the joy of jazz

It's all getting a bit serious again. So here's this.

Again.

the ethics of ethics part 2

I wrote something about the ethics of ethics a while ago and it's come back into my head again, mainly because of the talk the other night and this thing that the co-operative bank just sent me. Everynow and then the co-op will send a quick survey out to its customers asking what they agree with and don't so strongly agree with about the banks ethical policy.

With ethics and sustainability being such a broad area I think this is an obvious and critical area for brands to start questioning their consumers opinions aswell as their own. For example the co-op turned down £10 million worth of profit last year, was it the right 10 million in my opinion?

One thing that struck me in the Brands and Sustainablity talk was that everything seems so heavily weighted towards the West's own interests in the subject (conscious clearing?). No one has really started to talk about the statistically proven future implications of mass over population, starvation or draught yet which will probably have far greater implications on the planets sustainability than CO2 (or atleast the human consequences of it in my opinion).

Oh and on a more positive note I really like the first line of copy on the made from recycled paper bit on the same survey...

why i didn't join d&ad

One of the posts I wrote in my head last night whilst thinking in blog had the title 'why i didn't join d&ad' and was going to be basically just that.

Then I saw Joby this morning who said that he had dinner with Tony Davidson after the talk and told him not one person signed up for membership despite repeated promoting, a very nicely designed flyer and some great incentives.

I don't like moaning much but thought I'd write down my thoughts on this anyhow...

invisible divide
There seems to be a bit of a invisible divide at d&ad to me personally. It's a bit us and them, sort of an old boys club. I'd really like to be in on it though which is the strange thing. But in the mean time I'm not really prepared to fork out the money to be an 'elected associate' as opposed to a 'member' when both pay the same amount. It doesn't seem to make sense to me.

value for money
Again £180 pounds seems a lot to pay to be an ‘associate’. £180 a year is a lot to pay for any club but £180 for a club that your not even classed as a member seems like a sting. Especially when you are still free to attend the same lectures for a few pounds more. Some of the discounts you get are great but I think I'm looking for added value stuff and 'worth' rather than 'discounts' and concessions. There is a members area on their site but I've no idea what's inside it?

embracing community
If one creative institution should be embracing community I think it should be D&AD. D&AD have a great role call of inspiring creatives it seems a missed opportunity not to use them to their maximum benefit. It just seems like names on a list at the moment.

a solution: learning and sharing
I've got a thing about sharing at the minute. I think D&AD could have a great opportunity to capture the sharing of ideas, thoughts, inspiration, discussions that seem to be happening elsewhere in industry blogs right now. Like Russell's for example. One idea I had would be for D&AD to create a collaborative blog much like Creative Reviews but also a mix of K10K's old structure where a wide variety members can post next to each other.

D&AD already have a blog but don't seem to put much effort into it, there were no posts for the whole of February for example. They did however take a great opportunity in getting Gwen to post her unique style of observation on last nights talk. If this was then continued by a post by Tony Davidson, then Russell, then Dan from innocent, then Simon from Poke, then someone random fromt he other side of the world that I've never heard of before etc with the opportunity for everyone to comment, trackback, tag they'd suddenly have something of real value on thier hands.

This would then help give value for money, start to break down the invisible divide and hierarchy (associates and students have direct access to talk and network with members), embrace a community and be a great platform for learning and progression.

I'm obviously ignorant to alot of the wider issues around the above but as an outsider this is just my perception. Feel free to comment.

So much for shorter posts.

share and share alike

One of the posts I wrote in my head last night was about sharing. I think it's turning up more and more lately, Russell shares knowledge, insight and ideas on a daily basis (as does everyone else), freecycle share everything and then there's that thing of John Grant's about power tools only being used for 10 minutes a year so why don't we just share them?

Sharing is good. Sharing leads to better communities.

thinking in blog

I realised something quite strange tonight. I've started thinking in blog.

I came to this realisation after leaving the D&AD brands and sustainabilty talk tonight. A lot of very interesting things were said which I then started to think about how I could turn into something new to blog about (more of that soon).

Then I realised I was writing blog posts in my head, I'd start with a title then expand on the body copy and tone. It was then that I came up with the new title 'thinking in blog' and starting writing this post in my head while sat on the tube. I even wrote this bit in my head saying that I'm writing this in my head. Strange.

Maybe the pint of Timothy Taylors that Shrimp bought me before the talk went to my head. Does anyone else do this?

early twits

I remembered the other day that howies used to do this thing called 'By the way' which was the early form of their blog. So I went and found it on the great internet time machine. 'By the way' was great as every post was so short but so revealing. I used to read it everyday.

new idea

I need to start writing much shorter blog posts.

Like this one.

the king of kowloon

Last time I was in Kowloon (the main land side of Hong Kong) I saw some very interesting text murals on an underpass. It turned out these murals are actually the work of the oldest graffiti artist in the world™. He's called the King of Kowloon (real name Tsang Tsou Choi) and has been writing on the streets of Kowloon since he was 35 (in 1955), he's now 85. It was his belief that he was inherently the actual King of Kowloon and the Queen/ Hong Kong Chief Executive were imposters. His writings were his expression of this conviction and listed names of ancestors he believed proved his inheritance.

Dispite his wife and family disowning him, being a labeled a public nuisance/mentally unbalanced and earning himself a series of brief stints in jail he still painted. Even when he became so old that he had to use crutches to walk he still painted.

Like a far eastern Basquiat Tsang's hand for calligraphy and single minded vision can only be admired.

The King of Kowloon now lives in a nursing home. He scrawls his work on towels and bedsheets as his work slowly disappears from the streets. You can see some more of his stuff here on flickr.

good shit

*

Joby has been hanging around innocent this week. We've got a couple of thing in common me and Joby; he left London to live in Tenby a while a go, I left Tenby to live in London a while ago longer. He used to work at innocent as a creative, I work at innocent as a creative. He likes design and things, I like design and things.

Anyway Joby gave me this great essay by Milton Glaser (I ♥ NY logo) this week. He kindly printed it out for me rather than sending me a link and said that it's better to read important things like this from paper (the new business case for my blog publishing idea). Have a read of the essay. It's very good shit indeed.

*Good shit illustration by Joby for howies.

craftwork

Some people don't like arts and crafts much. I love arts and crafts myself. I think that's why I liked The Science of Sleep so much and that strange Swedish innocent film.

What's not to like about a knitted BBQ wrap, a smoky bacon scalf and string of sausages?

You can see the full collection here.