Reflex – Ivan's Blog

Faris Yakob, the former Chief Technology Strategist at McCann Erickson NYC, was in Minneapolis as a speaker in the series Conversations About the Future of Advertising.

The depth of cultural and philosophical exploration in what we heard that evening was refreshing, even surprising. Home, after the presentation, I visited Faris’ blog to get more of his thoughts. In his post “Mindware”, he uses language that, in my opinion, summarizes the tone of his Minneapolis presentation: ”And it’s that mix of things you are familiar with and things that you aren’t, things both establish and then disrupt expectations, that is one of the awesome features of recombinance.” Faris disrupted our expectations and took us down a path of exploration. He asked big questions: how is technology specifically influencing culture? How should the practice of advertising change in the face of a shifting cultural paradigm?

Here are some points from his presentation:

Technology becomes transformational when it is affordable and accessible to society at large. We’re living in times of great cultural transformation: 1. Variety of communication technologies have become affordable: computers, video cameras and cell phones.  2. A significant portion of the population is publishing content using affordable or free tools.

Speed of cultural response to events has decreased as communication technologies have become faster. Example (my observation): when aUS Airways plane crash-landed on the Hudson, many knew about it via Twitter before the event was covered by traditional news media. Immediate reaction to this event was independent of physical proximity to the crash site. Also, for better or worse, this expedient spread of information happened without mediation.

In this cultural context where the new norm is for technology to provide the power to easily, cheaply and expediently create content, advertising needs to change the mode of engagement. Faris offers four principles for a new mode:

Ubiquity
Make a lot of content and be everywhere. When a brand no longer has audiences’ undivided attention, it needs to be relevantly present in many channels.

Alacrity
Respond faster. In a culture that is increasingly accustomed to the immediate, the ability for any brand to respond or create on the spot is essential.

Utility
Make things, or create content, relevant to audiences. Brands need to merit attention.

Interactivity
We are not passive consumers. We want to participate. Brands need to allow audiences to collaborate building the brand narrative. “Do stuff that gives people a role.”

Faris finished with this message: brands must be willing to experiment and fail. We, the audience, are experimenting with technology and in the process changing culture. Brands, aided by a new approach to advertising, need to join us.