Ad Caulk

In China they use the word "Sifu"—it is a very special word indeed. Although it is always pronounced the same way its meaning differs depending on who is saying it.

The first spelling, 師傅, is the more generic, albeit weighty, use. It means 'master' and can apply to anyone who has mastered a trade. It is a sign of reverence for the time and energy someone has put into studying and working in a craft.

The second spelling, 師父, is far more personal. It holds the dual meaning of teacher and father. It represents the bond between a master and a student and transcends the first meaning. Even if someone sees your Sifu as a master of his trade this represents something deeper between the two of you.

This is also true in advertising.

There are masters: Bernbach, Lois, Hegarty, Abbott, Ogilvy, McCabe, Gossage, Wells, Burnett, Trott, Sullivan and a multitude of others, who represent the best of the trade. They leave behind information that enriches the generations after them. They are also generally revered by those starting out and practicing the trade. When we aspire we aspire to be like them—to do work that leaves an impact on culture and the industry.

Then there are the teachers. The people you strive to work for. The people who leave such an indelible mark on you that you cannot help but feel indebted to them.

One example of this I have seen recently is Eric Kallman (CW on Old Spice, now BFG9000) and Gerry Graf. According to Graf's blog Kallman has called him "boss" since they first worked together. Even when they weren't working together that was the term he used. I think there is a certain insecurity that all creatives have where they are looking for someone to help forge their path/ find a solid direction.

So thinking about who your Sifu may be, or who you want it to be, might be a good idea. You never know who will change the direction of your life.

I have been tremendously lucky to meet and work with the people I already have. Without them I wouldn't be nearly as motivated or eager to work towards something great every day. If any of you are reading this thank you very much.

You might want to sit down...

• Gordon Comstock revives his blog to give you his 10 best posts for 'New Blood'. (or any blood, really.)
• Don't want to bother with that pesky business of tracking down agencies? The Creative Ham has got you covered.*
• Preach! A compelling argument about why ad professionals should teach, from Makin' Ads' Jim Bosiljevac.
• Parallel posts about living vs LIVING from Dave Trott and George Tannenbaum. (not coordinated to my knowledge, correct me if I'm wrong.)
• John Allison's favorite writing over on the Sell! Sell! blog. Read the whole series if you have time.

Talkies!

The making baking of Skoda 'Cake'

Gold from BriTANick, "Everything."

A day in the life of Pixar's John Lasseter.

*but you should still be doing research on your own. They're missing a lot of agencies including a cool place in St. Louis a great little one in Chicago (but I ain't telling).

(posted this over on my google+ account but thought I would expand on it here)

A friend of mine said something very interesting last weekend. We had been hanging out all day and had received relatively poor service from every person we encountered. Walgreens, bad service. Lunch, bad service. Movie theater, bad service.

Unlike retailers we don't have products that hold up even if our staff don't. If we slack off it is reflected in the product. If we don't pull our own weight people will take notice. And if we chose to ignore our customers we're out of a job.

Our biggest assets are our minds. If you don't have one of those I advise you to find one: quickly.

So I lied about the Burrito, OK. But there's a ton of links this week since moving into an apartment got in the way of posting last week. Enjoy the linkage!

• Gerry Graf has a blog. You will read it. You will enjoy it. It's rather wonderful. via
• Google+ has been CONSUMING my life lately. Luckily Angela Natividad broke it down from a marketing perspective (and I left a comment).
• Very, very good inspiration from a Pixar animator. Letters of Note: Persist. (Can't remember who tweeted this. Sorry)
• "A Brief History of How You Stopped Being Human" from, arguably, the smartest man on the internet Ben Kunz.
• Is the end of conflict killing advertising? Let's at least keep and open mind about it.
• Myth, Too Many Project Managers, What Advertising Can Do, Irrelevance and One Word from George Tannenbaum. (if you're not reading his entire blog by now you're making a mistake)
• Do It Then Fix It + How To Respond To Being Screwed from the venerable Dave Trott.
• Seth Godin taking you to task for "Willful Ignorance."

*deep breath* And one two wonderful videos. (Stumbled across the second as I was writing the post)

The Cosmos: The Mind (autotune edition)

A Blast From the Past

*No, Taco Bell did not pay me but that commercial is on TV every 10 seconds and is stuck in my head.

I was browsing through my RSS feed and saw a post from AdPulp about this commercial for Sobe.

After watching it, actually about 10 second into watching it, I am reminded of a quote from fictional CD Don Draper.

Peggy: Sex Sells.

Don:Says who? Just so you know, the people who talk that way think that monkeys can do this. They take all this monkey crap and stick it in a briefcase, completely unaware that their success depends on something more than shoeshine.

It saddens me because although that is a commercial - a commerical that dudes will refer to the one, you know, with the hot chick and stuff - it's not really an advertisement at all. There is no substance, no idea other than "hot chick flirting to camera." I would like to think we as an industry can do better or quite frankly we deserve to wither away slowly and painfully.

This could just as easily be an ad for haircare products, bikinis, Vegas, a new reality show, pool furniture, cell phones, ray bans and a myriad of other products. This commercial is arrogant to think that it can waste a minute and a half of someone's time on something very akin to a late night 800-number commercial.

Sorry if this comes off a little cross but this is the kind of work that infuriates me. Also sad is that this comes from a shop whose work I generally enjoy. A shop that I actually admire. But it's work that says we are phoning it in because, well, why not?  

If that's something you find yourself nodding in agreement with kindly get out of this business. It doesn't need any more of this.

Also: I hopped over to the youtube page to look at the comments. If we are in the conversation business this video has some gems. Wouldn't it feel good for someone to say that the subject of your ad isn't made for commercials but rather "anal poundings"? Sounds lovely to me.

"As I stood in front of these creative students i could see fear on their faces. was their chosen career about to disappear before they'd even graduated? I assured these students that, far from disappearing, this was the most exciting time to be in advertising. || Yes, of course we were being confronted by enormous change. Yes, the digital revolution was changing the way we worked. Yes, many companies would disappear, but many new companies would also be created. The world wasn't going to be less branded. If anything, it was going to be more so."

There are a lot of people out there who say that advertising is dying. That it isn't fun anymore. That it ain't quite what it used to be. Some of these things may be true, most are over-exaggeration.  

There is another group who asserts that this is the most exciting time to be in advertising. That every new opportunity is the greatest opportunity there ever was. These too may be over-exaggeration but it is the side I prefer to fall on. If you look at some of the work that won Grand Prix at this year's Cannes festival, things like Tesco/Home Plus and Pay With a Tweet, it's not hard to see the potential that new ideas bring to the field.

It may not look like the advertising that we used to have. But it's rooted in the same quest for new ideas and new ways to help people, by buying our products of course.

Recently a friend and I took the Redline train to our destination north of downtown Chicago. We descended down into the subway system and were hit with a horrendous smell. (Those familiar with Chicago's Redline may not find this surprising as it also smells a bit off but this day it was nearly unbearable)

It smelled like a combination of sweat, body odor and rotting fish. Watching people walk into the station was like watching them walk into a sliding glass door. They stopped somewhere around the 3rd to last step after suddenly having their olfactory sense assaulted. Faces scrunthced up. People looked around nervously to make sure it wasn't a figment of their imagination.

All in all it was quite funny.

As we waited for the train the smell started to become less and less noticeable. It went from cripplingly bad, to mildly opressive, to bearable. By the time the train got there, 15 minutes later mind you, we could hardly notice the stench at all.

That may seem odd but this is actually a phenomenon they teach in Psychology. It is called Neural Adaptation or Sensory Fatigue. What happens is your body stops noticing old stimuli in order to stay aware of new, potentially dangerous, stimuli. It's pretty remarkable that our brains do this for us.

Turns out science is pretty cool after all.

But a form of this can also happen in different parts of our lives. There are different terms for it but my favorite is 'burnt out'. For a few weeks I got pretty burnt out of everything that had consumed my life for close to two years. Burnt out on blogs. Burnt out on books about advertising. Burnt out on magazines. Even burnt out on Twitter. I was caught in the sea of same.

The horror!

I had become myopic. It seemed like I was encountering same thing over and over. The same post, the same idea, the same sentance. Repeated ad nasuem until these things became a chore to read or encounter. I would sigh every time I checked my RSS feed - a far cry from a year ago when I couldn't add enough sources.

So I took a step away from that stuff. Marked hundreds of blog posts as read without reading them. Went to book stores and bought a bunch of books that have to do with everything except advertising. Watched a bunch of movies and TV shows. Listened to a ton of new music.

I only took a few days off from that stuff completely but it brought back the freshness. Things still aren't quite as interesting as they once were but I have found a decent amount of new stuff to obsess over - like John Hegarty's new book. It also let me realize that maybe I don't need to read every single thing that comes my way.

If you feel yourself getting burnt out take a few steps back and explore something new for a while. That's the surest way to make sure truly insteresting ideas don't slip by unnoticed.

While senior ad folks were drinking their weight in Rose on the beaches of Cannes I stayed behind and scoured the internet for interesting things. You can thank me later.

• "The Expected is Easy" and "Making a Killing" from G.T.
• "The Chairman's Wife In Hot Pants" and "Stupid in, Stupid Out" from Dave Trott
• A great interview with Tony Bradbourne of NZ's Special. From Junior.
• Some beautiful work from the Young Director Awards Winners.

Parking is going to the dogs. (via) Reminds me of the old Xerox commercial showing that it's so easy to copy something a monkey could do it.

I feel like I've been incepted. Everything is a remix, including this video!

Bob Garfield gets real about ads and his inspiration to become a *gasp* Ad Critic.

He wheeled in the large garbage can and looked around.

Him: "Nobody else working these days?"

Me: "They're in France for the week."

Him: "Why the hell are they there?"

Me: "Festival, awards."

Him: "Good for them. But it sounds more like 'Hangover 3: France' to me."

He shrugged and walked out.

"What if we told people to go buy the product in the store instead of "liking" us on facebook?"

Collective rapturous laughter.

And they say a part of us died that day.