cool?

               

                        

Martin, a friend and occasional commenter has a question he'd like you all to think about if you don't mind. So I thought I'd make it another Account Planning School of the Web quick quiz. Here's the question:

What does it mean for something, or someone, to be "cool"?  Can someone come up with a
concise definiton, that others can agree on?

Tricky. A great challenge, one that many people have failed at. Post your definitions. One sentence or less. In the comments here by midnight GMT on Monday. Then we'll have another vote to decide the winner. The victorious definition gets another signed copy of Blink. (Again, signed by Malcolm Gladwell, not by me, I bought a couple).

Comments

[Dino]

oops

wish i could edit the entry above to remove the comma after the word "find".

[wizard]

Cool is a ‘perceived frame’, brought about by ones actions, views or beliefs, which the audience wish they were in and could emulate as it immediately makes them believe they are a cut apart and more accepted in front of another audience

[TCP]

cool is tessa petrich.

[Northern Planner]

Cool is a positive description of being excellent thanks to a reputation for social superiority, , insead of physical capabilities.

[Mohamed Salim]

Cool is a collective state of mind resulting in a ripple effect syndrome by default

[Casper]

Cool destroys itself. It clambers over the bodies of the first people out of the trench, charges madly over the muddy field of culture, then collapses in a bullet-ridden heap once the gunner's noticed where everyone's running.

[Ruth]

Cool is being just that little bit ahead of everyone else: removed enough to inspire awe, but close enough to inspire imitation.

[andrew]

Cool is the new hot? Hot is the new cool?

But I was on the top floor of FIDM in Los Angeles when one of the lecturers used the word "cool" and the students (who are by any standards at the cutting edge of cool) said almost in unison DON'T USE THAT WORD!

[Corentin]

Cool is a common illusion to have a mimetic desire.

What is not KOOL is that I have already a signed copy of Blink!!

[carol]

Appealingly out of reach.

[russell]

Don't worry Corentin. You're not going to win if you use a word like mimetic :)

[RICHARD]

Cool just is......

[Gianpiero Di Gianvittorio]

Cool is classic simplicity...

[Corentin]

You're right Russell I sould have use parrotlike instead!!

[Colman]

Realised that 'cool' is: not posting on this thread.

[El]

Cool is an attribute that others perceive of an individual and would most like to own themselves.

[The Scamp]

Cool means just a little bit ahead of the pack.

[jeffre]

desirable and self-possessed

[Nenorocitu]

So? Which definition is the coolest? :P

[goldenfish]

cool is something that makes the heart pump dafter

[speed]

Cool is Russell deciding to leave Nike to do the things he wants to do.

[wotsit]

who gives a fuck?
(see what I did?)

[Miles]

Cool is anything that evokes a reaction, not on the part of the individual or object to which the "coolness" is attributed, but on the part of the onlookers who desire to obtain or constantly expose themselves to that "anything".

[Emily]

When you move from that calm and that fire inside, not looking to see who's watching, but at one with everything around you none-the-less. Others look up and say 'cool'.

It also helps if you're wearing good boots.

[Garrett French]

Google is NOT cool:
http://www.searchenginelowdown.com/2006/05/ben-wills-vs-garrett-french-round-one.html

...in a haughty sort of hipster geek 2.0 way :)