The price of privacy is $0 and there is nothing we can do about it. So there you go. That’s my first argument.

Second, let’s not confuse the idea of precision targeting with the myopic vision and poor execution of the media companies. Speed of technical innovation is overwhelming for everyone especially people in the “push marketing” world. They are stuck and that’s because they are in “push marketing” to begin with.

Most of the marketer are still drinking the Kool-aid media companies offer (impressions and share-of-voice crap.)

Now Let’s consider a consumer. Me. 38 year old; not one of those millennials that everyone’s so worried about; just a good old marketable consumer. I am driving back home in my car. Tired from work. I have some XM radio channel on. And all of a sudden a very annoying voice tries to sell me a mattress. A mattress!!! It boils my blood. I look at the radio and here is what I want to yell at it: “I  don’t need freakin’ mattress. I have one. I just bought one of those expensive temperpedics. You should know that. My iPhone would know that. My iPhone knows a lot of stuff. Why am I paying for this radio?” Can you imagine they repeat the 800 number three times. It feels like getting water-boarded.  Who calls that 800 number after going through such torture. Anyway, I, 38 years old married male, want targeted ads and it is not creepy to me. It was …. but not anymore.

Technology will finally figure it out. It already has for the smart ones. Do you think Google is a just search engine? It is the answer to your question. It is “targeted ads that are worth your privacy plus more”. They work. You know why? because they are not “push advertising”. They are on-demand. The user asks for the ad and the user gets it.

Here is another major misconception you have about people outside America, with all due respect. People outside America are “socialists” (from american point of view). Then there are the third world people who dream to live in a socialist sociality. Privacy is the last thing on their mind. Why do you think mobile transactions and digital wallets are common everywhere including countries like Kenya while privacy concerns of American public are holding it back in America. (I mus say that I do prefer our American approach in this case.)

Lastly, I’d like to point out that you have examples of Bing and its targeting based on demographics like age, gender, location and activity. wo wo wo. Time out. Age and gender are very different from online activity and location. You are mixing demographic targeting with contextual targeting. Demographic targeting is unreliable and contextual targeting is still untapped in my opinion. We have not even scratched the surface of contextual marketing.

Bottom-line,  your skepticism is understandable but it reflects the growing pains of  marketing as it moves from being predominantly ”push advertising” to the new world order. (Recommended reading: The Thank You Economy.)

Keep on expressing your ideas while the kids in the dorms keep proving us wrong.

I just saw his speech again and this time, I really understood his perspective on what harmony is about. He is talking in context of story telling but I believe it applies to the creative process for brand building, design and business in general.

He never says but rather assumes that harmony is what we need to look for in a creation , not perfection. (That is genius right there).

He explains that harmony is not about seeking resolution, it is more about the acceptance of contradiction. A good story is told at many different levels and it is OK if the elements of the story do not jive together perfectly. Every loophole does not have to be closed. Even in some of the great Hollywood movies, the creators compromise the intellectual quality just to provide a complete resolution at the end.

We, the agency folks, do the same thing only at a much stricter level. Because of the noise and competition out there, we have gone crazy with  ‘follow the brand guidelines’ thing. We are not being creative, we are just being the brand police. Sad. As Shekar says, “We prepare too much. We think too much. Knowledge becomes a weight upon wisdom.”

NIKE. Just do it.  — Think of all the levels this line plays at; emotional, political, mystical, good, bad, … who care? Let it be. That is the acceptance of contradiction. That is harmony. That is genius.

Here is Shekar’s speech. If you have not seen the movie Elizabeth and you do not have 21 minutes, you can skip the first few minutes:

Offering an escape from reality is big business. Its everywhere: sci-fi literature, comic books, movies, gaming platforms, social networks… you name it. Every new leap in technology is followed by some sort of attempt at creating virtual environments.

While James Cameron is good at telling stories and visualizing such environments, the sustainability of interactive platforms created so far, is very much in question.

Remember Second Life? The cool 3D world / social network that became famous in 2006-2007. Let’s look at its Google Trends curve. It’s pretty much dead as compared to where it was.

Now let’s look at the popularity of ZYNGA’s big social game, Farmville:

Similar, right? Pet Society is the same way. To Zynga’s defense, this could be just the typical life-cycle of its products. Overall idea may be more sustainable but… I don’t know. I guess, I’m not really feelin’ it!

I think we should look at technology differently. It definitely offers proven and sustainable business value when we try to make our “real” environments better. Virtual environments are just our little way to escape from the overall human condition. Some day we will ditch the Facebooks and match.coms to start over by introducing ourselves to our real neighbors!

For that matter, I think that the financial markets, with their crazy out-of-control algorithms, are a big fake virtual environment on their path to self destruction. I hope we, the humans, realize it early on and not destroy our “real” selves in this virtual game.

As I try to apply it to discover unique value propositions of different businesses, I am realizing that the metaphor of “blue ocean” has a problem. It suggests that you have to set on a “long  journey into the unknown” in order to find non-competitive markets. Not always. Sometimes, blue ocean is right underneath you in the middle of the red ocean as the competition fights itself to death.

Conventional business school wisdom suggests offering value-cost trade-offs through product-line extension. That approach has created so much clutter and craziness in the marketplace. BOS approach suggests otherwise. It says: Break the value-cost trade-off. I feel that in some industries (like appliances) that is all you have to do: simplify the damn product line.

Apple is the obvious example (sorry, seems like we don’t have much else to talk about now-a-days). Motorola, Sony, Blackberry, even HTC are still looking at their versions of the consumer perception maps and treating it as a battle ground. They are too busy playing the game of positioning new product offerings to cover gaps in the market. You know what? That’s the deadly red ocean right there. Stop the craziness. Consumer is pissed off.

You know how hard it is to find a washer, or for that matter, a toothbrush. Now, I understand the problem that CPG brands  but for high-involvement products like appliances, I think someone just has to go for it. Eliminate all models. design one washer that does everything but has one button on it, like an iPod. I know, it only takes courage to break the fixed cost structure and convince people who would think you are crazy – a classic blue ocean hurdle.

Since I am on a war against that demographics-based targeting that media companies and advertising agencies have plagued us with, I was really excited to hear what she had to say. “The crazy thing” she says, “is that media companies think if you fall within a certain demographic category, you are predictable.”

YES!!! finally someone else said that this is CRAZY. I’ve been saying this ever since I took my first Marketing class and my common sense started having issues with my MBA professors. Seriously, I want my money back.

Anyway, the good old days of post-industrial revolution are over. The rise of middle class in the developed world is history. David Ogilvy’s ideas were great but his books are not even available for Kindle.

Wake up people. It’s over. Age, gender, marital status blah, blah, blah is a hoax. Internet is too measurable and you can’t hide it anymore. Break the spell. Move on to psychographics and behaviors and create new value for your business (or just manage to survive).

Here is her talk. Enjoy:

Now, this is sort of a crowd-sourcing event on IDEO’s platform. I am more interested in the platform itself and its concept. The navigation is simple and sequential. I had the rare “I get it” feeling within seconds and I love the concept.

We have to wait and see how it goes. I am sure IDEO will figure out a good outcome even if it does not yield any original creativity. Or may be it is designed as a PR stunt to “raise awareness.” It would be interesting to see if 584 inspirations and 194 concepts are any better than a few people brainstorming in a room.

I think the problem of bias of order is still there. Ideas are listed one after the other. The threads of conversation are not random. Or even if the exposure of ideas is randomized, pure serendipity is missing because I don’t think pure serendipity is random (different debate but you get the idea). Also, in live brainstorms, really bad ideas get killed right away, no matter how much you try to avoid it. (I think that is a good thing as it reduces clutter.)

What do you think? Here is the link:

http://openideo.com/open/how-might-we-give-children-the-knowledge-to-eat-better/evaluation/

This concept is very applicable to change management. I think the idea of treating your follower as an equal is genius. Probably the most crucial point for any movement is its embryonic stage. It has not been emphasized enough in popular leadership theories as far as I can tell.  This video is entertaining and clever.

And so, I’d like to thank all of my Twitter buddies for “following me”:)

Very interesting that Apple iPad pitch is all about basic intuition uses lines like “holding internet in your hands” and “you don’t think about it, you just do!”. I think the next sustainable revolution is intuitive devices like these.