April 30, 2006
untitled 318
[Click on image to enlarge/download/print etc. Licensing terms here etc.]
Somewhere along the line a belief was generated that if you want to see the artist’s work on your wall, you have to pay money for the privilege. And not just to the artist- but a whole string of middlemen: gallerists, publishers, dealers, framers, art retailers etc. Everyone is entitled to a slice of your dollar, yessiree.
And you don’t mind paying the big bucks, do you? No, because I’m a celebrity, and you’re in my thrall. You’ve read the right magazines, you’ve seen me partying with the rock stars, you know how hot I am. It’s all about me and my friends, you and your kind don’t really matter. You’re just lucky you can afford to by a small table at the party me and my people get paid to attend. Maybe we'll even let you talk to us.
Whatever. It’s a chronically inefficient, expensive and defective system that simply does not work for the vast majority of artists. A chronically defective system based on 20th Century ideas about art, celebrity and commerce.
Which is why I gladly encourage folk to download my work and post it on their walls instead. I want to make the process as friction-free as possible. I want the people who like my work to enjoy it with a minimum of fuss. I don’t need their money. I can make money other ways.
And it’s starting to pay off. When I hung a drawing in a gallery in my early-90s hipster art scene days, I was lucky if 200 people ended up seeing it. But now every time I post a new drawing on gapingvoid, maybe thousands of people see it. Sure, it took me five years of posting every day before hitting critical mass, but who cares? It now creates far more economic opportunity than any gallery owner could ever possibly hope to offer.
If you’re an artist, and you want a glimpse of the future, forget the gallery scene. They don’t know anything. Check out the internet instead. That’s where the action is.
April 29, 2006
i had just sold the client
[Click on image to enlarge/download/print etc. Licensing terms here etc.]
stormhoek cartoon label
I want to use my cartoons for the new Stormhoek label design, starting later this year.
The plan is not to do typical wine-related messages in the cartoons, but unrelated messages like this or this.
Think about it- you're walking down the aisle in the wine section of the supermarket, and instead of the usual wine-related messages being broadcasted at you from the bottles, you see something more like this, or this. Edgy, random, a conversation starter etc.
Obviously, if you're familiar with my work, you'll understand the story. But methinks it'll work for the "virgins", as well.
Anybody?
[UPDATE: To see the new label designs as they're rolled out, go here.]
will myspace
[Click on image to enlarge/download/print etc. Licensing terms here etc.]
[Inspired by Technology Evangelist's recent post.]
dulce et decormum est
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[Hat Tip: Wilfred Owen 1893-1918]
April 28, 2006
a blog gets the audience it deserves
PT just asked me the following quetion:
What exactly is the use of blogging if you have no idea often who it is you are talking to? In other words - are they bright? Are thay sane? Are they knowledgable about the things they purport to be? If it is simply an uncontrolled medium through which anyone can say anything then it seems to me it will become no more than a modern day Tower of Babel.The short answer is; a blog gets the audience it deserves. If the people reading and leaving comments on your blog are a bunch of losers and idiots, it might have more to do with the quality of what you write, and the vigilance with which you monitor your comments, than any limitations of the media.I do however accept that the technology is here - but how to make it really useful?
You're right, the technology is there. Everything else is up to you.
April 27, 2006
looks like it was just a rumor...
Just got an e-mail from Rick Segal a few minutes ago:
I'm in China right now, typing this via my EVDO card on China mobile, looking at Technorati...Looks like the rumor that China had shut down Technorati was a bit premature.
Anybody?
cull the weak etc
Nice thought from Marketer's Eye:
For what it is worth, I don’t care if “Blogs as a business model” has “peaked”. If it has, then some of the heart-not-in-it folks will drop off and clear the air a bit. You can’t force a good blog, and it is painful to see some people try, convinced that it will be profitable if they can just force it long enough.
BBC goes 2.0
MediaGuardian.co.uk: "The BBC today unveiled radical plans to rebuild its website around user-generated content, including blogs and home videos, with the aim of creating a public service version of MySpace.com."Not sure how big a story this is. Centralized social media? Huh? I already have a blog. Why do I need them?
[Link: Rubel]
April 26, 2006
first it was google...
Now it seems China is blocking Technorati.
Anybody?
[UPDATE:] Looks like it was only a rumor. Good news.
nice thought:
Everyone wants to feel as if they are a part of something important. You, me and just about every person I've ever met. So let me ask you this.. what is your purpose? As a leader what do you convey to the people under you?
first geek dinner in san antonio
The very first Stormhoek 100 Geek Dinner is about to launch, on May 1st, in San Antonio, Texas. Says Kami:
If you will be in San Antonio on May 1 and want to meet up with us, please contact me via e-mail at kami (at) yahoo (dot) com. I need a head count pretty quickly because Stormhoek needs to know how much wine to send.Thanks, Kami! This totally rocks.We haven’t settled on a final location yet, but we are looking at Central Market, 12 noon on May 1, 2006. I will keep the RSVP crowd apprised on the final location via e-mail and I will also post it the day of the event here.
I love San Antonio. Used to go there occasionally, back in my UT college days in Austin.
Wow. This is all becoming real. Very exciting.
Not sure how it all happened exactly, but the gapingvoid DNA and the Stormhoek DNA are becoming more and more intertwined by the day [I suppose this was the tipping point.].
We're hoping to have the cartoons adorning the Stormhoek bottle labels by year's end. The edgier, the better [Within reason, of course- no point doing it if we offend all the wine retailers, and they end up dropping us en masse etc].
But... and I think Seth would agree with me here, if you're a small [wine] company, located 6,000 miles away from your customers, and have the marketing budget of a flea, then you have to push the edges.
I don't see any other alternative. Do you?
[UPDATE:] Good Grape has a REALLY good synopsis of the Stormhoek campaign:
What's happening here is very interesting and compelling. If the wine delivers, this could be the seeds of the next great wine case study ala Yellowtail.
98052
98052 is the zip code for Redmond, Washington, corporate HQ of Microsoft.
Full story here and here.
crime-infested urban cesspool
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entrepreneurs don't need money
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April 25, 2006
we need to re-invent
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Robert Scoble, Microsoft’s high profile blogger, went on a blog holiday for the past week and it obviously gave him time to do some serious thinking.He has posted a marathon post which posits five ways to improve Microsoft’s image both internally and externally.
What are his five suggestions?
* A guaranteed Terabyte of Internet-based storage space for EVERYTHING and for EVERYONE running Windows in the world.
* buy every [Microsoft] employee a top-of-the-line Dell machine with dual monitors running Windows Vista. And do it now.
* Change employee behavior through public compensation change logs.
* Get rid of corporate speed bumps.
* Force marketers to explain their decisions — in public on their blogs.
I'm still not sure what Microsoft's "Big Idea" is. Except maybe protecting what they already have, of course. Maybe that's enough. Maybe it isn't. Time will tell. I wish them Godspeed.
April 24, 2006
small world (in tokyo)
[Click on image to enlarge etc.]
Chris Heathcoate, a British blogger who works for Nokia in Helsinki [I hung out with him at Reboot last year in Copenhagen], was recently in the Hotel Miyako in Tokyo, when he went into the hotel men's room. There he stumbled across a framed gapingvoid print. Small world.
[Back story:] The manager of the hotel is an old friend of my cousin. The former bought the print off me a few years ago.
gapinvoid widget
[Click on image to enlarge etc]
Following my conversation with Michael and the Gillmor Gang a week or two ago, I've decided to build the widget.
Here's some ideas:
That's the basic idea. Have I left anything out?
1. The widget will allow anyone to have regularly-updated gapingvoid cartoons published on their website or blogs, fed through via RSS.2. The widget will be paid for via text ads- Google, Yahoo, or whoever, with some sort of revenue split between me and the subscribers.
3. The widget will come in two versions i.e. large and small. The big one [1] will be about 400 pixels wide, the small one [2] will be about 150 pixels wide,the latter good for fitting on blog sidebars. Visitors to the blog will click on it and the full-size widget [1] would pop up etc.
4. Because of the adult nature of some (but not all) of my cartoons, there would have to be some sort of filter, designed to suit the nature of the subscirber and his/her readers. Ergo, every cartoon will be tagged either "Safe", "Semi-filtered" or "Unfiltered", so that the subscriber can choose what level of filter he/she wishes to have.
I don't know how feasible an advertising revenue split is, technologically. But I would prefer it if there was. If anyone has a friend at Yahoo, Google, or anywhere else that deals with this stuff, please let them know I wish to start a conversation.
Thanks, as always, for all your help and goodwill. Rock on.
April 23, 2006
wrong question:
Wrong Question: "What If Media 2.0 Is Less Profitable Than Media 1.0?"
Right Answer: Nobody cares.
"authority aggregator"
A client of mine needs something built.
Basically, it's an "authority aggregator" like Memeorandum, Megite, Tailrank etc.
But instead of it being about tech or politics or whatever, it aggregates stories specifically pertaining to my client's industry, identifies the most authoritative stories from the most authoratative sources, and then posts them online in simple, aggregated form.
So if you think you can help and could use some business, please drop me an e-mail. Thanks.
April 22, 2006
April 21, 2006
i have measured my life out
[Click on image to enlarge/download/print etc. Licensing terms here etc.]
[Hat tip to The Master.]
April 20, 2006
hughtrain stormhoek
[Click on image to enlarge/download/print etc. Licensing terms here etc.]
A little Hughtrain-inspired piece of Stormhoek marketing collateral. What do you think?
April 19, 2006
LE1600 lust
For the last two months, I've been drawing my cartoons on the M1400 PC Tablet [the cartoon above was the first Tablet cartoon I published], which Motion Computing no longer makes.
It has been replaced by their new LE1600 model, which I now find myself lusting after [naturally].
The spec diffferences between the two models are posted here in PDF. Enjoy.
[PS. Thanks to Ron Hayes at Motion sales for sending me their specs.]
[NOTE TO SELF: I wonder if Motion would ever hire me to blog for them professionally, the way Scoble does for Microsoft. I bet I could do a pretty good job.]
somebody hire tom raftery, dammit
Got an e-mail from Tom Raftery today:
Hey Hugh,Rock on, Tom. As somebody who started blogging during an unemployed period of his life, I can certainly relate.I read with interest the report in the Boston Globe how blogging can improve your chances of getting a job so I decided to try an experiment this morning - I am looking for a job through my blog - http://www.tomrafteryit.net/gis-a-job-seriously/
It'll be interesting to see how it pans out - can I market myself as my own global micro-brand?
I'm not holding my breath!
And sometimes it works. The Economist liked Megan McArdle's blog so much they offered her a job. I love it when that kind of stuff happens.
how to market to geeks.
How to Market to Geeks.
1. Start at the bottom of the corporate food chain. The further down, the better.[Full Disclosure: I own equity in Thingamy.]2. Forget about the "decision makers". Connect with the "thinkers"- that's the way forward in this new age of ours.
3. If in doubt, go read this. from an IBM employee.
black and grey 419
[Click on image to enlarge/download/print etc. Licensing terms here etc.]
[Bonus Link:] From The Guardian:
Ignore bloggers at your peril, say researchers· Online pundits 'influence businesses and opinion'
· Companies are falling foul of negative net buzzBloggers and internet pundits are exerting a "disproportionately large influence" on society, according to a report by a technology research company. Its study suggests that although "active" web users make up only a small proportion of Europe's online population, they are increasingly dominating public conversations and creating business trends.
abusive editors and meagre paychecks
Oh Jeez, here we go.
"Can Blogs Make Money?" in The Wall Street Journal.
Blogs have a lot of buzz, but there's still considerable debate about whether that can translate into profits.Sure, it's lovely to see Jason making all that money from Weblogs Inc [Full disclosure: I'm a big Jason Calacanis fanboy], but Mssrs. Calacanis and Meckler's debate just revolves around the argument that the only way to make money via blogs is through advertising, and only for a lucky few.While many blogs remain little more than amateur diaries, several bloggers have tried to parlay their online ramblings into branded businesses. One, Jason Calacanis, co-founded Weblogs Inc., a network of blogging sites that was acquired last year by AOL. Mr. Calacanis has been an outspoken proponent of blogs as business vehicles, arguing that quality content can drive enough traffic to attract advertisers.
But longtime Internet entrepreneur Alan Meckler is skeptical. Mr. Meckler, who is chief executive of Jupitermedia Inc., believes that some blogs may achieve a measure of success, but doubts most blogs will be able to generate meaningful profits.
The other major way to make money with the blogging platform is to use it to market your Global Microbrand, like Thomas did with English Cut. That to me is far more useful to far more people, yet it gets no mention in the Journal article.
As I'm fond of saying, blogs are good for making things happen indirectly etc.
But journalists seem to have a problem getting their head around it. "Indirectly" is too foreign to them. They're too used to living in the "directly" universe:
Wake up. Commute to office. Write stuff. Take abuse from Editor. Collect meagre paycheck. Go home. Complain to long-suffering spouse about abusive Editor and meagre paycheck. Go to bed, sleep, wake up and repeat etc.
That's not what blogging is about, Guys. Blogging, at its best, is about freeing yourself from that crap.
[Bonus link:] The neuroscience behind Robert Scoble's new blogging policy.
April 18, 2006
two questions
Two hypothetical questions:1. "How do I use blogs to change the world?"
2. "How do I use blogs to preserve the status quo?"I speak at a lot of blogging conferences and whatnot. Seems to me, as these gigs get more mainstream and corporate, I'm asked Question Two A LOT MORE than Question One.
Plus ça change, plus c’est la męme chose.
[AFTERTHOUGHT:] I guess I drew the cartoon above for a reason.
[Bonus Link:] The Boston Globe: "Blogs 'essential' to a good career."
[Ego Surf:] You know the world has changed when Hugh Hefner and Hugh Grant are no longer on Page One of Google.
smarter and faster [high-res]
[Click on image to enlarge/download/print etc. Licensing terms here etc.]
Just did a high-res version of one of my old "Hughtrain" cartoons. Enjoy.
April 17, 2006
well-meaning corporate schmuck
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two ways of expressing myself
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2.13 billion blogs?
From David "Technorati" Sifry's quarterly "State of The Blogosphere":* Technorati now tracks over 35.3 Million blogs
That means if the 'sphere keeps growing at its current rate for another 3 years:
* The blogosphere is doubling in size every 6 months
* It is now over 60 times bigger than it was 3 years ago
2,130,000,000 blogs i.e. 31.5% of the global population.
If the curve starts to significantly dip anytime soon, it won't because blogging jumped the shark. It'll be because the planet has run out of smart, passionate people with cheap internet access.
Crazy future projections notwithstanding, methinks the next three years are going to be VERY important for the history of communication.
I hope the big media companies are paying attention. What sayest Rubel?
"the gillmor gang with hugh macleod"
From Crunchnotes [Michael Arrington]:
This just released Gillmor Gang was the most fun I ever had on a podcast. Hugh MacLeod joined us and we went on and on (85 minutes total). Lots of talk about his famous cartoons.Michael was right; it was a lot of fun. Hope you'll give it a listen.
Thanks to Steve Gillmor for having me on.
tiger tiger etc.
[Click on image to enlarge/download/print etc. Licensing terms here etc.]
[William Blake: "Tiger, Tiger". My favorite poem of all time etc.]
[Bonus Link:] And while we're on the subject of great English poets...
April 16, 2006
happy easter
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I was meant to be going to church this morning, what, with our Lord & Savior [not to be confused with Lord & Taylor] rising from the dead etc. However early this morning I got buried in this idea I'm working on, and lost all track of time.
So I'm there typing away, and suddenly I hear the church bell clanging in the nearby village... I'm still in my pyjamas and haven't even showered yet. Bugger. Missed it.
Oh well,... Maybe if I make it to the Christmas service next year, God won't send me to Hell. Then again, I hear he doesn't cut deals.
Life is an amazing thing. We're very lucky to be here. And happily Easter, like Passover, has always been very good at reminding us of that.
Happy Easter, Everybody.
gloomy hamish
From Cardboard Spaceship:
Well, I enjoyed the planet while it lasted, and it puts it in perspective that I`m kinda wistful for the good old days when the opposition was the Russians, who at least knew how to play chess.I watched Dr Strangelove again the other night, it`s looking more and more like a documentary.
aldo coffee
Aldo Coffee in Pennsylvania is a fine example of a global microbrand:
Aldo Coffee Co. is a new, Italian-style coffee bar and cafe located just south of Pittsburgh in the beautiful, vibrant community of Mount Lebanon, PA.I'd be interested in finding out if and how their blog is helping their business. Seriously.Aldo Coffee Co. serves up the South Hills' richest espresso and fine coffees and teas, all from the award-winning Intelligentsia Coffee Roasters. We feature espresso made with Intelligentsia's renowned Black Cat Blend (tm).
Secondly, if any of y'all know of any good GMB's, your own or somebody else's, please feel free to share by leaving a comment below. Or even better, add it to the GMB list I just set up on the wiki. Rock on.
April 15, 2006
if in doubt 2
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[Inspired by Techdirt's recent post.]
stormhoek cartoons
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I've been asked to mess around with some cartoon ideas for Stormhoek's marketing collateral etc. See what happens etc.
oh susanna
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When Susanna left her comment, I quipped, "Wow, that should be a cartoon in itself." So naturally, I couldn't resist. Apologies to Susanna in advance ;-)
social pressure
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A great 2,000-word article in American Way [American Arlines in-flight mag] on one of my current heroes, Seth Godin, written by Joe Jarvis:
This quick rapport helps keep Godin booked for speaking engagements up to 65 days a year, when he’s not busy organizing his own Whiteboard Seminars or writing follow-ups to Unleashing the Ideavirus, the most popular e-book in history. Or writing his next hard-copy book, Small Is the New Big, due out this summer. Or writing daily entries on his blog, read by more people than his seven best-selling books combined. Or starting a direct marketing company like Yoyodyne, which was acquired by Yahoo! in 1998. Or monitoring the growth of Squidoo, his latest — and in many ways most ambitious — project.The phrase, "Or writing daily entries on his blog, read by more people than his seven best-selling books combined" really struck a nerve with me. That's staggering.
Still, I'm not trying to sell books. I prefer selling wine.
yummy
A big Marketing Begins At Home thank you to Jeremy Pepper for the Red Vines. Taking a page from a certain well-known experiment in wine marketing, Jeremy’s been sending packages of Red Vine licorice to Mommy Bloggers and others, kick starting some conversation and injecting some well needed Cluetrain thinking into the big agency world.Rock on.Welcome aboard the Hughtrain.
hold an unconference
[Thanks to Dave and Marc once again for inspiring a cartoon etc.]
[Click on image to enlarge/download/print etc. Licensing terms here etc.]
April 14, 2006
this country wouldn't suck so much
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free movie tickets
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One of the things I'm going to recommend to the Hallam Foe execs is that they hand out free movie tickets to bloggers.
As with my Stormhoek meme from last year, I would utterly insist that bloggers would be under no obligation to write anything, good or bad, if they didn't want to.
Last September the movie "Serenity" gave out free tickets to bloggers, but only on condition that they write about it. I think that was a big, big mistake.
Here's my question: Assuming [A] the movie turns out great and [B] is worth talking about, how many bloggers do you think would need to see the movie for it to make a sizable difference to the idea-virus/buzz/marketing efforts?
100? 1,000? 5,000?
I think the more bloggers see it, the better. But of course, I would say that.
[UPDATE:] Just posted my thoughts onto the Hallam Foe blog. That ought to start a few conversations etc.
hallam foe in the scotsman
[My old pal, Peter Jinks.]
The movie, Hallam Foe, is based on a novel of the same name set in Edinburgh and written by former Scotsman journalist Peter Jinks.I remember fondly hanging out in Dave and Peter's flat in the early 1990's... [*Nostalgic Sigh*].Mr Jinks wrote the bulk of the book while living in Stockbridge more than five years ago.
The screen adaptation is being directed by his former flatmate and acclaimed director David Mackenzie - who previously worked in the city with Ewan McGregor on Young Adam.
The dark story follows the life of teenager Hallam, who is just coming to terms with the sudden death of his mother when he begins to suspect that his beautiful step-mother may have had a hand in her death.
I had this thought earlier: Most film marketing is farmed out to third parties- ad agencies etc. It's a pity. I have the feeling that if film people found marketing their films as interesting as they find making them, they'd sell a lot more cinema tickets.
April 13, 2006
"it's about connection, not content"
"What will it take for MSM (Mainstream Media) to understand that the point of broadband is not so much fatter pipes down which they can stuff stuff, but that the connection is always on and we can transact and connect with each other easier."
I'd love to hear Jason and his AOL paymasters address that.
blogging from a real live film shoot
[Click on image to enlarge etc.]
I know I'm biased, but methinks the Hallam Foe movie blog is going strength to strength. Kudos to Colin for "getting it" etc.
Nice to see a blog not totally crippled by the Hollywood P.R. machine etc.
Now we just need to get the frickin' design budget approved. Grrrrrr...
Besides that, I'm looking for ideas to make their blog more potent overall. Anybody?
[Suggestion #1: Stop truncating the long entries. Bloggers HATE that.]
April 12, 2006
a long tail
[Inspired by Tara's brilliant post.]
[Click on image to enlarge/download/print etc. Licensing terms here etc.]
"As you move down the long-tail, your marketing becomes less about the product, and more about the people." - Mack CollierAnother way of saying it: As you move down the long-tail, you stop "living the brand", instead the brand starts living you.
let's open a bar
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OK, so I guess my second question of the day is: To those people downloading the new high-res cartoons; do you think this makes you more likely to buy a bottle of Stormhoek [at least try it once], if you ever came across it? Or is my marketing plan just a lot of "Whistlin' Dixie"?
Again, just curious etc.
are you the king of the jews?
[Click on image to enlarge/download/print etc. Licensing terms here etc.]
have you got a girlfriend
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Quick question: Now that I'm putting up high-rez versions of my work, is anyone here making use of it? Printing them out, computer desktops etc.? Just curious.
your total quality lifestyle
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April 11, 2006
the maltese falcon
This is The Maltese Falcon on paper.
This is The Maltese Falcon coming out of the shed.
I love being in the yacht business. Heh.
unconference of one
Inspired by Canter, natch.]
[Click on image to enlarge/download/print etc. Licensing terms here etc.]
BBC article
Nice little blogging article from BBC Online.
gapingvoid, Stormhoek and English Cut all mentioned.
i'm a speaker
I just listened to Charles Wood's St. Mark's Passion on BBC Radio 3.
Deep, rich and... and so very English.
Utterly, utterly beautiful. *Sniff!*
[Bonus Link:] gapingvoid got a brief mention in The Gillmor Gang [The podcast inspired the above cartoon etc]. Rock on.
Hey Gillmor, regarding Web 2.0 conferences, it's not about the speakers [let alone their content], it's about the corridor conversations and the alcohol. The speakers are there to draw the crowd. No more, no less.
[Note To Self: Has the Gillmor Gang discovered Thingamy and Sigurd yet?]
[Click on image to enlarge/download/print etc. Licensing terms here.]
old client
An old client of mine contacted me recently, asking me to help him with this project.
Of course, I'm happy to help. We go back a long way.
But this time, the question wasn't the usual, "How much are you going to pay me?"
Because of my whole Stormhoek thing, the question is now, "How are you going to help me sell more wine?"
Future clients, please take note etc.
a bottle of stormhoek
[Click on image to enlarge/download/print etc. Licensing terms here.]
Here's the deal with The Stormhoek Bottle Redesign ["Why shouldn't a small wine company see Apple or Google as its competition?"].
When I came on board the Stormhoek project a year ago, the weakest link in the chain was the bottle design. It was, to say the least, unremarkable.
So last autumn we decided to do something about it. First, to stir things up, we offered a $2000 prize to any gapingvoid reader who could help with our thinking the most. A lot of people joined in, and posted their thoughts on the wiki. Though no idea in particular offered the direct solution we were looking for, it did jar our thinking in the right direction. So there will be a prize given, once the new bottle design is released to the public.
Watch this space etc.
So what's the new bottle like? Well, don't expect the glass equivalent to a Web 2.0 logo. It's not funky or "techie". It's simple, classy and elegant.
That being said, Phase Two of the redesign could be interesting. Phase Two is when we're thinking of launching "Stormhoek Limited Edition", hopefully some time this year.
And Limited Edition, so we're currently thinking, will feature my cartoons in the design.
Different cartoons, different labels. And lots of them. So hopefuly the bottle with different cartoons will become some sort of collector's item. Something like that.
The trick is making the cartoons interesting, without losing too much relevance to the product, or undermining the elegance of the bottle. Or maybe relevance is overrated. Who knows. Either way, we're fashioning it in such a way that allows us to try lots of different alternatives. Allows us to attack the market in a plethora of new and creative ways.
Like Doc Searls said, this kind of marketing isn't about pushing a rock uphill, it's about pushing lot of little snowballs downhill, and seeing which ones gain traction etc.
What sayest thou?
April 10, 2006
ABC online
[Inspired by Fred and Jeff's recent posts.]
[Click on image to enlarge/download/print etc. Licensing terms here.]
selling more stormhoek
[UPDATED: September, 2007]
[Add the gapingvoid widget to your blog]
Like I've said many times before, I much prefer giving away my cartoons for free, rather than trying to sell them. It saves everybody a lot of hassle, myself included.
Which is why I'm now letting people download my stuff in high-resolution, print it out and stick it on their wall etc. Which is why I have a Creative Commons license.
Hey, if you want to put the work up on your website, blog, or stick it on paper, t-shirts, business cards, stickers, homemade greeting cards, Powerpoint slides, or whatever, as far as I'm concerned, as long as it's just for your own personal use, as long as you're not trying to make money off it directly, and you're giving me due attribution, I'm totally cool with the idea.
[NB: If you see a gapingvoid cartoon that you like, and you fancy it as a piece of schwag, all you have to do is download the high-resolution image off this site, then upload it here onto Cafepress. I make no money at this, everything on Cafepress I sell at cost. Easy.]
So, if people aren't paying me for my work, then how do I make a living? Good question.
Well, years of messing around in various enterprises have led me to the following conclusion: People don't buy art. Not really. But they do buy wine.
Which is why I have a commercial interest in the Stormhoek winery. Basically, the more cases that sell, the bigger a car I get to drive. It's that simple.
So to the kind folks who download and use my stuff, I say thank you very much, but if you want to support what I'm doing, please keep your money.
Instead, if you're ever in wine-drinking mode, walking down a supermarket aisle, and you see a bottle of Stormhoek on the shelf, I hope you might consider giving it a try. No worries if you'd rather not, but I'd appreciate it if you did.
The other thing you can do to help the cause is add the gapingvoid widget to your blog, but again, no worries if you'd rather not etc.
I guess this all ties in with my "indirect marketing" schtick, of which I am a huge advocate.
Sounds like a plan?
[NB:] Stormhoek is now available in San Francisco and Silicon Valley at K&L Wine.
[BACKGROUND READING:] The "about gapingvoid" page. Also carries some of my favorite cartoons, and what inspired them etc.
April 9, 2006
if you're not in it for the money
[Inspired by Jeff Jarvis' recent post. Click on image to enlarge/download/print etc.]
the more i love the idea
[Dave Winer: "You need a village to raise a child, and you need an Internet to fully develop an idea." Click on image to enlarge/download/print etc.]
meaning scales
[Click on image to enlarge/download/print etc.]
From "Meaning Scales":
As Buddha says, there is no one road to Nirvana. Enlightenment is a house with 6 billion doors. While we're alive, we intend not to find THE DOOR, not A DOOR, but to find OUR OWN, UNIQUE DOOR.And we're willing to pay for the privelege. We're willing to give up money and time and power and sex and status and certainty and comfort in order to find it.
And guess what? It'll be a great door. It'll add to this life. It'll resonate. Not just with us, but with everybody it comes in contact with. The door will useful and productive. Alive and kicking. It'll create wealth and laughter and joy. It'll pull its own weight, it'll give back to others. It'll be centered on compassion, but will be intolerant of dullards, parasites and cynics.
It may be modest, it may not. It could be a little candle shop; it could be a software company with the GNP of Sweden. It could involve politics or working with the elderly. It could be starting a design studio or opening a bar with Cousin Mike. It could be a screenplay, oil paints, or discovering the violin. It doesn't matter. Meaning Scales.
hallam foe blog
[Giles Nuttgens & David Mackenzie discussing a shot.]
A few months ago I wrote about my friend, Dave Mackenzie, and his upcoming movie, Hallam Foe. We even let people download the script and have a read.
Dave, as you might also remember, was also the director of Young Adam, the movie I kept yammering on about two or three years ago ["The best Scottish movie ever", which, I'm happy to report, I think still holds true today].
To make a long story short, the shooting of Hallam Foe has begun, and they've just started a movie blog, called "Get Your People".
[As in, "Get your people to call my people". Heh.]
David sadly is too busy on the shoot to write and manage the blog. Instead, he's recruited another friend of his, Colin Kennedy, to write it. Also, other people from the production cast are contributing. But it's really Colin's baby.
The good news is, Colin is actually a full-on member of the production crew already, not just a blogger-for-hire. He's also a filmmaker in his own right.
So the blog is now up, in rough form. The writing is coming along nicely, however the design still need to be done. But I thought I'd let you all have an early peek, anyway.
Get Your People is not the first major film blog [Right, Gia?]. That being said, I believe there's a lot of unexplored territory in the film-blog-as-marketing-device, still waiting to be discovered. So I'm interested in seeing what happens.
Very interested.
More importantly, David is an old and dear friend of mine, and I want this film to be sucessful. So I'll do what I can to help.
What sayest thou? Please let me know your thoughts. Thanks.
house for sale
[View of the kitchen etc.]
My friend, Dave Freedman, is a London-based TV producer. He also has a blog.
Usually he writes about TV production stuff. I guess it’s a good little blogospheric niche to have etc.
Recently his house in Sevenoaks went on the market. So instead of blogging about his usual TV production, he started writing about his house for sale.
I think that’s kind of cool. Selling a house via blog. Interesting commercial application etc etc.
So… anybody want to buy a house in Sevenoaks? Heh.
April 8, 2006
snow hunting...
Debbie and Lloyd wanted to build a snowman. But first they had to find some snow.
One of the main reasons I live in the UK. Love those crazy Brits.
[Bonus Link:] Lloyd does a wee video podcast interview of Yours Truly.
history lesson
50 Most-linked Blogs in September, 2000:
1. http://robotwisdom.com/ (44 links)Thanks to Blogebrity for the link.
2. http://kottke.org/ (42)
3. http://slashdot.org/ (40)
4. http://www.metafilter.com/ (39)
5. http://memepool.com/ (37)
6. http://obscurestore.com/ (35)
7. http://camworld.com/ (35)
8. http://www.misterpants.com/01/ (28)
9. http://www.evhead.com/ (27)
10. http://www.harrumph.com/ (26)
April 7, 2006
same people
[Inspired by Marc Canter's recent post etc. Click on image to enlarge/download/print etc.]
art 671
Click on image to enlarge etc. Yeah, feel free to print it out and hang it on your wall. Or whatever.
Observant readers of gapingvid will have noticed that the t-shirt banner is no longer on the sidebar.
Yep, I'm no longer selling t-shirts.
I think giving them out for free is more fun.
April 6, 2006
free wifi in sf
San Francisco Picks Companies for Wi-Fi.
San Francisco Chooses Google, EarthLink to Blanket City With Free Wireless Internet Service.Happiness is when you turn up to one of those "Future of Media" conferences, and the venue hosting the event wants to change one of the speakers $200 a day for wifi. Oh, the irony. [True story.]Google Inc.'s bid to blanket San Francisco with a free wireless Internet service cleared a major hurdle Wednesday when a city panel identified the search leader and EarthLink Inc. as the best candidates for the ambitious project.
The future is wifi. Any company, city, culture etc that gets too greedy about providing it, consigns itself to the dustbin of history.
fenderkicker is getting geekier...
Fenderkicker is getting geekier, as per the "Geek till you die" marketing strategy:
Arneson Surface Drives are designed to eliminate cavitation and any restrictions on the diameter of the propeller. Located aft of the transom, the shaft and propeller are supported by a series of hydraulic struts allowing the captain to lift or lower its location relative to the speed.Exactly.
April 5, 2006
when a-listers start losing the plot
[Bonus Link:] So perhaps Dave Winer nailed the future of media in two short sentences:
1. Aggregation can now be customized, and it can be done by machine.It's wierd talking about "the future of anything", when said future has already arrived.2. Bundling is not going to be a way to make a living in the future.
bill's tablet p.c.
Looks like Bill Gates has almost the same Tablet PC as me.
I have a Motion Computing M-1400. I'm guessing his is the newer Motion LE 1600... that's definitely a Motion keyboard/cover, to his immediate left.
Any Microsoft employees reading this know anything more concrete?
And check out the Channel 9 tschozke on his desk, too, just below the desktop monitor. I see Scoble's pretty pleased about that, as well.
on becoming more viral in the offline world...
Had an interesting conversation with Anu Gupta yesterday, all to do with how blogs make people more viral, even in the offline world.
Take HR, which is Anu's profession. I know very little about HR. What I know about HR could could probably be written on the back of a postcard.
So let's say I'm talking to some hotshot at a cocktail party, and he mentions he's looking to hire someone in HR.
As I know nothing about HR, nor do I know anyone in that profession very well, in the pre-blog world I would probably have just gone, "Sorry, can't help you", and quickly have changed the subject.
But with blogs I can tell the hotshot, "Well, there's this guy named Anu Gupta that works in HR. Don't know much about him. Met him once or twice before. Nice guy. Seems pretty bright. Here's his link. Maybe talk to him etc."
Suddenly a connection between the hotshot and Anu is made, without the bridge (i.e. me) having had to risk any of his (my) social capital, via making the recommendation.
In other words, the better your blog, the less qualified I have to be in order to recommend you. The easier and less socially risky it is for me to spread your story. Because all I have to do is give the guy your link, and hopefully your blog does the rest.
And if the same is true for everyone else who knows you, suddenly, like Anu, you've become a lot more viral.
Which surely is a good thing, right?
[Update: Roy says "it's how blogs work in the background." Well put.]
April 4, 2006
reboot 8
Looks like I'll be speaking at Reboot.
Thanks to Thomas Madsen-Mygdal, as always, for setting up the grooviest mashup in Europe, bar none.
Hoping to do a panel with myself, Rick, Doc, Scoble [if his boss lets him come], Preston and Jason.
Subject: The Global Microbrand.
Here's my schpiel: A lot of the blogosphere's big success stories seem to come mostly from the usual suspects: techies, internet developers, journalists, media folk and consultants.
I'm interested in how we get more success stories from other sources.
There's no one answer to this. But it's an ongoing conversation that utterly fascinates me.
How about you?
[Reboot 8: 1-2 June, 2006, Copenhagen.]
blogging 4 business
I'm currently at the Blogging 4 Business conference. Just got done speaking. Rock on.
fenderkicker update
So far I'm pretty pleased with how the Fenderkicker yacht blog is progressing.
I still think it needs to be geekier, as always. Like I've said before, the more geeked-out it is, the more yachts it will sell.
More photos. More geekery. Geek, and all the world will be yours. Geek, geek, and geek some more. Geek till you drop. Geek till you die.
Agreed?
"business as morality"
"Business as Morality".
There's an interesting e-mail exchange going on between Doc Searls and O'Reilly Media. Basically, what seperates Web 2.0 from Web 1.0 is morality, as Doc explains so eloquently here:
Worth a read. Worth a think.
I think some of what we see in Web 2.0 (a term I've never liked, much as I like Tim, who has done the most to promulgate it... I think it's what we'll call the current bubble and the next crash) is the morality of generosity. At eTech, I saw a preview of a browser-based Photoshop/Album organizing/print product front-end service. The biggest thing the creator wanted to show was how generous Flickr is. "Watch this," he said, before using Flickr's API to suck all 6000+ of my photos from Flickr into his product. All the metadata, all the tags and associations, were intact. His point: Flickr isn't a silo. Their closed and proprietary stuff doesn't extend, not is it used, to lock up customer or user data. It's wide open. Free-range. Most of all, however, it is a "good citizen". It is generous where it counts. Nurturing.
[Doc Searls' homepage is here.]
April 3, 2006
April 2, 2006
happiness is...
[BONUS LINK:] From The Sunday Times:
In search of lost manliness.Harvard professor Harvey Mansfield tells John-Paul Flintoff he is sticking out his jaw at the storm his views on maleness have caused.
[...]
It is not only women who have attacked his views on manliness. “Male reviewers behave with gallantry, speaking up for women,” Mansfield said. “It’s a paradox: they’re demonstrating manliness by attacking it.”
But he doesn’t mind. In fact, he positively welcomes the buffeting. And the harder the blows of his critics, the more manly he feels: “Manliness loves being embattled,” says the Byronic professor and washer-upper, “and alone against the world.”
praise, praise, praise the competition etc
This is my favorite English Cut post for a while.
Not only is a great story, full of local history and color, it does a superb job of pulling off what has become my favorite thing to do as a marketer:
i.e. Praising one's competition to the hilt:
If you fancy a new suit, he's one of the best. Hardcore old school.Of course, you can only do that when [A] your praise is sincere and [B] your own product is up to snuff. Otherwise you just sound obsequious.
Brian Staples: +44 (0) 207 734 5069.
[Bonus Link:] In The Observer:
"Britain has become a combination of a giant golf course and a giant call centre"This is a business that specialized in selling second-hand vintage Savile Row suits. Quite sad, really.George Cazenove, owner of the eccentric second hand clothing shop Bertie Wooster, regrets being forced out of business.
April 1, 2006
should amazon blog
[Inspired by Shel Israel's recent post.]
[UPDATE:] Werner Vogel blogs this cartoon. Thanks, Werner!
pandora
Neat:
Ever since we started the Music Genome Project, our friends would ask:I'm listening to Jimi Henrix on at the moment. Rock on.Can you help me discover more music that I'll like?
Those questions often evolved into great conversations. Each friend told us their favorite artists and songs, explored the music we suggested, gave us feedback, and we in turn made new suggestions. Everybody started joking that we were now their personal DJs.
We created Pandora so that we can have that same kind of conversation with you.
scoble's going to google
Robert Scoble just quit Microsoft.
[Update:] The Head Lemur joins Microsoft. Taking over Scoble's job?