Last week I was at the Picnic '06, Cross Media Week in Amsterdam. Not only was the Westergasfabriek a nice location for meeting each other, the whole entourage and atmosphere I found very stimulating. But of course that was not the only reason I went...
During the three cross media-focussed days I heared 'between the lines', that a lot of succesfull (innovative) idea's spring from enthousiasm, teaming and creativity.
It was very cool to see the Pixar presentation by Michael B. Johnson, where the enthousiasm just spluttered all around when he gave us some insight in the process of creating a movie. On friday I listened to John Underkoffler (worked on Minority Report), talking about his view on the replacement of the current computermouse. He showed us a video of the Gesture Glove, in which enthousiasm and creativity were centric again...
Another thing I heared a lot at the Picnic was the buzz of 'user-generated content'. This is, as you probably all know, one of the most important factors in Web 2.0.
If I should name two companies that really get it (and inspire me), I'd say MTV Networks and Linden Lab (creators of Second Life).
- MTV Networks: because of projects like Digital Scout and Flux, that give young people the opportunity to make their generated content count in today's world. Simon Guild, President MTV Europe, said MTV is all about constantly pushing the creative boundaries. For the Flux concept in Italy, they promoted the website YOS.it. Nobody knew MTV was behind this, and the page was at first all black. For every visit another pixel appeared, till the whole Flux page was visible...
- Linden Lab, Second Life: because this game is all about what the users do with it. You can create your own house, company, cars, etc, and can even make a good living out of it. Where other games restrict their users, Second Life gives a lot of opportunities. For example, the PR company Text100 (also speaking at Picnic) opened it's first office in Second Life and even conferences are finding their way to this virtual world.
Of course there are a lot of other good examples, so feel free to put your favorites in the comments.
Finally I'd like to tell you about the presentation by Joseph Jaffe. Mostly revolving around his book Life after the 30 second spot, he tells the audience about the fact that consumers aren't stupid anymore and they're no longer impressed by 50 years of branding. The new branding is about engagement, reach out to your customers and connect with them. Sharing, respect, listening, working together...
I seriously started to doubt then and there, wheter the big companies with long history (such as IBM) are able to make the switch on time, to this new branding Jaffe talkes about... And if you'd ask me if they're able to handle Web 2.0? I think most traditional marketers and comms are scared as hell of customers having a voice.
An interesting quote for marketers from Jaffe, which I fully agree on: "Consumers know your brand better than you". Let's start learning from them!
IBM's CEO study comes to the table once again. The CEO quote of the day: "Collaborative innovation separates winners from the losers". Won't go into the details, since we've talked about this already on this blog. The people here get a nicely printed copy, but of course a download is available for you...
