You should get this week's New Yorker. (April 10, 2006) (last week's if you're actually in New York.)
There's a splendid article about Muzak. Lots of good thinking from people who actually have to think hard about the non-verbal, non-wordy aspects of a brand. How does a brand sound? Does it like funk? Why does Armani Exchange get beatmatched segues where Ann Taylor gets a couple of seconds of silence?
And there's a great Malcolm Gladwell review of Why? by Charles Tilly. 'Why?' is about the reasons we give each other for the stuff we do and the type of reasons we give. It sounds like essential reading for anyone doing research about communications. Gladwell's illustrations sound just like the kind of mismatch you get when talking about communications with people. Their frame of reference is completely different to yours or the brand's so you get this failure to communicate - because we're thinking about different types of reason. I'm not making sense. Read the article, or better still the book, then you'll realise how clever I am for pointing it out. Honestly.
But the real reason for mentioning it is to sing the praises of Gladwell again. At the end of this review of this dry, academic book he almost had me crying on the tube. He's a genius. (Or I'm in a bad way.)
