Interesting piece from yesterday's Observer on the intricacies of carbon offsetting.
just checking
Does no-one have any more nominations for November's Post Of The Month? Really?
youth
Here's a couple of interesting resources about youth and that. Three billion is a selected feed of youth/marketing news from around the world. (The name comes from the fact that there are three billion people in the world under 25). And then there's the BBC World Service's Generation Next project. All kinds of stuff talking about young people including a survey they did with under 18-year olds in 10 cities around the world, splendidly it's a little less western-centric than most of these things.
brainstorming
I got this question in via email - anyone got any suggestions?
"I'm a young planner in NYC and I was wondering if you could guide me to some resources on the web on any new brainstorming techniques. I'm sure the basic tenets of brainstorming still hold true, I was just curious if anyone out there was doing something innovative."
coffee
Nice low-key coffee morning yesterday. Richard and Asi turned up.
as did Henry
And Ben (who describes his morning here). Who spells out, once again, that you don't need to be a planner, or have a blog, or know anything about anything to turn up for coffee morning. Just be willing to drink a warming beverage and chat about stuff.
And we had newcomers Andrew...
...and Charles. Welcome chaps. The conversation ranged from timebank to volunteering generally, to horses mouth, to evangelical atheism (and Richard's version of a kids version of The God Delusion), to how someone needs to make everyone realise what an asset asylum seekers probably are to the country, to some other stuff that I can't remember. But we did end up with discussion of parental internet use. Ben said his Dad is convinced that everyone's email address is just theirname.com. And I mentioned my suspicion that my parents limit themselves to one google a day. Children of rationing you know. And that made me think, on the way home, about how creating false constraint is another way to add interest to things - like the way Bill Drummond describes his music listening habits on No Music Day. Imagine how much you'd think about it and plan if doing a web search was rationed. Just one a day. And then Ernie Schenck's book arrived when I got home, and I suspect it's all about that kind of thing, so it felt like a day of mild coincidence.
I have to say though that our gentle ramblings pale in comparison to the thinkfest that is the Chicago Coffee Mornings. We need to raise our game.
the archaelogy of strategy
I had coffee with Caroline Marshall (Executive Editor of Campaign) this morning. She told me about a project they're doing and I said I thought they'd be people reading this who'd like to help. So this is what they're after:
"Stephen King, who worked for JWT and died in February 2006 was one of the leading thinkers in communications strategy.
We want to reprint his most important article, “What is a brand?”, with an introduction by a known and respected practitioner describing the relevance of the article today. Mike Hall might be the man for the job.
We want to find another nine (or so) famous articles (speeches, chapters of a book etc) that contain principles that are appropriate in today’s more complex media environment.
We want to cover advertising, marketing, media and research (at least).
We’ll create a supplement which we hope will be of interest to everyone in the business, not just in the UK but all over the world."
The questions they'd like us to think about are - what papers should be in there, and why?
(I was banging on to Caroline about how buzzy and interactive blogs are compared to print and how I'm always really excited by the quality of feedback in the planning blogosphere, so please don't let this be one of those posts with no comments and an eerie wind whistling through. thanks)
trumpets
A visit to Alex Ross led me to the Trumpet Bloopers page - which will bring smiles and tears to anyone who ever played in a school or amateur orchestra. (Especially 'Messiah Organist On Crack') but he also reminded me of the Portsmouth Sinfonia's version of Also Sprach Zarathustra. Genius.