The Across the Sound lads have been talking a bit about transparency and product placement. They should read Graeme’s great post. His belief is that he’s willing to view all the ads in Formula1 racing because the ads essentially subsidise his viewing, but he doesn’t feel that he should have to put up with it when he pays to go to the cinema. His feeling is that advertisers should pay him to watch films when they have their brands inserted all over the place.

In principal I agree, but my feeling is that films should go to a panel before they hit the circuit, that panel would give the film a PP rating, where a high rating

There are two points I would like to make with this post, even though the two are strongly linked

1. No ugly girls are aloud to be lesbians. Under any circumstances (except maybe if the the ‘circumstance’ is a collapsed house, or ACME anvil). Lesbians are only hot girls, so the rest of you hunched, leering, badly dressed females (and I use that term in a form more loose than they are) are fakers and frauds. I know this, because I have seen a few movies on the subject, and lesbians, without exception, look like the two in the pic on the left. It is a lovely, wondrous thing. Don’t mess it up.

2. If you want to be a lesbian, I would presume that it would be because you find the female form, mind and emotion more attractive to the kinds you find in men. And rightly so. If that is the case, please explain why it is that you would pick a partner with more testosterone than the Running of the Bulls, all nicely packaged in jean-pant overalls and mullets and complete with spitting, crotch-scratching, swearing, a mechanics diploma and arms like my thighs. For God’s sake, it’s a boy! If that’s what you’re looking for, you’re straight. Deal with it. Those girls (loose term, again) are more man than I will ever be. Hell, they’re more man than any of us will ever be. If you want something like that, there are spans of them everywhere, and at least they come with the extras that count.

• A light background is fresh and clear. Think Apple
• If you are staring at the screen for 45-minutes, there are bigger problems than the background colour. You should be staring at the speaker for 40, and the slides for 5.
• The movie credits analogy is daft. It’s flawed in that it’s hardly a great example of something captivating, how many of you actually stay for the credits?
• However, if he is correct, and if he truly believes it why is his book black text on white, and more to the point, his website?

He goes on to say “put your logo on every slide”. You know myfeelings on this.

PowerPoint: Everyone’s an expert…!

The problem isn’t space at all, you have all the space you want, the problem is simply

As such, I don’t see how essays are going to help, I still have about 10 Change This manifestos (essays?) that I’ve downloaded and not yet had a chance to read (I read a lot, and I’ve just had a 20 day holiday too).

Eh? But this isn’t blogging, it’s just writing, and people have been getting this right for some time now. As for seeing if a blogger i.e. a person that blogs, can develop essentially unrelated projects that make money… I already have

I said I’m hopeful though, that’s because of the inclusion of audio formats (which I will listen too) and a printed book (which I’ll buy if what I hear is worthwhile).

That’s akin to blaming Hitler for using gas chambers instead of firing squads… if you do that, you’re missing the point!

The Change This manifestos are about content, not format. Lads, print them out and read ’em on the bog, its comfy, private, and you might just learn something.

And as for Seth not listening to his customers (it’s a free service?), my clients often ask us to produce presentations in tools other than PowerPoint as they don’t want to bore their audience. Lesser suppliers give in here in the name of customer-centricity, we insist on what we feel is the best plan of action, even if that means going against their wishes and using PowerPoint (BTW. blaming PowerPoint for bad presentations is like blaming the pan for shit food). Don’t confuse pandering with good-service, and remember, it’s a myth, the customer really isn’t always right, they just always have the right. So Jeff, Doc, you have the right not to read a single manifesto.

It’s called breaking your nose to spite your face…!

 

Adding my bit to the post, and follow-up, by the John Moores, is a memory from my days as waiter.

I remember a lot of the other waiters getting overly upset with the grillers when they made the occasional mistake with an order. It never bothered me though. I was almost always guaranteed an extra 5% tip when there was a mistake, because I got to show how well I handled it. Damage recovery is one of the very few times you get to show-off. It’s often difficult to shine when all is running as expected.

When we help our clients with pitches, the case studies we produce almost always highlight installation teething problems. Why? Well, they always happen, they’re expected, so there is no reason to hide that fact. On the other hand though, there is nothing more powerful than a client saying, “Well there was a hiccup at the beginning, but the team went into overdrive and got things sorted in hours.”

Damage recovery has to be the single easiest way to impress a client, cherish those opportunities.

The triangle below is a great tool for letting our clients know what we can, and cannot do. It’s very simple really, we can give you any two

You can have cheap, and fast, but it wouldn’t be good (and lets face it, you’re not buying shit, and we aint selling it, so we’ll scrap that one); you could have good and fast, but we’d need to charge you for the privilege; or you can simply give us fair lead time, and you’ll get a great product, at a great price! Could this work for your business too? I reckon it probably could.

Thanks Ains’…!

In Seth Godin’s book on web design, “the big red fez” he discusses the need for a banana. A banana is that thing on the page that tells you, unambiguously, what you’re supposed to do. No prizes for spotting the banana here

What if the Seth’s monkey didn’t recognise the banana though, he’d see it there in front of him, but ignore it, after all, the jungle’s a big place. Full of fruit

When I was young and living in Scotland, my Mum used to play a John Denver video in which he recited a poem called “The ambulance down in the valley”. It made an impact, and has stuck with me since, in fact, I doubt a month goes by where I don’t read it to someone. A while back D’ave submitted it to Jon Strande’s story blog, but I love it, and wanted it

• Martin at d2 wrote this post
• Steve from The Hitchhikers guide to the blogos#$&re liked it, commented, and linked to it.
• Martin then subscribed to the hitchhiker feed (so did I)
• The hitchhikers then linked to cph127
• Martin liked that too, so much he mailed Hans Henrik the founder
• They liked him too and invited him to join their ranks
• His first post, information atmosphere is up