Canuckflack

1. The mall’s role in American culture

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   December 14, 2006 by Colin

   The blogging world is full of niches. Public relations blogs are one tiny niche. Another even smaller grouping is mall bloggers. The leading mall blogs are featured in Retail Traffic this month. Here’s my list:

   • Malls of America is a multimedia blast into the past, with a fond eye for the postcard views of 60′s design and the overhyped promise of technology.
   • DeadMalls popped up on my handheld during a shopping trip to Syracuse. It was of no help in finding hollister, though.
   • the BoxTank – a more considered examination of the role of malls and big box stores in the suburban environment, but seems to be dead
   • Roadside Architecture – an attempt to document all those “did you see that” locations along the highway. Dinosaurs, 50′s bus stops, diners …

   That’s blogs about malls, written by fans. As opposed to blogs written for malls, by consultants – like the poor Oakland Mall Blog. A post every quarter that reads like promotional copy, and a contact address that has a different name to that listed under “author.”

   Underserved niche: I’m surprised no-one has set up a blog for mall walkers. There’s a consumer market, property nuisance, neighbourhood watch, and liability lawsuit waiting to happen, all in one group.

   I also like the “closed for business – abandoned shops/stores” group on flickr.

   [tags] mall, retail, shopping [/tags]

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2. Saving the world – one stitch at a time

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   November 30, 2006 by Colin

   Knitta Please. Renegade knitters, touching up the inner city one stitch at a time. Pictures on their MySpace page and Flickr.

   “…A tag crew of knitters, bombing the inner city with vibrant, stitched works of art, wrapped around everything from beer bottles on easy nights to public monuments and utility poles on more ambitious outings. With a mix of clandestine moves and gangsta rap — Knitta was born! Today, Knitta is a group of more than 10 ladies of all ages, races, nationalities, religions, sexual orientation… and gender.”

   Interview in Metropolis.

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3. This creativity tool is whickety whack!

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   November 29, 2006 by Colin

   

   That’s my rendition of a Death Star, built out of a Ball of Whacks – the new creativity toy/tool developed by Roger von Oech.� Built from� of 30 magnetic blocks, its’ geodesic shape reminds me of the Montreal Biosphere or the Hostel in the Forest (photos).

   Roger sent me a complimentary Ball after I praised his books in a post on creativity. His level of engagement online, as Paul has discussed, is both startling and logical: the audience and market for truly though-provoking innovations really has moved online.

   I can go on and on about Roger’s past work encouraging creativity and innovation, but I’ll let my recent experience with the Ball of Whacks say it all:

   • when I have this ball on my desk, everyone – I mean everyone – who stops by plays with it.
   • when I took it home, my three kids fought to play with it.

   We went on a road trip this past weekend, and the kids demanded equal time playing with the ball. One of them even brought a plastic Ikea tray so she could smash the ball and reassemble it into different shapes. If you look closely, you can see white dots where the kids wore down each individual magnetic piece as they played with the ball.

   I found it remarkable that all three kids wanted to play with the ball so much – they each have their own style of learning and expression. Nevertheless, the expressive kid, the intuitive kid and the crazy kid all found different uses for von Oech’s Ball of Whacks.

   This observation seems to apply in the office as well. The control freak wants to reassemble the ball. The skeptic takes it apart and reassembles it. The procrastinator tries to build a Transformer robot out of it. The lazy bastard just takes it apart and leaves all thirty pieces on the desktop. And the truly creative person uses the pieces to spell words on the side of a metal filing cabinet.

   As a visual thinker and attention-deprived worker, I appreciated the 96 page handbook that comes with the Ball, but I haven’t read it yet. I’m sure it’s very good, and will make good reading when I find time – in 2007. In the meanwhile, I’m going to continue playing with my ball.

   [tags] Creative, Creativity, Imagination, Whacks [/tags]

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4. Hooker and Tail: Something Good to Eat on the Rideau Canal

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   November 23, 2006 by Colin

   Mmmmm. The promise of� winter and a sure-fire retail� success.� Right now, it’s only a� hut dropped onto blocks in� the recently drained Rideau Canal.�

   All we need is twenty straight days of sub-zero weather, not too much rain, a little snowplowing,� dozens of teenage cooks and servers – and this hut and others along the Canal will be serving fresh and sweet BeaverTails. (a concept first developed by Grant Hooker)

   Matt Mackenzie has a flickr photo of a BeaverTails hut in full swing.

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5. Communications for muncipal politicians

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   October 15, 2006 by Colin

   Some quick thoughts on the communications involved in campaigning for municipal office, from Vicky Smallman, candidate for Ottawa City Council.

   In my ward, (a mushrooming exurb dominated by builders, road construction and big box stores) the roadside signs planted by candidates have to compete with realtor’s signs, mobile billboards, and giant hoardings directing drivers to new developments. Oh – and we seem to have twelve candidates for council in our area, each with their own sign in two or three sizes.

   Anyway, here’s the candidate on signage and other vehicles:

   “…They are also one of the few parts of “the message” that a campaign team can control.

   • Web sites only reach the people that seek them out (as you, our dear reader can attest to);
   • media coverage is solely at the discretion of the publishers and editors who also must (hopefully) carefully weigh the coverage amount;
   • public debates are hosted and moderated by (sometimes self) interested third parties — in our case, the ward’s community associations;
   • even pamphlets are just as likely to end up in a recycling bin unread as they are to end up in a voter’s hand.

   Signs though, they’re right there in your face: Announcing who’s in the race. They can’t be avoided. They also cost a tonne of money.”

   (Vicky Smallman)

   An afterthought about the effort being put out by the Ottawa Citizen to cover the municipal election: the paper itself is doing a great job, but its effort at blogging really suffers from poor design. It’s hard to distinguish between posts, the headlines for the posts are undescriptive, and the text and kerning is quite tight.

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6. Gnomic fame – mass hysteria, cats and dogs

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   September 14, 2006 by Colin

   What’s the price of fame -� if you’re a sculptor of gnomes? Creative Loafing Charlotte talks with Tom Clark, a former college professor and a longtime creator of over a thousand decorative and collector gnomes.�

   “…One loyal fan in California took Clark behind the scenes of a Lloyd Bridges movie as a favor for Clark coming to his home to autograph all his gnomes. During lunch, the man was showing the cast a catalogue of Clark gnomes and a woman across the table, a fellow collector, asked if it was a Clark catalogue. “Yes,” the man confirmed, then pointed next to him. “And that’s Tom Clark.” The woman was so shocked that she choked on her food and had to be given the Heimlich maneuver …”

   I guess that’s the benefit of gnomic fame – crashing Lloyd Bridges movies. “It’s GO TIME!“

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7. Adapting design for unique cultural and economic situations

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   September 12, 2006 by Colin

   How do Indian designers deal with the conflicting pressures of� competing with� international designers, incorporating or simply recognizing their cultural heritage, the Indian approach to a multi-cultural� and professional training in design, and a colonialist past? Steve Rigley talks about it in Eye.

   ” …Thrilling as it may seem to Mumbai’s new generation of shoppers, the mall reveals an insidious form of imperialism, a psychological rather than physical ruling: the ‘colonisation of the unconscious’ as Wim Wenders famously observed. And so within this context do contemporary Indian designers – like the court painters working for the Raj – find their taste challenged or their confidence undermined? Has there been any form of reactionary movement, any re-awakening of swadeshi within design education?”

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8. First Job Archetypes for Teens and Twenty-Somethings

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   August 31, 2006 by Colin

   The first day of September is just hours away, and that means we’re about three weeks from a new year’s worth of high school and college students realizing they’re desperately short of money. They will then hit the bricks looking for anything that will may cash money. As a tribute, I present 6 First Job Archetypes for Teens and Twenty-Somethings:

   Fast food chatter – The bottom of the new-to-retail food chain, she works in a smaller franchise serving juices and wraps to mall shoppers. She took this job to satisfy her parents and be near her friends – who also work retail at the mall. She has absolutely no loyalty to the job or her boss, and will drop the job the second a trip to Vail opens up.

   Ducking from Reality – not actually an employee, this guy hangs out where his friends (and imagined girlfriends) work. He’s a serious drain on productivity, a distraction when real customers come in, and a confirmed stalker. He can demonstrate passion for the product in the store, but will shy away from any formal role moving product.

   Too Smart For Your Own Good – This guy spends every waking hour of his day learning about the stock on the shelves – whether it’s records, D&D, xtreme sports or yoga wear. He has more invested in his identity as an expert and connaisseur than as your latex salesman, and this will harm your balance sheet. He sort of slid into the job after coming into the store 197 days in a row, and will be hard to get rid of.

   Halfway to Juvie – Bouncing from call centres, rental car outlets to cheque cashing places, this guy is honestly trying to find a niche for himself in society. He just has a problem with authority. Your authority. Will rise to the challenge and deliver in the crunch, but his tendency to question the larger social implications of his job may drive him (and you) nuts.

   ‘Stache Man – Likes to think he’s pulling off a Tom Selleck/David Carradine vibe, but really looks like the sofa dwelling stoner he is. Unspecified life experiences have prepared him to turn any conversation to the worst. No real job plans are in his future, but he certainly knows what he’d do if he won a million dollars.

   Oh God No! – This is what happens to students if they don’t plan ahead. $19.95 photo packages, smoke breaks by the loading dock, and a vaguely suspicious feeling about the rent-a-Santa. And a job that may end by Boxing Day, but doesn’t pay enough to let you shop on December 26.

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9. The reason for Jessica Simpson’s Ongoing PR Woes

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   August 30, 2006 by Colin

   

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10. The 22 (somewhat) Immutable Laws of Buzz

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    August 29, 2006 by Colin

    Sean got the ball rolling with the 22 Immutable Laws of Word of Mouth, I threw in the 22 Immutable Laws of Blogging, and Tamera Kremer has followed up with the 22 Immutable Laws of Customer Engagement. Here’s my take on the 22 (somewhat) Immutable Laws of Buzz:

    1. Indie cred, commercial dead
    2. Feed your fans’ hunger for information
    3. Sponsor a “D” list celebrity event
    4. Promotions targeted to extreme niches
    5. Win their hearts: build credibility with new audiences
    6. Bright lights, big titties. Leverage celebrity connections. Or sex.
       
    7. A heavy ValPak buy. Just kidding.
    8. Hit the local social circuit – in outrageous clothing
    9. Lifestyle reporters: ten dollar words, ten cent facts
    10. Celebrity gifting: Local weathermen are surprisingly affordable
    11. Chase’s Calendar of Events: the art of piggybacking
    12. Car Accident or Sales Record: Just spell my name right
    13. Teen hits drive time > AOR hourly
    14. Community weeklies: filling news holes weekly
    15. When in doubt, let your publicist leak it out
    16. Post no bills: really, it’s just a suggestion
    17. Try local late night, the cpm is lower. (So is the return)
    18. Celebrity endorsements: there’s gold in the 1990 Fox television schedule
    19. Guerrilla marketing – at community soccer games
    20. Public Access Cable: the Dead Zone
    21. BOGO does not create buzz. Unless you’re a mortician
    22. All Hail Empress Oprah

    Update: Bob at Flacklife has published his 22 somewhat immutable laws of evaluation.

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11. YouTube as anthropological record

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    August 21, 2006 by Colin

    More than a decade ago, archivists and historians fretted about what would happen to the tell-tale details of everyday life – the scribblings in the margins of books, doodles in journals, folded and unfolded personal telegrams – that help social scientists reconstruct how our parents, grandparents and forebears led their lives.

    It was already obvious that handwritten notes had been abandoned in favour of the temporary record produced by e-mail. Even worse, successive generations of software and computing technology meant that electronic records were being lost to planned mechanical obsolescence, not� good old mould, water rot or poor filing.

    Today, the pendulum seems to be swinging the other way thanks to cheap plentiful memory. A gig of memory (and rising!) in Gmail means you don’t delete your messages as quickly. Online sharing sites, like Flickr and YouTube, mean more data is being added to the public library every day (whether that data is valuable or not is subjective).

    Terence Dick, writing in This Magazine, notes that YouTube may have some historical value (providing they don’t figure out a way to monetize the site and get bought out) :

    ” … The site’s success lies in how easy it is to make the most minor of experiences and events available to all. That convenience, however, threatens to change You Tube from an idealistic adventure in media democracy (“Broadcast yourself” is its current motto) to something much more utilitarian. … You Tube has become a message board for its users, home to in-jokes, personal letters and individual exchanges. Instead of minor masterpieces, videos are reduced to the level of Post-it notes.

    … And while this might not make for compelling television, it makes for incredible anthropology. Nowhere else could you access such intimate moments in the everyday lives of strangers. Instead of their current catchphrase, the powers-that-be at You Tube might consider changing their motto to “Excavate yourself” and encourage their users to share something more authentic (and original) than their lip-synching tributes to pop stars.”�

    Still – YouTube the anthropological reference should learn from the experience of� the movie Galaxy Quest: if your culture indiscriminately beams out thousands of hours of programming into the ether, you better hope someone out there has a really good TV Guide.

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12. Tom Hanks’ reluctance to be interviewed – unless it’s a movie junket

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    August 1, 2006 by Colin

    … Mr. Hanks was initially reluctant to be interviewed for this article. “Why would I want to — so I could see my name in the paper tomorrow?” he joked. “I get my name in the paper when I go out and buy socks. I go to Gray’s Papaya in New York and I’m on Defamer.com.”

    Quoted in a NYT profile of his production company, Playtone.

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13. Targeted marketing, the Wieden + Kennedy way

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    July 27, 2006 by Colin

    

    Really, wouldn’t it be better to post a notice like this in a liquor store? Don’t know whether W+K London is, in fact, looking for a creative director. They’ve linked to the picture on their in-house blog, though.

    And for those of you not in the U.K., Tesco is a tremendously large chain of grocery stores/hypermarts.

    Photo originally posted by Mik3yb.

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14. VW’s manual for backseat drivers

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    July 20, 2006 by Colin

    CP+B’s work for Volkswagen continues to impress. These are images clipped from a Backseat Driver’s Manual for Jettas, as inserted in recent issues of Wired, Spin and other magazines.

    Full scans of the booklet, including the Backseat Driver’s Exam, can be found on the VWVortex forum, courtesy of USCVWFan.

    Hat tip to Advertising for Peanuts, and thanks to pvera for the images. Michael Seaton noticed it much earlier than I – then again, I haven’t bought the print edition of a magazine in at least a year.

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15. A Guide to the New Middle Class: Chavs, DVNTYs, Loft Wingers and others

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    July 7, 2006 by Colin

    It’s always a daunting challenge: explaining an ever-fragmenting market to your clients while building your consultancy’s intellectual capital. That old stand-by of risk-shy and ad-aware behaviour, the middle class, seems to be disappearing into smaller niches characterized by individualistic behaviour and apparently irrational market behaviour.

    “The old class-based definitions have become redundant. We need new, sharper tools to distinguish the nuances and subtleties of the recently enlarged middle classes,’ [Dan Halliday, the managing director of the brand communications agency TheFishCanSing,] adds.

    ‘We characterise ourselves almost exclusively with regard to taste, in particular taste as defined by consumer choice; more specifically still, taste as defined by brand loyalties.”(Campaign magazine, via TMC)

    Halliday’s shop has put together The Class of 2006. A Guide to the New Middle Class, which attempts to break down the British middle class into market segments. The names are witty and will ring a sociological bell if you’re at all familiar with British society:

    · THE DOING VERY NICELY THANKYOUS
    · POSH CHAVS AND AGA LOUTS
    · WHITE VAIN MAN AND NO SUGAR BABE
    · NORMAL ACTUALLYS
    · (JAMIE) OLIVER’S ARMY
    · LOFT WINGERS

    Campaign’s piece offers highlights of each segment, but the report goes into more detail with many illustrations. it also attempts to forecast where these segments may play on trends currently developing in general society. One example:

    Put a blog in it: the new citizen media

    Blogging, the axis-point of being very opinionated and having too much time on your hands, should be fundamentally middle-class. But not every tribe is doing it. Some, like the Normal Actuallys, are by nature suspicious of new trends, and frequently entirely ignorant of them. Others, like White Vain Man, just aren’t burdened by the
    desire to read or be read by anyone outside their set.

    Some tribes took to citizen media immediately, though. Both Doing Very Nicely Thankyous have erudite professional blogs like Phosita or Law Blog. The Hornby Set blog about politics and culture, and their comments sections are a litany of feuds between members of the Berliner and Independable sub-groups. Initially fans of the lively, up-to-the-second and media-rich blogs of Loft Wingers, the Hornby Set now find that the young turks’ posts make them self-conscious of their own efforts, and read only other Hornby Set blogs.

    For their part the Loft Wingers read Holy Moly and make a great deal of noise about getting all their news from ohmynews.com or Indymedia – unless something important has happened, in which case they go to the BBC website like everyone else. Stephanie Oliver’s Army has a passing interest in photography, and has a stream for their local area on flickr.com (which is in reality a series of photos of garden birds, her dog or her car).

    The Fair to Middlings were fascinated when their grown-up children introduced them to flickr, and now post pictures of their grandchildren online after every family get-together. The Fair to Militants, meanwhile, are coming to embrace the new media landscape with sites like The Grey Vote. Expect citizen media, and blogging in particular, to rise in proportion to middle-class disillusionment.

    Wondering where you might fit into this new brand-relevant grouping? Try out the quick quiz at the back end of the report/deck (found at a specialist site)

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