El Gaffney

Wieden Your Blog Reading

See what I did there?! I could have said “expand” or “add to” but then you wouldn’t have started off your week with that nasty double entendre. Oh yeah, I’m on fire this Monday morning. Literally. I’m still sweating from the walk into work.

To the point. In the now half-year I’ve been working at W+K NY, I’ve met some amazing people (cue violins) and some of those people have blogs. Sure, amazing people does not always mean amazing blogs, but these two are top-notch on and off line. Thus, I’d highly recommend anyone interested in the Internet/Digital Life/Social Media check out:

The Gist of March: Greg March is media guru here with an uncommon understanding of the digital space. I use “uncommon” purposefully as he recently offered some insight into McCain and Obama’s friend situations on Facebook and Myspace. One of my favorite posts of his has to be What Wu-Tang Taught Me About Social Marketing.

Geeky is a way of life: Melissa Sconyers is a search guru here and digital native, passionate and expert. I, of course, have to give her some love for her term-coining abilities based on her Befoogled post (Befoogled = “Not having time to Google somebody before you meet them in real life.”) I was hooked from the first post that I ever read of hers about the work-life balance giving way to the work-life blend (cite: Adrian Ho).

So they’re both worth reading and meeting.

P.S. I am now realizing there’s very little chance that “Wieden” is a double entendre given it’s not a verb in the English dictionary. Racecar. That’s better. Palindromes usually do the trick.

P.P.S. Given I hit up the Tumblr party last night I thought I’d also give a shout-out to three things friends put me onto this morning. I “reblogged” cool things from Chet, Katie and Amit this morning.

Tags: blogging, Friends, tumblr

You Say You Want a Transformation…

Well, you know, we all want to change the world.

Wow. That’s just about the cheesiest way to start off a post whose purpose is to link you to one of the most inspiring reads I’ve had in a while.

My friend, Leland Maschmeyer, now the Director of Strategy at COLLINS: (soon to be Director of Concept Design and Storytelling, I believe, as it is a more appropriate description of his job there) has recently posted “On Life Support: A Transformation Design Speech”.

Let me start off by saying, it is fantastic. And not in a “Man, that Leland is a smart dude…I got through 66% of that post and understood 39% of it and of that 39% approximately 90% was f-ing brilliant” sort of way. I read the whole thing, comprehended all of it (I think) and found it very compelling. And I’ve been trying since our breakfast yesterday morning to figure out a way to expand on his thoughts. But just as Lee feared he’d never post his speech if he waited for every element, I fear I’ll never pass on this link if I take time to build on it.

His observations/examples range from JFK to DJ Dangermouse, from Sao Paolo to Philadelphia’s 30th Street Station, from Target to BP to tell the story of transformation design. Which he defines as “the process of developing a system of activity that enables organizations to support or create in individuals the positive change he or she desires.” Because as he posits:

The companies that will thrive…will not be those with a great sales pitch. It will be those with a great support system.

He started out just wanting to make better marketing. But the opportunity seems quite a bit bigger (like changing the world bigger).

Enjoy reading the speech here.

Tags: design, Friends, planning

Do Day: Pic, Quote and Video

It’s a busy one and figured the help start-up shout-out would do for the Do Day, but thought I take a hot second to hook everyone up with a little mid-week motivation (or assets for presentations).

via katie

Brands have grown up using content to communicate.
But do we really need more content? Or are we tense enough as it is?
Perhaps there are other things brands could do, rather than adding to the ever-expanding infinity, to be entertaining or useful. To earn some attention.
Someone has to help alleviate all this tension.
Could the future of brands be in collation, curation, aggregation, dissemination, navigation, catalysation (insert other words that end in -ation of your choice here) – rather than traditional creation?

-faris articulating (or more appropriately, his articulATION of) something I’ve been thinking a lot about lately

via greg

Tags: action, Friends, obama

Inbox of Immaturity

Three the hard way and late in the day…

via the silly entertaining Too Much Rod Benson.

via a posting on fire Kevin Rothermel (working link to t-shirt)

via new favorite Kevin Driscoll, though the “Tay Zonday On a Ronald Jenkees Beat” post title was a cruel tease.

Tags: Friends, ioi, tmrb

Inbox of Immaturity

Could call this the inbox of creativity, sneakiness, or nastiness for now, since we’re kicking it off with Patrick Ewing Jr.’s jam last night in the NCAA Dunk Contest.
Okay, onto the silliness…

This World of Warcraft dancing video has been around for a while, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen it. Thanks to Nien for passing along.

This trailer for The Foot Fist Way from Matt has now put this movie on my radar, especially since I’ve yet to see friend-favorite, Kung Pow: Enter the Fist.

And while the Design and the Elastic Mind exhibit keeps getting press, craplinks reminds us not to forget the MoMA’s permanent collection.

Tags: Friends, ioi, WoW