Monthly Review - November.

So Paul Ford writes a weekly review for us over at Harpers, and my father has been writing up his work diary over the last fifteen years, thus I decided these two unconnected things should be the premise for me keeping a monthly work/interest review. These are not necessarily things that happened this month, but things that occupied my thinking, work or discussions.

Innovation, Shminnovation.
I spent much of this month questioning, albeit mostly in my head and a little over on CHP127, the buoyancy of the term ‘innovation’ in the media and how valid this new interest in it really is. I became most concerned when Ford started advertising that innovation is their mission, and that their tagline is now “Driving American Innovation“.

The newfound interest in it from designers and business people alike is fantastic for all the discussion it promotes, but my concern is that it soon suffers the fate of Brand Strategy and become overused, abused and tossed in a ditch somewhere. IDEO, Doblin and many others have been making a living for some time, helping their clients innovate - so it is helpful when people like Kelley and Keeley weigh in to give us some perspective from time to time. So then when Beirut, a graphic designer (albeit “the” graphic designer) suggests (perhaps tongue-in-cheek) that it is the new black, and questions where is design’s place in business when its not attached to the word innovation, I get the feeling people are going to try to push for a whole new field of work. From Beirut’s post:

“So we come full circle. Don’t say design, say innovation, and when innovation doesn’t work, make sure you saved some of that design stuff, because you’re going to need it.”

Transformation = transmogrification.
In my own work I come across the desire, when teaching an organization how to adopt innovation and design as a process, to completely transform them. This is usally perpetuated by large-ish consultancies who need to pay the bills - but transformation nonetheless is part of the service of innovation consultancy too. I came across an essay by Dr. Karmen Guevara - Creating Organizations Fit for the Human Spirit, which could have been written yesterday, but in fact, after getting in touch with Guevara, I learn it was written about 10 years ago. The same points about innovation, transformation and organizational health were all there 10 years ago. Dr. Karmen Guevara generously sent me two of her old consultancy reports for the Ministry of Defense in the UK, prepared over ten years ago, which seem to be a prescient story for today.

City Dwelling
Also this month, San Francisco gained a noteworthy architecture landmark in the middle of Golden Gate Park. I stopped by briefly to look at the outside of the new de Young museum, designed by the Swiss architects Herzog & de Meuron. It was timely as I had just read Charles Moore’s essay, You have to pay for the public life, who questions the uniqueness of urban places, city centers and urban development some 20-odd years ago. It made me appreciate that San Francisco is unique and special because from so many places within the city, you can see much of the city. This, I think, helps you feel part of living in the city quicker. As opposed to somewhere like L.A. or New York where people often say it takes years to feel part of it. In this theme, I particularly enjoyed Powazek’s short piece on parking in the city.

A Small Town Called Dish.
At the same time this month, as a Texan town was renamed Dish for the same-named network, I visited Gadsden AL, to talk about naming with the Mayors office. Most wouldn’t visit a small rural city voluntarily, unless family or work took you there - but this was a snapshot of America that you usually only see fictionalized on TV these days.

Disengaged.
A conference I continuously miss, would like to attend, but don’t think I have anything to contribute to, happened: Design Engaged. Some of the most interesting and talented people working online get together, discuss, argue and seemingly document everything. So really I needn’t attend - I can spy, read and learn remotely. Andrew Otwell seems to have done an excellent job starting up a small micro-conference set in Europe over three days. I would say that Andrew Otwell is the only other symposiarch that I know of - and I look forward to the chance to a: meet up one day, and b: to seeing what he continues to do.

AJAX = Black Hole.
I can’t remember why I wrote this: Less Ajax, Less Ruby but GYM and Web 2.0 still lingers. Perhaps someone else did and I copied it. But the interest in Web 2.0 and Ajax seems to have subsided a bit, and though it still indicates a definite trend in web maturity, it reminds me of how we all used to say, IntRAnet, Macromedia Flash, or even Shockwave back in the day - until someone who wasn’t meant to says the term to you, and you realise you need to find a new one that no one else really knows. The fun of it all is that Ajax is technology alledgedly invented by microsoft back in the 90s but not until AdaptivePath thoughtfully coined it, was it easily adopted. Reminds me of the (incorrect) Black Hole story as said by Lexicon-Branding. It seems that this coming year we’ll see the beginning of major Ajax/2.0 apps taking us away from using their desktop counterparts. Email being the first.

Interruption Scientists.
But it all still wont help us from being hopelessly distracted and overworked/tasked. Interruption scientists are busily working on stuff that tells us today (NY Times - needs reg.) that the average employee spends only 11 minutes on any given project, before being interrupted. Often that eleven minutes is portioned into three minute tasks, which we’re often multi-tasking. Thats how business is getting done today.

Yahoo Travel Will Grow.
I enjoyed the concept of the Flickrization of Yahoo, as written by Erick Schonfeld, depicting the battle between Yahoo and Google and suggesting that while Google may win on advertising and catching up on daily hits, Yahoo wins on loyal customers and their content. Yahoo Travel could be the next big thing for Yahoo, as it like Flickr, invites user-generated content. I wonder what would happen if they made a Yahoo Travel app utilizing someone like GeoVector’s software?

David Vs Ozzie?
So while Yahoo battles google, it does seem that Microsoft is battling… well, themselves really. (There was a Wharton report published today on how Yahoo is ‘carefully’ staying out of Microsoft’s ‘crosshairs’ by positioning itself as a media company.) GYM - meaning Google, Yahoo and Microsoft - does exist in some form - but Microsoft really does seem to be in a world of its own. Being able to subsidize the new X Box by over a 100 dollars a piece is stunning, but it looks like it suffers from a nearly innovation-bankrupt culture, and has no interest in changing.

I do have to say though that I did find some of Natasa Milic-Frayling’s research interesting, in particular the SmartBack feature. But this does seem to be a typical Microsoft’s approach, which is to concentrate on the ‘feature’ rather than the app or platform.

Flockensteining: to hobble together three silly apps.
I find Flock to be a symptom of that. It’s a frankenstein of an approach to build a better browser by simply integrating more apps to it. Does anyone not remember the last Netscape? The bloated email, browser and whatever app? I wish someone would work on building a better email application, or better still, a layer on top of an OS to help how we deal with internet communication.

Building Vertical Outside of Hollywood & Root Kit.
I find Mark Cuban’s stealthy, yet quite public, development of a vertical studio system quite interesting. Cuban now has the ability to let people like Steven Soderbergh simultanously release a feature through a theatre, broadcast and DVD release. And all digitally. With a growing network of production, in his recent investment in the Weinstein Brother’s new outfit, Cuban could be building the new model of movie publishing - all from outside of the current system. His technical capabilities and knowledge will hopefully provide a better ownership solution than things like SONY come up with too.

PSP Art, Is Not and little alarming things.
I bought one, though not sure why, I think its an excellent device and an important one - made even more interesting by a joint art event with the RCA.

Is Not Magazine hit the streets again. And I’ve still not purchased a copy. An interesting concept - using only Underware’s typefaces.

Last but not least, as it will be a major thought for the month of December, is the performance of brands. I received a call from a very friendly and likable Anaezi Modu from ReBrand. An ex-architect who dived into early web activity, now focuses on running an annual award of rebranding by companies worldwide. And guess what, she actually gets international jurors, like from far flung places as China, Romania and Brasil. It looks interesting - even if the site is a little limiting in its exposure of the results. More to come on ReBrand.

I read in a weekly issue of Hollywood Reporter two alarming things, one that Stanley Kirk Burrely, who you might know as M.C. Hammer, is selling off his music catalogue which belongs to his bankruptcy estate. It seems Hammer is filing for chapter 7. Interested parties should contact Wixen Music Publishing. Also alarming for me is that there is a remake of The Omen in production, which will only fuel the number of bumbling idiots who make Damien Omen + 666 jokes to me.

All in all, an interesting month with plenty to think about for next month. I’ll figure out how to summarize my notes in shorter statements, and perhaps with more conclusionary thoughts.