Scoble video interview with Julie Larson-Green, and demo of Microsoft's new Office12 replacement for Office 2003, and I thought before watching, there's no way I'm paying for incremental improvements, but having watched the demo, I'm saying WoW! Gimme, Gimme, Gimme.  They've taken a jump and changed the Office interface. 
Of course they've listened to users, but it's what they've done with their listening and taken a leap of faith.

This is all very Purple Cow, which I'm currently reading.

Fedex Furniture

This made me laugh.  FedEx Furniture (via Seth Godin).
Amazing that FedEx would attempt to stop a celebration of their brand.
They just don't get it.
I guess if you allow this one you open up the floodgates.

I'm not sure FedEx are on firm legal ground here.  Can't you satirise something legally.
It wasn't satire to start with, but FedEx have made it satire now!!
And here's the storm that follows this stupidity by FedEx, You've been Slashdotted.

FedEx were one of the pioneers of the web, by turning over their systems to the public to view, I think they've lost their sense of humour and are getting behind the times.
FedexFurniture makes me more want to use FedEx.  Cool.
FedEx's response makes me not want to use FedEx.  Sour.

I think I need a new category for my weblog....American Companies Suing Themselves Down the Plughole.

Scoble, FedEx, Apple and Microsoft

A few Scoble inspired links.
First Fed-Ex.  This guy who works for FexEx's competitor has written a slightly pompous marketing piece trying to get every hip "e" word into it, but not seeing blogging as a key platform for the strategy.  That's ok, maybe he's right, but let's prove him wrong!!  Scoble has scurrilously suggested linking to FexEx to drive them to No1 for the word "shipping" that's it, shipping!  And besides, I was always led to believe that FexEx were at the forefront of commercial websites on the Internet when they moved their internal network to TCP/IP early on, and then turned their shipping system over to customers to enquire on, over the Internet.  A radical idea, early on in the Web's development.  So no problem with linking to FedEx!

Next, another Scoble link, to Robert Cringely, who has predicted that Apple and Intel will merge.  A very brave prediction I don't agree with, simply because a large proportion of Intel's product is driven by sales of Microsoft software.  An intriguing prediction all the same.

Why are we obsessed with Microsoft?

Why are we so obsessed with the number 46?
That's Microsoft's Fortune 500 ranking on 2003 revenue.
The first disparity is of course Microsoft's Market Capitalisation, which would rank it third if all the shares were sold.  Why is this the case?  Is it their pile of cash?  Do we bet on the potential of Microsoft relative to other companies, or does the market talk Microsoft up, because it's in everyone's interest.
Look around your home and office.  Yes there's a Microsoft presence, but there's also a Ford, Nokia, Procter and Gamble presence which in some cases outweighs your investment in Microsoft.

Could we do without Microsoft in our lives?  Would the world be a worse place without Microsoft?
Think about it.  We'd have Apple as our operating system (actually we'd have UnixV as our operating system, if that bloody OSF hadn't sabotaged things), we'd have GUIs and a mouse without Microsoft. We'd have Word Processing, Spreadsheets, Server operating systems, and better browsers.
What have Microsoft done for us?
The only thing I can think of, is it gives us goodish integration across the office tools (which is where they make most of their money!!).  But I don't copy spreadsheets across to Word that much!  And I don't use the features of Microsoft Office beyond '97, probably.

So why all the fuss and share price around Microsoft?
The mantle has passed from IBM to Microsoft, and now possibly Google. 
Do you think the Chinese will care for this idle talk?
I carry my Nokia around with me. 
Do I care which operating system, chip, protocol and standards it uses?

And so all this Scoble/Ballmer talk.  Does it matter?  I guess if it's the third ranked company by market capitalisation then it does, but if all Microsoft is dependent on for it's high profile existence is market capitalisation, then aren't the institutional investors going to want things quietened down and remain neutral?  That's my predication, and I also think Dave Winer is on the money on this one.

Making Money the Cluetrain way

Hugh has a posting about Making Money with Cluetrain.
Very interesting.  After Cluetrain was written as a book, there was a very active mail-list run by Chris Locke, with Doc and Dave Weinberger (I think) chipping in with comments as well, but over time the conversation died, I think largely, because the basic question wasn't being answered......give us examples of a "Clued" company.

Chris Locke's book, Gonzo Marketing took the next step, and laid out how everyone could make money and live happily ever after.

Doc Searls being interviewed by Cameron and Mick gave the answer quoting Paul Saffo,
"We overestimate in the short term, and underestimate in the long term"
And that is what has happened with Cluetrain. 
In the short term we overestimated its impact, but in the long term it will come good.

Kind of ironic, that of all people to spot the trend, Murdoch is beginning to mouth off, probably fearing and seeing the drop in circulation and advertising revenue, and thinking the same money must be going somewhere else, so now he's chasing the dollar.

The trouble is, in the long term, we're no longer going to put up with the same advertising shit, dressed in a different form on blogs and podcasts. 
We don't want your ciggie adverts inserted in between our conversations.

But much of our capitalist system, especially media and sport, is dependent upon the advertising dollar.  So where is it all going to lead?  Somewhere, but very very slowly!

A pity really, because what big corporate wouldn't benefit from, Chat, Weblogs (internal and external), RSS, WiKis, and PodCasts?  But for the time being they're going to crap on about Knowledge Management, which inevitably ends up as Document Management, which is about as exciting as watching Newcastle United (except if you're a Man Yoo fan) lose last night! 

Imagine if large corporates got really serious (or fun) about enabling the knowledge that's in people's heads, which doesn't mean capturing it in a Word document and putting it on an Intranet!!

Pod to Blog

Thanks for the link Hugh.  One word.  Money.
Probably shareholder pressure, to drive quarterly earnings.
You want another company that in the blink of an eye is becoming "they"?
Google.
You mark my words. Shareholder pressure.
Last year they were still the darling.
Now?
Ok, so I'll keep using Google, but as soon as something better or different comes along, I'm outta here.

I'll keep saying it until I sound like Tom Peters!
China, and India, and Korea, and Brazil, and Russia are looking on, and will kill any company that tries to be a "they".  Because "they" will be better and less expensive.
You want to make Apple hurt?

Let's change the name from Podcast to Blogcast (or whatever name hasn't been copyrighted!)
Apple don't deserve the credit on this one.

Tom Peters' non-Blog!

Hey Hugh beat me to exactly what I was going to say, which is that I'm getting more and more weary of other people blogging on Tom Peters' blog.  Piss Off back to your own blogs.
I want to read Tom Peters' blog, not someone blogging on his behalf.

This suggests to me that Tom Peters is becoming more of a brand than a person!