We read endless articles and interviews about how new media has changed the world overnight.
Everything is totally different all of a sudden.
Those who don’t accept it are dinosaurs.
And like the dinosaurs, they’ll disappear.
Personally, I think this is herd mentality.
Insecure people feel safer when they group together.
So these people are looking for a group to join.
It’s not as nasty as racism, sexism, ageism, nationalism, classism, or religious-fundamentalism.
But it is based on a similar need to be part of a larger group.
Not far short of playground behaviour.
On your own you’re vulnerable.
As part of a group you’re more secure.
You can’t get picked on as you could when you were an individual.
And you can safely insult anyone who isn’t in your group.
Sort of football supporter behaviour.
Our group’s great, and if you’re not in it you’re crap.
It’s like that with a lot of new-media name calling.
But, if you accept Rogers Technology Adaptation bell-curve, new-media evangelists are a small part of the real world.
Which may be why they feel the need to group together.
According to Rogers, Innovators make up 2.5% of the total.
Early Adopters make up 13.5%.
Then everyone else (the rest of us) make up 84%.
So how does the world of constantly evolving media look to the rest of us?
Are we counting down to the second the latest innovation is going to be released at a silicone valley press conference?
Strangely enough, no.
What we’re doing is getting on with our lives.
Media is just a way stuff gets delivered to us.
Mainly, we’re not even aware of media.
Certainly we don’t think about it.
I heard a man the other day saying he’d just had an unsettling experience in a motorway service station.
He’d pulled into the rest area to use the toilet.
He went into a cubicle and locked the door.
Then he took his trousers and underpants down.
Then he sat down.
After a while, he heard someone enter the cubicle next to him.
They locked the door and sat down.
Then they said, “How you doing mate, alright?”
He was a bit embarrassed, but he didn’t want to appear rude.
So he replied, “Er, yes thanks.”
He hoped that would be the end of it.
But the man next door said, “What’s new then, everything going okay?”
He didn’t quite know how to answer.
So he said, “Er, yes, everything’s fine thank you.”
Then the man said, “The wife, the kids, work, everything ticking over?”
By now he was getting irritated, he said curtly, “As I said, fine thank you.”
Then the man said, “So apart from all that, what are you up to you old bugger?”
He thought this was starting to get a bit personal.
So he said, louder, “Exactly the same thing as you are I imagine.”
Then the man said, “Hang on a bit Chris. I’ll have to put the mobile down for a sec, the bloke in the next cubicle keeps trying to talk to me.”
Some people adapt to changes in media faster than others.
Seth Godin, the new media guru, says we don’t know where any of this is going to end.
We can’t see the future until it gets here.
So anyone who predicts the death of anything is pretending to a knowledge they don’t have.
All we know is stuff changes.
Always has, always will.
And we’ll absorb it into our lives.
Always have, always will.
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Surely it’s the heard mentality, Dave?
Top marks for speed John.
That comment was up before I finished typing it.
Why have I now got “More haste less speed” in my head?
OK, I’m going off on a tangent here, but I think there are certain places where it’s not acceptable to make or receive a mobile call.
A public toilet is one of those places. While eating a meal in a restaurant with someone else is another.
I’m not sure what makes a place acceptable or unacceptable. I think there are a range of different factors that I probably take into account (the urgency of the call, the length of the conversation, how well I know the people involved, how easy it would be to excuse yourself and call back…).
But my response isn’t just about my old-fartiness and inability to adapt to new media. Would I be as offended if the communication happened in another medium?
For example, I think it’s fine to check emails or text in a public toilet.
Not sure you should get too hung up on the toilet issue there Kate…
“Seth Godin, the new media guru, says we don’t know where any of this is going to end”.
are we going somewhere? or are we always there?
is there a finish line we´re supposed to cross? or things just constantly change, so live with it?
i think it´s an always in beta kind of thing. we´re constantly crossing ant-sized finish lines.
so many, too fast for some.
Kate,
Personally I agree with you.
For me the rule is that anything is okay as long as it ticks 3 criteria.
It’s got to be between CONSENTING ADULTS in PRIVATE.
Then whatever it is, absolutely whatever, it’s no one else’s business.
That phone call didn’t tick the PRIVATE box.
I’m with you on the mobile phone in a restaurant thing. Next time my wife chats on her mobile in a restaurant I’m just going to get up and walk out the door.
not sure about your \CONSENTING ADULTS in PRIVATE.\ rule dave, that would technically make the jonestown massacre o.k.
Also many the bell curve does not necessarily suggest that the large majority are the best group to target.
Seth Godin also said that the best way to target the large majority was through the minorities via word of mouth. Not mass media.
For example; if I wanted to buy a new camera, i would go to my friend who knows everything about cameras- the camera enthusiast, and ask him which is the best one to buy. If i don’t have one of these friends (which is very unlikely) I am likely to Google it and find reviews on the blogosphere (all written by my friend the camera enthusiast again.)
I’m not saying that \old media\ is redundant as that would be a rather silly statement to make. I do think however that \new media\ has made us realise that we need to be a little more clever about who we target, when and why. The change that new media has bought about is a change in the way we see advertising, not in the media itself.
That makes sense Ben.
I don’t have a problem with any of that (I think).
Very timely, Dave. I go for interviews and CDs keep asking to see ‘new media’ in my portfolio (since it’s new media, it’s not quite book any more, I would say). Anyway, I don’t have a lot of new media. And I suspect, neither do many of them. Of hand, Dave, could you name 3 great digital campaigns? I can’t really and that frightens me. Thanks - an art director.
on bell-curve.
I once saw bell-curve in combination with profit.
well, profit had its highest point in the early-adopters area - going as high as bell-curve in the middle. then slowly going down.
(I hope you get it.)
I don’t know who did and based on what data. but it makes sense.
Has someone talked about “The folly of certainty” or have I dreamt it? Either way I think people who are absolutely certain of anything, especially in advertising (how often do people say “it’s not right?”) are
a) often loud-mouthed bastards who “win” debates by talking louder and longer than anyone else.
b) fuckwitted.
c) untrustworthy.
Choller 21,
One of my favourite quotes is from the philosopher Alfred North Whitehead: “The problem with the world is that ignorant are arrogant and cocksure while the intelligent are full of doubt.”
erm, umm?
Dave, can’t remember who said it but I found the paraphrase of Whitehead very amusing: “The trouble with this country is the people who know what’s best for it are busy cutting hair or driving taxis”.
The people who cut hair or drive taxis ‘think’ they know what’s best for the country.
The common man is in abundance and advertising, by nature of it looking for the populist vote, has to factor that into the equation whether we like it or not.
Fine balance, I think. If advertising is about the ‘populist vote’ then the clients, by virtue of being the common man and the ones paying for the work should have the last say.
Well, lots of stuff changes but not everything gets absorbed. How does stuff diffuse to the mainstream? Marketing - good marketing - particularly when overcoming the “paradox of relevance”. People are generally happy with their lives - they have to see real, tangible benefit to give something a go - whether that it saving them time, money, effort or entertaining them in a way they had never previously considered
umm, erm?
Ian
I’m not sure there are too many clients or rather marketing directors who are in touch with the common man let alone ‘are’ the common man themselves. I think it’s our job to put them in touch though.
John,
I heard a great quote recently, from Steve Jobs.
He said, “It’s not the average person’s job to know what they’re going to want. It’s my job to know what they’re going to want.”
Yes Dave
And Steve Jobs will employ somebody to be in touch with the guy at the end of the bar and the woman in the supermarket check-out queue. Cue ad agency, no?
It is amusing, if a little tiresome, to hear the new media evangelists try to explain the idea of the ‘opinion leader’ (early adopter / sneezer / connector / whatever) as if they’ve just had an epiphany.
One of our new business guys was desperate - the other day - to talk to a prospect about advertising on Spotify. He didn’t know what it was. He didn’t know if it was appropriate. He just wanted to make the agency sound innovative.
I persuaded him to see reason. But that was half an hour of my life I’ll never get back.
@Choller21 very true - like the following very well worn (para)phrases:
\the more you learn the less you know\
and
\a little bit of knowledge is a dangerous thing\
I read recently somewhere about a radio ad boosting hits on a website by 50%.
This was hyped-up to be massive breaking news in an online media mag.
Laughable when you consider radio had the lowest recall of all mass media.
Go Compare and Money Supermarket launched themselves by mass media TV
and poster campaigns for a reason, because they cannot reach new business
‘en masse’ by talking to existing customers. So what’s was all the hullaballoo about ?
Dave, like you, I’ve stayed awake to see the sun rise exactly the same way as it did yesterday for decades. If only people would stop and think (something many people rarely have the time or inclination to do these days) rather than rushing headlong to deliver.
Technology has been ‘nudging’ us since the days of Captain James T. Kirk and Star Trek.
In fact we still haven’t caught up with some of it’s technology even now. As for those strange unearthly beings on planet Evangelista, I heard of one recently who maintains a personal relationship globally via Skype and needs a clock placed at the other side of the globe to let him know what time of day it is over there because he is totally losing all sense of time and context. Is this an advance for the human race?
As Spok would say: “It’s life Jim, but not as we know it.”
“Beam me up Mr Sulu and give that guy a sleeping tablet.”
Colts Saints, Colts Saints, Saints… Colts no, Saints, yep definitely one or the other to win. Or draw. Alfred North Whitehead musta been shot with doubt.
on Colts Saints.
I’ve just heard a great quote that manager of Colts has on his wall: “take care of little things and great things will follow”.
so true. gotta love it.
I received your book yesterday. I normally read a little before bed.
It’s normally what sends me to sleep, but with your book, I couldn’t just put it down.
I think it’s brilliantly simply, funny and educational. I especially love the part about the Exorcist book.
I am excited about part two…there is a part two right?
Hi Clint,
Thanks a lot for that.
That’s a nice way to start off a Monday morning.
I’ve often wondered why women spend so long in the loo. Now, thanks to Kate, I know. But why do they have to go in pairs?
I was having an intelligent(unusual event)chat with my mate Duncan. Halfway through I was doing all the talking, waxing lyrical on the tyranny of Kim Jong Il and the US presence in South Korea. When Duncan said, “Rick I said, I wanted a new CAREER, not a new KOREA.” Which leads me to think, when I’m done mastering ‘new media’, I’ll tackle probably the hardest communication of all - the face-to-face conversation.
Very funny adheckler.
I shall have to nick that.
All I have to say is - amen!