Infomagination

Culture clash creativity

Travel broadens the mind, so they say, and after 3 weeks in Vietnam & Cambodia it certainly feels like my brain has been well and truly streeeeetched.  If you haven't been, they're both incredible countries, full of beautiful scenery, fascinating history, friendly people, delicious food and crazy, memorable sights.

One of the big reasons they're so memorable, though, I was thinking after my jetlag woke me up at 4:30 this morning, is that the new stuff I saw/did/ate in my travels wasn't always completely unfamiliar - it was made up of new ways of mashing together things I know well.  Here's just three of my discoveries, all featuring two words I wouldn't normally have put next to each other:

1.  Fish Massage

Siem Reap, Cambodia, isn't just home to the incredible temples of Angkor.  It's also home to tens of Fish Massage stalls - pools of water containing shoals of "kissing fish" that are more than happy to suck the dead skin off your feet if you stick them in.  It's a bizarre sensation, kinda like sticking your feet in a can of coke, but when you pull your feet out they're as smooth as a babies bum. 

Fish Massage: an awesome and unexpected blend of the human and animal that's got me thinking more about the increasing relevance of symbiosis (creating mutually beneficial relationships between humans, animals and the planet) as we move into an ever more environmentally conscious future.

2.  Snake Wine

If people are feeling adventurous in the UK, they might make flavoured vodka, by putting some toffee, peppermint or even a chilli in a vodka bottle.  In Vietnam, those people would get laughed at, by locals who regularly drink their rice wine with a pickled cobra inside.  After steeping in the wine for a minimum of three years, the stuff is finally good to drink - and having tried some 9 year old vintage, I have to say I was actually pretty impressed.  Kinda like sherry for hard men. 

Snake Wine is supposed to have health benefits including helping rheumatism, but it's main function is basically virility - in every sense.  On one side, a few shots is supposed to do wonders for your "manpower," as I heard it called (I also heard it called "Vietnamese Viagra").  On the other, one of our guides explained how rich men buy massive tanks of the stuff, filled with hundreds of snakes, at a cost of tens of thousands of dollars, to sit in their living room as a status symbol. 

Snake Wine: a blend of the primal and sophisticated that's got me thinking about the way we take power and identity from the symbols and signs in the world around us and how we absorb and display them to others.  That and what my dad will think when he opens his present this Christmas.

3.  Water Puppets

Finally, a bit of fun from Hanoi, in north Vietnam, with a Water Puppet show.  Slightly cruelly described as "Punch and Judy in a pond" in my guidebook, I found this 45 minute display, where puppets rise, dance and perform in a pool of water, thanks to the skillful expertise of some puppeteers lurking behind a screen at the back, thoroughly charming and strangely enthralling - in spite of, and perhaps part due to, some slightly crap puppet design.

Water Puppets:  something basic elevated to something special, just by shifting the context.  And that's got to be a lesson we can apply time and time again to the brands we work on.  A decent production budget certainly helps too, though.

It's time to get clashing

So those were just three of the weird and wonderful new mixtures I came across whilst I've been away.  Of course, creativity's always been about combining, remixing and re-making stuff that doesn't usually go together, though.  That's why George Kneller, the American philosopher, said "creativity consists largely of rearranging what we know in order to find out what we do not know" and that's why I wrote my IPA Diploma thesis - because I think there's so much to be gained by smashing information and imagination together.

So hey, get out there, mix, re-mix and mash it all up again.  And next time you're out travelling, don't just bring home a T-shirt or a straw donkey, grab yourself some new ideas - and chuck it all into the melting pot together.

Good Planner, Bad Planner

"I love working with planners," an account handler friend said this week.  

"Good planners can take a plate of spaghetti...

 

... and turn it into a tube map."

"This one planner I work with, though," she continued, "he's not so good."

"He'll take your plate of spaghetti...

 

and cover it in fucking bolognese."

Ukraine's got talent

If you haven't seen anything incredible yet today, check out this astounding video from the winner of this year's "Ukraine's got talent." 

Ever the analyst, I've been trying to break down just why this is so good.  For starters it's obvious that it's an original, atmospheric piece of skill performed live by a beautiful heroine. Like many great pieces of creativity, however, it also has several tensions at its heart:

-  Everyday, inorganic sand becomes something magical and alive

-  A serious tragedy is brought to life on throwaway reality TV

-  Destruction becomes beautiful

Personally, the serious nature of the film makes me hope that she doesn't sell out to an advertiser just yet.  A sand doodle iPhone app, though...  Now THAT would be cool.

Ideas that are destined to get ripped off by advertising #475,642

Reactive music makes your life your soundtrack

I don't know about you, but the most interesting thing I've seen in music this year hasn't been Friendly Fires, Empire of the Sun or even the new Sugababes line-up. It's been reactive music.

Reactive music is a whole new genre of sound that uses sensory input to generate and control the music you're listening to.  If you've got an iPhone you can start having a play with it now.  Just download the RjDj app and it'll start sampling noise from the world around you and looping it into a kind of weird, trippy music track.  It's mind altering stuff, but VERY cool - and a completely new way of participating with the music you're listening to, not to mention the world around you.

For those of you without an iPhone, just watch this and pretend it's your house...

Like all new tech, it'll take a while for reactive music to find its place in the world.  But in a world that loves relevance, personalisation, interactivity and entertainment, and where technology is moving ever faster, the creative potential of a feedback loop from you and your environment to the music you're listening to, the pictures you have on your walls, the clothes you're wearing, your Facebook page or whatever seems massive.

Definitely one to keep an ear out for in the future.

Now what's the marketing equivalent of this?

I don't know yet but, as career goals go, making it happen's got to be a pretty good idea.

Anthropomorphise this! pt 3

If you belieeeeeeeeve they put a man on the moon, man on the moooooooon! sang Michael Stipe, as he thoughtfully ruminated the most interesting news story of 1969.

What Mike failed to consider, however, was that thanks to the wonders of anthropomorphisation, there's been a man on the moon since way before Neil Armstong.  That's not to say things haven't changed since the early years, though.  These days he's got a wife.  Not to mention a pet rabbit.

Yes, my final piece of anthropomorphic inspiration comes courtesy of The Moon - or, more specifically, the Mighty Boosh, with their unique take on what our lunar companion would say if he could talk (as demonstrated in their live shows last year).  Classic.

Now go take some humanity and put it in a strange place.  It's fun.  And, if you do it right, people might just love you for it.

Anthropomorphise this! pt 2

Number two in my series of anthropomorphic magic comes courtesy of this sneak preview of the new BBC programme Walk on the Wild Side. 

Planet Earth x Creature Comforts = Love it!

Anthropomorphise this! pt 1

If there's one thing that us human beings like, it's being human. 

In fact, we like it so much that we want everything else to be human too.  Or at least, more accurately, our socially wired brains are programmed to look for "human" signals everywhere - and get tickled when they find them.

I could wang on about anthropomorphism in product design (think cars, vodka bottles or angle poise lamps) but instead I'm going to share a few examples of anthropomorphism in art that have caught my imagination recently.

For part one, check out these cool photos from Czech artist Vlad Artazov.  And just remember the next time you're doing the DIY - nails are people too, yeah?!

Could this wedding entrance change music videos Forever?

Jill and Kevin Heinz met when Kevin’s childhood friend, Jeff, married Jill’s college friend, Ann, in 2005. Jill couldn't resist Kevin’s wit and charm. Kevin couldn't resist Jill’s intellect, not to mention her remarkable dance moves.  This year, they got married and this video of their church entrance has clocked up over 30m views on Youtube, for one reason and one reason only:  because it is AWESOME.

So far, so heartwarming, but the story gets even more interesting when you realise that the video is actually something of a landmark in music video history.  That's because Chris Brown's record company decided to put that little overlay to buy a copy of the song at the start of it, rather than kicking up a fuss about the fact that their song had been used without permission.

The results have been astounding, with double average click through rates of other Click-to-Buys.  Interest in the song also seems to have rubbed off on the original music video, which saw its Click-to-Buy CTR increase by 2.5x at the end of July. Most importantly, however, the song has rocketed up the US music charts, reaching as high as #4 on the iTunes singles chart and #3 on Amazon's best selling MP3 list over a year after its release.

The result is a whole heap of lessons about branding today and here are just three:

1.  Throw away your dictionary:  old definitions of things like "music video" and "advertising" are being re-written fast.

2.  Context is king:   a little nudge at the right time can make a big difference - and our data rich, hyperlinked world is is full of opportunities to grab people with the right message at the right moment.

3.  Remember that the public has the last laugh: Chris Brown may have seen his chart position rise off the back of his record company's ad, but the decision of the happy couple to add their own overlay - for a charity that campaigns against domestic violence - is a healthy reminder of where the balance of power lies when it comes to reputation.