Category: culture | 文明 | 미디어와 예술 | 人文

  • July 2024 newsletter

    July 2024 newsletter introduction Welcome to my July 2024 newsletter, this newsletter which marks my 12th issue. I hope the wettest part of the summer is behind me. This time last year, I didn’t set out to get to 12 issues. I thought I would try three and see where I got to. You’d think…

  • The ultimate driving machine + more things

    The ultimate driving machine Interesting interview with author Steve Saxty on how BMW as a modern car brand came into being as the ultimate driving machine and a discussion on what eventually became the 1-series. The brand value of it being the ultimate driving machine actually came from a review by US magazine Road &…

  • Zynternet + more things

    Zynternet is a portmanteau made up of Zyn and internet. If you’re reading this internet is self-explanatory, the Zyn in question is tabacco-free Skoal bandit type nicotine pouches. Zyn comes in a tin and has various flavours. According to journalist Max Read, the Zynternet is a kind of 90s to early 2000s sports obsessed ‘lad’…

  • Media virus by Douglas Rushkoff

    By the time Media Virus came out, Douglas Rushkoff was a public intellectual with the same kind of cultural impact of Simon Sinek back in the 1990s and early 2000s. I went back to read Media Virus for the first time in decades. The book design feels very dot com, with neon colour details a…

  • End of culture

    This post on the end of culture as inspired by a presentation. Pip Bingemann of Springboards.ai presented at Cannes in Cairns – a marketing festival for Australians who wouldn’t be able to go to the Cannes Festival of Advertising. Pip’s presentation touched with things I had seen about the end of culture and had some interesting…

  • IT director powers up + more stuff

    The IT director is seeing a return to power and its thanks to the power of hackers and AI. The smartphone, the resurgence of Apple and SaaS saw IT decisions become more organic thanks to increased access to online services that provided better features than traditional enterprise software companies and the rise of knowledge working.…

  • Shutting down

    Shutting down is a conscious choice. You might see it described as digital detox or a digital break. I, like a number of people that I know have a ‘dumb’ phone to complement my smartphone. This is different from the pre-broadband era of the internet where going online was an active decision punctuated by the…

  • Dove 20 years of real beauty

    I was privileged to freelance at Ogilvy on Dove a number of years ago and got to understand the brand a little better during that time. My work on Dove was focused on product advertising for Dove soap in Brazil, the US, Vietnam and the Philippines rather than adding to the master brand canon around…

  • Omakase and luxury futures

    Omakase and luxury seem made for each other. Think about the core elements of omakase: As a trend omakase has expanded geographically with Japanese cuisine. But it has also expanded in terms of categories covered. Koreans have taken omakase and pushed it into other areas: So how can omakase and luxury come together in the…